COASTAL AND INTERCOLONIAL STEAM SERVICE.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1315, 13 May 1897, Page 43

COASTAL AND INTERCOLONIAL STEAM SERVICE.

•PARTICULARS OF THE IMPROVEMENTS. For the past year or more the Union , Company have been considering and arranging various improvements in connection with the different services on the -coast and between New Zealand and Australia. Last year we particulars of various new steamers that the Company intended building, and the following details in connection with the coastal and intercolonial service will no d«ubt also be , read with interest: — The Moana, the new ship for the San Francisco service, is due in Sydney on the Queen’s Birthday, and will take up the San Francisco running thence on June 6th. She will relieve the Monowai, which will at ■once be placed in the service from Sydney to Wellington, proceeding thence via Lyttelton, Dunedin and Bluff to Melbourne, returning ths same way. The Monowai, which is a well-known and popular ship, is capable of maintaining 13 to 14 knots in the intercolonial service. She has a high reputation as a comfortable passenger ship, and is considerably larger than the Mararoa. -The new ship which is being specially built for the intercolonial trade and which will be named the Waikare —is about the same tonnage as the Mararoa. She will steam 14 knots. She is to leave the Clyde on May 31st, and will arrive in New Zealand towards the end of July. When the Monowai and Waikare take their places in the intercolonial trade along with the Mararoa and the present ships, the public will not have much reason to complain. The Company has arranged also to effect considerable improvements in the coastal service next year. The Eotomahana during the summer months will take up : the Penguin’s work between Lyttelton and Wellington, and a new steamer is being built to replace the Mahinapua. This vessel, as already -mentioned, will be called the Rotoiti. She will be of the same dimensions as the Takapuna, but of lighter draught,and will be propelled by twin screws. She is to have large passenger accommodation, and will be completely equipped in all respects, having a refrigerator for ship’s stores, improved electric light installation, &c. Owing to her light draught she will be able to leave Onehunga and New Plymouth at low tide in the same way as the Mahinapua.

In other respects the Company are contemplating improvements in their present plant. They are importing appliances to •equip all their coastal passenger steamers •with electric light. The steamers to be so equipped are the Te Anau, Wainui, Richmond, Flora, Mawhera, and the Island steamers Ovalau and Dpolu. It is intended also to make some alterations in the Takapuna, with a view to increasing and improving her passenger accommodation.-- The rooms in the forward part of the ship below the deck are to be removed, and the saloon extended, while a number of additional rooms are to be erected on deck, both forward and aft of the present deck accommodation. The vvessel’s > baths,. lavatories and other conveniences are to be modernised, as, in- . deed, are those in several of the other .steamers. The Waihi, which has been withdrawn from the Blenheim trade, will be sent to ■ Gisborne to replace the Snark as a tender •to the steamers calling there —an improve-, ment that will be much, appreciated by ipassengera and the Gisborne people. The Moana is being brought out by -Captain Sinclair. On arrival at Sydney, he will exchange with Captain Carey, the I popular captain of ,the Monowai, and Captain Sinclair will command the Monowai in the Ndw Zealand trade. Mr Mills, managing director of the Com- , pany, left for Melbourne in the Talune, . and will meet the Moana in Sydney, where her arrival will be.celebr'ated by a banquet. Mr Lambie, branch manager at Christchurch, passed through Wellington the . other day on a holiday trip to Australia.