THE QUAY STREET RAILWAY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXI, Issue 18772, 28 July 1924, Page 5

THE QUAY STREET RAILWAY.

Sir,-—The whole aim of , the Marino Boroughs' Association, in connection with the Quay Street railway, has been to {irevent Quay Street being added to the ist of dangerous railway crossings in the city. When the Prince' 3 Wharf project was first mooted, the Railway Department warned the Harbour Board that they would never take the responsibility of connecting it with the railway system. In spite of this warning the board went on with the work, and thfi' responsibility has therefore been thrown upon the board to carry out this railway itself. It is quite evident to anyone wftio has given tne matter any consideration, that if the Harbour Board runs tho railway it will collect a special freight charge levied on all produce inward and outward, to ships lying at the Prince's Wharf, a service which is now given by tho Railway Department free, should the loading vessel be lying at either the Queen's or the King's Whapes. The City Council has agreod to £rant a five years' private .license, all it could grant to the board, in consideration of the Harbour Board handing over to tha City Council the viable endowment known as Gladstone Buildings, valued at not less than £35,000, for the paltry sum of £9049- II this is not a bribe to get a tramway license, then it would be interesting to know what you would call it. The remarkable thing about the whole negotiation is, that whereas the City Council has no power to build or run a public tramway in its own streets without the authority of the Public Works Department, it thinks it can take the power to grant permission to the Auckland Harbour Board to run a. tramway through Quay Street. The plain fact is that the council has no such power, and the Harbour Board will yet wake up to the fact that it his parted with a valuable endowment property belonging, not only to tho city, but to the North Shore people, and the country rating area of the board, for a license that is not worth the paper it is written Upon., This license is merely a private license, which any authority can grant tc a private person, or private company, to use a street such as was recently issued to the Auckland Gas Company. It is totally a different matter for a public bedy building a public railway along a public street to carry tho produce of the pubjic and for which they shall charge a freight. The Harbour Board will still have to apply for permission (0 the Public Works Department to run their iailway, but before doing this they must show their hand by stating what safeguards they intend to make for the pedestrian traffic, and the freight they intend to charge the farming community for tie carriage of their produce. I will go so far- as to say that the sole reason 'or evading these two important points is what lead to the useless negotiations between the board arid the City Council, and the inserting of clause 9 in lithe City Councils Empowering Bill* a clause which unfortunately may bring about the defeat of the whole bill in Parliament. This no one wishes to see; and the sooner the coMncil and the board realise that the HSuse ib not so easily hoodwinked, the better it will be for all concerned. Tt is most regrettable fo see so much bickering between bodies such as the Marine Boroughs' Association, tho Auckland City Council, and the Harbour Board, and as lihese. two bodies know very well that iihe Public Works Act, of 1908, provides the necessary machinery for the Harbour Board to hand over Gladstone Buildings at a propc-r valuation, and also provides the necessary machinery to enable the board to lay their rails and run their trains through Quay Street under certain conditions, why the necessity of endangering an important city bill embodying as it does the necessary machinery for the granting ti a site for the Auckland war memorial for fallen soldiers, which everyone wishes to seo carried to completion by the introduction of clause 9, which hus doubtless been put in for tha purpose of side-tracking the Public Wofks Act. J.. fiiaii©*s • ** . 1 s '' "* t .