THE COLONIST. Published Daily—Morning. Neleos, Friday, Aug. 16 , 1807. THE MIDLAND RAILWAY.

Colonist, Volume XLIX, Issue 12015, 16 August 1907, Page 2

THE COLONIST. Published Daily — Morning. Neleos, Friday, Aug. 16 , 1807. THE MIDLAND RAILWAY.

The "Christchurch Press" of Monday last ccntaics an article by a special reportor on railway routes between Canterbury and Nelson Prvinces, in which special reference is made to land settlement injthe vicinity of Murchison, and in the contiguous valleys. The writer observes tbat "few port iocs pf the Midland Railway district command more interest tban that which radiates from Murchison, the principal township of the Upper Buller Gorge. . . . . Assisted by the vigorous policy of the Nelson Land Board, the community is rising to the occasion, and closer settlement is the order of the day. The locality of most of the new settlements is a group of four rivers tributary to the] Buller, the Matakitaki, Manlges and Maruia, flowing in from the left, the Matiri from the right. Unlike the parent river, which is a gorge, the four streams, as one ascends, widen out into grazing land, much of it good limestone country. Measuring the area length wise, it may be said that Bettlement begins at the junction of the Owen river with the Buller, 'about twenty miles from the Hope Saddle (the dividing range betweeD Nelson and the Buller), and extends about thirteen miles soufch-we3tward to Murchison, the centre of the territory included in the four river valleys. . . . Tbo freeholder is in evidence in a -beautiful alluvial flat are und Murchison, extending four : miles along the Buller, and the gem or the gorge. The soil is. rioh, and some of the properties are well 1 -farmpd," , <

7 From " this^ last-mentioiied^st'ate-nient, and .from a reference to Fern Flat, '.vbich the Minister for Lands recently termed the Taieri IPlain of Nelso p, it is evident that the writer quotc-:l erred in terming the whole of the main valley of the Buller a gorge. At the same time he is right in saying that the valleys of the other streams he mentions do widen out into considerable flats'With regard lo IL V - Aiaruia he says' it is a most reniar&ale valley. From its head waters, boxed" in with mountains, you may cross the great Spenser range (Lewis Saddle) into the valley of the Waiau, which includes Hanmer and Oulverden in North Canterbury. Westward you may climb over the Victoria range (Kahu Saddle) into the water shed of the Jnangahau, where is Reefton, 'or you [may work out to the head of the Maruin into the valley of the Brown Grey, and thence to Greymouth. All thesß distances are fairly short, but the mountain ranges which divide the watersheds are high, and lack of access has been a huge handicap. He alludes to the want "of u a bridge ijcross the Buller, giving access to the Maru in —a want that is shortly to be supplied—and says to reach Murchison you must cross into the parallel valley of the' Matakitaki. The writer of the [article rightly says that the pioneers of the district belonged to Nelson. -Proceeding, he remarks thatj the future of the country tends more and more to land settlement, more iparticularly [since the Midland Railway Company's reservations have been lifted-, unlookihg large areas, the einbatgo on which had paralysed the district. "Since then, \ Murchison," he proceeds, "has been on the up grade, and is now a comfortable place with a couple of hotels, stores, and other accessories of a country township. Seeing that the Hope Saddle, 2300 feet, stands between Murchison and NelSoiV, one would think the trade of this district, like the Buller, would go to the West Coast. But it does not. The grades of the Buller coach "road below Murohilk.fi and above Lyell aro severe, including hills like Dublin 'Terrace.and although Westpsrt and Reefton supply Ly el l , Nelson caters for Murchison, Mileage from railway is shorter on the Nelson side, and if the Tadmor line is iontinued^to the coach road, will continue to be the shorter, even if the Wost Coa_3fc lines come* to Inangahua. As a result of the extension of tho Tadmor iifie Murchison hordes* to "reduce freights on its imports from £3 103 to £2 a ton, because in that case the Hope Saudis will be avoided. " The remainder of ths article is devoted to arguments that hr.re bean dvanced in favor of the Lewis Middle or Cannibal Gorge route fore railway connecting Canterbury and the West (jioast, a route thafc tbe writer evidently views as unsatisacto'ry ln his corcluding paragraph, however, he suing up the position with accuracy, lie says:— "Even _if the Lewis Saddle route has all the advantages its supporters lay claim to— and it ecr.niniv possesses some of them— th a time for such a radical change of policy has long gone by." The people of Canterbury would have been wise had they in the past steadfastly supported the construction of the railway through, the Clarence Valley to the Top House, from which point lines could have been carried in three directions; one to Blenheim, another to Ne son, and the third tothe West Coast, thusj servirg to open up the centre cf the northern portion of "the Island. In ; the past, too many of the people of ] Canterbury have ignored the importance of Nelson, and its great potentialities. Now it is too late to raise questions of route for the arterial lnes for the country in committed, but we are glad to observe that our Southern friends are now taking more interest in thia portion of the Island, and that all who examine the country appreciate the necessity for railway extension from Tadmor to ■ the Hope. That is a work that will benefit not only the existing settlers, but all who are taking up land, and the extension will render the whole line far more profitable than it is to-day, even as the Tadmor extension, which only benefits a comparative few, has done.