TRAMS TO EDENDALE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18355, 22 March 1923, Page 6

TRAMS TO EDENDALE.

BRIDGE LOAN CARRIED. DECISIVE MAJORITY. THE EXTENSION ASSURED*;

By a decisive majority tins ratepayers of Mount Albert at a poll 'taken yesterday, authorised the Borough Council to raise a loan of £11,000 for the construe tion of an overbridge to span the railway line at Kingsland. The tramway extension along the Edendale Road was involved in the result of the poll, the City Council having made the erection of the' bridge in question a condition of the extension. The voting on the loan proposal was as follows:— For 1341 • Against . , . . . . 100 Majority in favour . . 1241 The total number of ratepayers on the roll is 5166, of whom 1441 went to the poll. A feature of the voting wa3 the interest shown at the Edendale polling place, where 738 votes in favour of the proposal were cast, as against 18 in topposion. Mr. H. Utting, town clerk of Mount Albert, was returning officer. When the result of the poll was made known, the Mayor of the borough. Mr. A. F. Bennett, expressed himself as being highly pleased.

CONSTRUCTION OF TEAMWAY.

AN .EARLY START POSSIBLE. Commenting on the decisive vote cast bv the Mount Albert ratepayers in favour of the loan proposal, the Mayor of Auckland, Mr. J. H. Gunson, stated last even-' ing that it would no doubt enable the Mount Albert Council to accept the terms of the city municipality for the proposed Edendale tramway extension. The tramway extension on the Great South Road, said Mr. Gunson, was well ahead of schedule time, and this would, enable the City Council to make an early • commencement on the Edendale line. The ■■•• finances had been arranged, the money having been authorised, and would therefore be available when required. The Edendale extension would serve a very thickly populated district which had been given preference by the management of , the tramways and adopted by the City Council on its merits. Mr. Gunson said there were other extensions claiming consideration, but the programme in hand, together with the urgent duplications of single lines, would fully absorb the City Council's resources, for the next two years. There was a limit to the extent of new work possible at one time, both from the standpoint of capital account and from the effect of so much non-producing work on current account, from which interest had to be-p paid. The city corporation could fully meet all its present commitments and was in a position to promise, subject to the financial authority of the ratepayers, a continuance of its progressive policy of improving and extending the tramway : system. There should be no question about this because it provided its win finance. The Great South Road and Edendal* '& extensions should do a very great deal to take a large population out. to cheaper ; V building land than was available in the | city and near suburbs, added the Mayo/. ; The Mount Albert ratepayers* authorisa- > tion of the loan for the new bridge in-.'.';.-dicated that the extension to Edendile;' was favoured, and was a final endorse- A ment of the City Council's policy of de- W; veloping the system.