THE The New Zealand Herald. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 1921. THE EAST COAST TOUR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVIII, Issue 17708, 17 February 1921, Page 6

THE The New Zealand Herald. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 1921. THE EAST COAST TOUR.

The Parliamentary tour of the route of the East Coast Railway is a happy conception. North Auckland gained much in prestige by the organisation of a similar tour several years ago, and it would be altogether to the good of the Dominion if other districts with a strong claim for development were to invite inspection by members of Parliament. No doubt Auckland members would be pleased to visit Canterbury in return for the courtesy which some, but, unfortunately, not very many, Southern representatives have shown in joining the present tour. It is futile to expect unanimity on public works policy, but many of the controversies which feed on ignorance are both harmful and avoidable. One result of the investigations which members are now making must be to broaden the sympathy of Parliament with the legitimate claims of the East Coast districts, and these claims are so strong that it is not too much to hope that they will move those making a first acquaintance with them to enthusiasm. The Leader of the Opposition, a Wellington representative, visited the East Coast recently and professed himself a convert to the coastal railway project. The district is so fertile, so vast, and so undeveloped that it will be surprising if all the Southern members do not share Mr. Wilford's conversion. They have already seen something of the pumice country which forms so large a part of the interior of the North Island, and witnessed evidence of its productivity under intelligent cultivation. Before they return home they will traverse portion of the seven million acres of fertile land which the railway will serve; they will gain personal knowledge of the famous Whakatane Valley and the Rangitaiki Plain; they will glimpse the Urewera Country, the last terra incognita of New Zealand, and the East Cape country, and they will learn in their travels of the isolation of Poverty Bay and portion of Hawke's Bay. To Southern members accustomed to electorates threaded by roads and cobwebbed with rbilways, it may come as something of a shock to find that such important centres of population as Napier and Gisborne are connected by neither railway nor road. If so, they may assure themselves that this poverty of communication is not confined to the East Coast, but is paralleled in many parts of the North Island.

The circumstance that the twelfth anniversary of the inauguration of the North Island Main Trunk service fell this week has some bearing upon the present economic situation on the East Coast. The Main Trunk, like the East Coast, was a very important railway project which proceeded at a leisurely pace for many years. By 1905 over a million and ahalf had been sunk in the section between Marton and Te Awamutu, and this large sum waa not earning interest because the line was not finished. The two largest cities of the Dominion still lacked direct communication with one another, and settlement awaited the meeting of the railheads. The circumstances were in many respects similar to those obtainirig on the East Coast to-day, and they were met by a policy of concentration. The annual appropriation for the Main Trunk was increased from £150,000 to £300,000, and early in 1909 trains were running between Wellington and Auckland, and the whole of the capital invested in the railway was earning interest. The success of the policy of concentration between 1905 and 1909 should encourage the Government to repeat it on the East Coast now. The opening of the Main Trunk Bailway has been the most important factor in the progress of the North Island during the past decade. It has stimulated settlement, increased production, and added directly and indirectly to the wealth of the Dominion. The opening of the East Coast Railway would yield the same results. Mr. Coates' policy is to concentrate upon the East Coast as one of three national works whenever he has finished certain branches, but the value of this policy obviously depends upon the speed with which he discharges his preliminary tasks. The Prime Minister's hint of the curtailment of public works is therefore most untimely, and will, if realised, go far to destroy the prospect of a reformed public works policy which Mr. Coates raised so hopefully a few months ago. The parallel between the condition of the Main Trunk Railway in 1905 and that of the East Coast Railway to-day appears all the closer if the large amount of capital lying idle or only partially productive be considered. The various portions of the East Coast system may be thus enumerated, those which have no connection with the main railways of the Dominion being marked with an asterisk :—■

Completed Coat. _ _ ~ . miles. £ Paeroa-Wsihi ■.. 13 143.438 W aim-Tauranga, .. None 42 264 *Tauransa-Matata .. 40 852.'761 •Motu-Gisborne . . 49 626'.649 •Gisborne southwards 30 178)279 •Wairoa northwards. . None 1^640 Napier northwards . . None 52,048

Totals . . . . 132 £1,397.074 This table shows that only 13 miles of the whole system, those between Paeroa and Waihi, constructed at a cost of £143,438, are an integral part of the railways of the North Island, and are therefore fully revenueproducing. Sixty-two miles, built at a cost of £770,087, are operated by the Railways Department, and the remaining fragments of the system, built at a cost of £626,987, are idle altogether or carry only ser-

vices provided by the Public Works Department. of economy clearly call for the consolidation of the piecemeal construction already undertaken, and particularly for the closing of the WaihiTauranga gap which separates from the North Island system the 40 miles of railway already completed between Tauranga and Matata. The present tour will not have been undertaken in vain if it emphasises the folly of paltering with so great a development work as the East Coast Railway, and puts the line in its true perspective as the most urgent and promising in the Dominion.