EAST COAST RAILWAY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVII, Issue 17652, 13 December 1920, Page 6

EAST COAST RAILWAY.

HAWKE'S BAY DISTRICT. NAPIER TO WAIROA. f * No. 11. [BY our special commissioner.] A few weeks ago, at the invitation of the East Coast Railway and Development League, I visited Hawke's Bay for the purpose of examining the country on the route of the East Coast railway from Napier northward. This particular league is a very powerful combination, and includes representatives of all the county councils, borough councils, chambers of commerce, road boards, harbour boards, between Gisborne and Woodville, as well as representatives of the various industries, manufacturing interests, and even of the labour uiuons. The pity of it is that such a league was not in existence 50 years ago, for if such had been the case, Hawke's Bay would not have been in its present condition regarding roads and railways. Southerners are apt to complain about the parochialism of the North islanders, but such a complaint conies with very bad grace from those who, having instituted a parochial system of establishing railways and public works in the past, now protest against such works being constructed on a national basis. In travelling through the Hawke's Bay Province recently, I could not help comparing its conditions with other districts I know. From Woodville to Napier there is a length of 97 miles of railway gunning through magnificent country, and 'connecting it with the Wellington railway system. One hundred and fifty miles further north there is another length of railway—from Gisborne to Motuhora —49 miles in length, isolated hopelessly from the national system. This total of 146 miles, in two widely-separated sections, is the only railway possessed by Hawke's Bay, and one is naturally inclined to ask why this fine province, which has an area of 5,508,900 acres of fertile land, which exports £6,166,511 worth of products from its • two shipping centres, Napier and Gisborne, and which has a capital value in its counties and boroughs of £51,230,266, on which revenue and taxation is paid should have only 146 miles of railway, whilst Southland province, which does not contain so much good land, which exports less than one-half of the amount, of products and provides a good deal less in trie way of taxation and revenue, should possess over 400 miles of railways all linked up with the main system of the South Island. Why, again, should that portion of the west coast of the South Island between Ross and Nelson have 266 miles of railway, while the east coast of the North Island between Cape Turnagain and Cape Runaway has only 146 miles. Railways, Eoads and Power.

I met in Napier quite a number of members of the East Coast Railway and Development League. They included some of the leading men in the town and in the province, and they are all determined that their district shall receive greater attention in the future than in the past. They are interested in three important subjects —the extension of the railway northwards to eventually link them with Gisborne and Auckland, the construction of a main road to open up the, 150 odd miles between Napier and Gisborne, and in the development of the hydro-electric scheme at Waikaremoana. I should also add to this list the completion of their inner harbour, which to them is of very great importance. Although^Napier has made remarkable growth during recent years and to-day is one of the most prosperous towns in the Dominion, there can be no doubt that it would have expanded at a much greater rate if it had possessed railway and roacJ communication with the northern part of the province. The East Coast railway northwards of •Napier is represented by a section of about 16 miles of earthworks, principally in the Esk Valley. For the first few •miles the earthworks cross the esfcuarial fiattj near the cpast, but after leaving the Esk Valley they enter a region of,'papa hills, -excellent • pastoral country, but cat by innumerable deep gu4lie3 and steep spurs, which will make railway building expensive. It will be a matter of cuttings and fillings for nearly 80 miles, and the soft and treacherous nature of the rock wi;ll add, to the difficulties qjt construction and * maintenance. There will also be required several bridges and viaducts, one of the latter, over the Mohaka, it is said, will be nearly twice as high as the highest en the Main Trunk line. This portion of the East Coast railway will not be easy to make by the ''onghandled shovel and wheelbarrow method so common in New Zealand, but the use of mechanical navvies and excavators .will modify present estimates considerably. I saw the steam-shovel at work on theEskdale section of the railway, and Mr. Thompson, the engineer in charge, as sured me that it was wonderfully effective, Tjut no one could see it in oneration without being impressed by it. " The man working the machine J watched must have been a master hand. He could by touching; his fevers swing the scoop into the face, pick up nearly a ton' of earth and drop it into a truck nearly as quickly as a man .would fill a« ordinary shovel and throw into a barrow. Up at Waikaremoana there are thousands and tens of thousands of horsepower, some of it to be utilised quite soon. The transmission lines for the big hydro-electric development scheme will roughly follow the route of the East Coast railway. With abundant cheap power at their command and modern machinery, the engineers can revolutionise railway and road construction.

Through Pastoral Country. I journeyed overland from Napier to ■yVairoa over a road that was just recovering from winter ruts and mud. The distance between $e two places is about 80 miles, and there are over 8000 bumps and jolts to the mile. There is not a main road as bad as this in the whole of the South Island, and I can quite enter into the feelings of a local resident who declared that until this road was metalled, or a railway made, not a single shilling should be expended on public works in the South. , With the exception of a stretch of arable pumice land which should come in well for the growing of root crops, the country is all pastoral, the formation being papa and recent limestones. From the edge of the sea to the distant Ruahine and Kaimanawa Kanges the district seems to be in grass, and grass will be its main crop as long as grass will last. It is all more or less cne and a-half to two-sheep-to-the-acre country, and is principally held in large areas, although recently there has been a certain amount of subdivision for soldier settlers. I suppose that the minimum areas under what would be called close settlement would be from 500 to 1000 acres, so that this portion of Hawke's Bay will never bo densely populated. *It will, however, continue to produce a very large amount of wealth in the shape of wool, mutton, and cattle, and there is little doubt that a general subdivision of, th*> large estates, in conjunction with the creation of roads and' railway, would increase both population and production. Few people realise what a great extent of country lies to the westward of this East Coast railway route. A little to the northward of Napier one could travel, say, in an aeroplane, for over 80 miles and not sea a metalled road or a railway; irom Gisborne it is, nearly 150 miles as the crow .flies to the Main Trunk -line, and nearly ail 'the intervening countrv is unsettled and undeveloped,; from the East Cape to the Main Trunk it is about 200 miles, and the great bulk of the land is still untouched by the hand of man. The section of the "East Coast railway from Napier to Wairoa will not be of easy construction, but everv chain of it will go through land already producing fieight and freight will drain to it from a very extensive back countrv, and the Eart Coast railway does not depend for success off particular sections. It is an arterial line, linking province to province and town to - * l ?— WeUingten with Napier, Napier with Gisborne, Gisborne with the Bav of Plenty towns and Auckland *