THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, MARCH 15, 1921. A RAILWAY TO TAUPO.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LVIII, Issue 17730, 15 March 1921, Page 4

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. TUESDAY, MARCH 15, 1921. A RAILWAY TO TAUPO.

The Royal Commission which has been investigating the railway needs of the centre of the North Island has reported against the purchase by the State of the Taupo Totara Timber Company's tramway, and has strongly recommended the construction of a Government railway between Rotorua and Taupo. The first conclusion must have. bee~j anticipated by those who read the evidence placed before the commission. The opinion of railway experts was so unfavourable that, assuming their competence, the commission must have offered novel and very strong reasons for dissenting from it. The commission estimates the cost of converting the tramway into a standard secondary line at about £600,000. This figure has apparently been taken from the evidence of Mr. F. W. McLean, chief engineer of railways, who placed the cost of a secondary standard line to Oruanui at £543,000, and to Taupo at about £900,000, or, allowing for additional rolling stock, at nearly £1,000,000 in all. Both Mr. McLean and Mr. McVilly. General Manager of Railways, were of opinion that, after compensating the company and spending a million pounds in reconstructing the line the State would have on its hands a railway which could not be made to pay on the standard schedule of fares and freights. The only possible inference from such evidence is that as the nucleus of a State railway the existing tramway is of little value, and the commission therefore felt itself free to consider another and more promising project for giving access to the central pumice plateau. The report should not be read as a sentence upon the existing tramway, which has served a useful purpose in opening up a district labouring under an extraordinary degree of isolation. To some extent the tramway has proved a public utility, but probably uncertainty as to its future has prevented it serving the district to the full limits of its usefulness. That uncertainty is now removed, as far as Government intervention is concerned. The commission has made certain recommendations to the company which it may or may not adopt, but whatever decisions may be reached the public will expect the company to meet the interests of the district wherever it can do so without detriment to itself. The abandonment of the line is a contingency which it is hardly necessary to contemplate if the settlers and the company are willing to co-operate in the development of a district which is full of potential wealth and which knows no other outlet. It is proof of the strength of the case for a Rotorua-Taupo railway that a commission set up primarily to investigate a rival scheme should have ended by rejecting that scheme and recommending an extension of the Rotorua line. This recommendation rests principally upon the necessity of a railway for the economical working of the State plantations south of Rotorua. The argument is not the strongest that could be advanced for such a line, but it is probably the one which will weigh most with a Government which ! seeks an immediate return upon its i railway capital. Tree planting has j been undertaken at Waiotapu upon a gigantic scale. Some aspects of j the enterprise are open to criticism j because the same expenditure on forest regeneration would have yielded better results. The fact remains, however, that in this district there are vast and well-established • forests of exotic trees which in a comparatively few years will yield two-thirds of the production of all ( the mills in New Zealand to-day. In the meantime, about 29,000,000 young trees must be thinned out and their carriage will go far to assure the finance of the railway in the - earlier years of its operation. Another immediate source of revenue will be the tourist traffic. All New Zealanders who know their country realise that the Government railways carry the tourist to only • the first link in a chain of scenic ] wonders, which are surpassed no--7 where in the world- Between Rotoj rua and the National Park there lies an unparalleled variety of thermal, f lake, river, forest, and alpine . scenery, which is little known to the . outside world because of its inaccessibility. A railway to Taupo - would place the traveller in the very heart of this scenery, and the con- \ struction of roads through and to 1 the National Park would encourage e him to traverse the chain to its last } unsurpassed link. * But the special recommendation I of the Taupo railway is its settlei ment value. It is pleasant to have the potentialities of the pumice , country, so often and for so many . years advanced in these columns, again recognised by a disinterested * eominission. It i& still more plea-

Eant to contemplate the vast areas of this promising land which would be tapped by a short railway of easy construction, and to realise that the increment in values would to an unusually large degree benefit the State. Not only does the Government possess important timber interests in this district, but it owns 700,000 acres of land between Rotorua and Taupo, and timely purchase of native land would increase this acreage to at least a million. Not only would a Rotorua southwards railway give communication to the soldier settlements already established, but it would carry a tide of settlement into the broad, empty valleys of the Upper Waikato and the Waiotapu which belong so largely to the State. Nor would settlement exhaust itself within these boundaries. It would roll onwards and outwards to Galatea and the Urewera, to Runanga, Taharua, into the Hawke's Bay Province, and round the shores of Lake Taupo, whose waters would provide a costless extension of communication to all the land within reach of the hundred miles circumference of the lake. In this aloof, but not distant, heart of the North Island lies one-twentieth of all the cultivable and habitable land of New Zealand. The construction of 50 miles of railway would not serve the whole area, but it would at least bring millions of acres within the range of settlement, more especially as roads are easy of construction in this great plain. The commission has shown sound judgment in recommending the Rotorua - Taupo railway and laying emphasis on the time factor. Unfortunately, the Dominion has prior railway commitments, and Mr. Coates will have a somewhat delicate task in deciding what place this proposal should have on his programme. In determining its precedence he should not overlook the low cost of the undertaking and the settlers' offer of a subsidy of £100,000, which is evidence not only of their good faith but of their confidence in a district which is as vast as it is unique, and as full of potential wealth as it is empty of settlement.