EAST COAST LINE

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19365, 1 July 1937, Page 4

EAST COAST LINE

PROGRESS SYMBOLISED RAIL CARS FOR SERVICE MJNISTER’S UNDERTAK ENG NIGHT AND DAY SCHEDULE (Special to the Ileraid.) WAIROA, this day. Spoken of by the Minister of Railways, the Hon. D. G. Sullivan, as a symbol of the progress shown throughout New Zealand in the past year or two particularly, the handsome rail car Arai te Uru, which conveyed members of the Cabinet and a large party of officials and Hawke’s Bay residents to Mohaka for yesterday’s ceremony at the new viaduct, gave the settlers of the Wairoa district a foretaste of the type of service which will be conducted when the Railways Department has fully developed its plans for the East Coast Main Trunk line. The, Minister informed the large gathering on the banks of the Mohaka River that when the service was fully developed, Wairoa would be within 31 hours’ rail travel of Napier, and 111 hours from Wellington. ' The running time between Wellington and Gisborne would be 13 hours, and day and night schedules would be conducted on the whole route.

The speed of travel, he assured the settlers, would rival that maintained on the Wellington-Auckland Main Trunk line.

He was particularly pleased to see so many children present at the ceremony, said Mr. Sullivan, for to see the job with their own eyes would help them to realise how great a thing had been done here by men of their own country, and in their own time. They would also appreciate, he thought, the first sight of a rail car, which he held as indicative of the new spirit of progress abroad in the country. To the Railways Department, the rail car represented the same determination to throw off the chains of the past. ' Fastest Thing on Rails Mr. Semple, in the Public Works Department, had shown by his decision to mechanise the public works jobs as far as possible that he wanted to use the machine to save time and money. On the viaduct job, mechanisation had completed the department s task below the estimated cost, and at a considerable saving of time. So, too the rail car which he (the Minister’of Railways) had had the privilege of just driving over the Mohaka viaduct was characteristic of the spirit of the Railways Department. “It is the fastest thing on rails in New Zealand, and, in fact, the fastest form of transport we have in this country—except, of course, air transport. It can travel at 50, 60, and 70 miles per hour, and the comfort and convenience of the passengers has been studied in every way. We are hoping to put one of these rail cars in service on this line. (Applause.) “The boys and girls here to-day are seeing the results of a great achievement. They are to have the advantage of living in an age when the rail car and the aeroplane will be taken as a matter of course; they will have wonderful and glorious opportunities denied to their parents in their former isolation.” Tentative Schedules Drawn Up The service contemplated by the Railways Department for the East Coast line had been prepared for discussion with the people whom the line was to serve, continued Mr. Sullivan. The aim was to evolve schedules which \Vould be most useful to the people of this district. In a short time the work whicli Mr. Semple’s department had constructed would pass into his hands for administration under the Railways Department, and consultation with the people to be served would determine the form of service to be given. A tentative schedule for a temporary service pending the completion of the line to Gisborne, and rail cars became available in greater numbers, was ready for submission to the people interested, Mr. Sullivan stated. It was proposed to run a service that would bring Wairoa within ID hours of Wellington, and when Gisborne was brought into the scheme the total running time from Gisborne to Wellington would be 13 hours. Wairoa would be 3£ hours by rail from Napier. There would be daily goods trains on the line, while the passenger service from Wairoa would enable people to visit Napier for several hours and return the same day. Night trains from Wellington to Gisborne would have combined day coaches and sleeping cars, said Mr. Sullivan, for the Railway Department was not going to fall down on its job of giving service to the people. Railways and Balance Sheets “We don’t know whether the line will pay at the start,” continued the Minister. “Some people in New Zealand think that railways should pay their way and balance the ledgers, and if possible show a profit. “I have always held the opinion that you cannot judge the value of railways on that basis. You must have railways to develop the country, and I hold that if it had not been for the pioneers building the railways from that point of view, we would not have the country we have to-day. “I know that we cannot spend unlimited funds on railway construction. There is a limit, of course, but you must look at the money spent in this way in something of the same light as money spent on roads or public health. You must look at its effect upon the production of the country, and the access it gives to remote parts. We must have a different kind of balance sheet for the railways.” The Minister closed with an assurance that just as the Hon. R. Semple’s department was doing its work with a view to the future, so was the Railways Department striving to serve the public.

"We are going to give you the transport facilities you require to open up your country, and which you have been helping to provide for other districts in the past. We hope the district will continue to prosper, and that its prosperity will be enhanced by the opening of this section of the East Coast Main Trunk line,” he concluded.

Other reports .of the function on pages 3 and 8.