TARANAKI'S RAILWAY REQUIREMENTS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 80, 24 March 1908, Page 4

TARANAKI'S RAILWAY REQUIREMENTS.

To the Editor. Sir,—First of all I desire to tender you my sincere and hearty thanks for your kindness and courtesy in publishing in full my somewhat lengthy screed anent the above. After reading your sub-leader of Saturday 1 was fully prepared to find any true and incontrovertible statements 1 might make concerning the Mt. Egmont line termed "exaggerations," but I was not prepared for the somewhat uucalleilfor sneer contained in the first line of your article. In reply to your uncomplimentary remark, may I refer you to the column of your paper next to that in which tlr later portion of my letter appears. If you glance down tliis you will note that in the report of the Stratford meeting re your Harbor Bill Mr. I». McK. Moiison moved in the direction of releasing Mr. ■!. L. Thomson from his pledge to oppose any further borrowing in connection with your harbor. That resolution you will see by the report was s ■- conded by—your very humble servan:! I congratulate you, Sir, on the stand you have determined to take up with regard to public works in this ilistrH. Believe me, we shall be deeply grateful for any efforts put forward on our l-e----lialf. One word with regard to my statements. You term them wild and

exaggerated, but really 1 think it would have been better had you brought forward a- few facts and figures in support of your denunciations instead of contenting yourself with merely abusing me. When 1 write that in my opinion it will tie something like two years before local liodies can obtain cheap metal from the mountain you suggest that the wish is father to the thought in my case. Now I liappen to be a ratepayer to more than one local body in tliis district, and don't you think that 1 am keenly interested through that very sensitive organ—the pocket—in seeing this line put through, for the sooner it is completed the sooner will the cost of road metal be lower, and consequently my annual contributions to thelocal bodies I am connected with will be proportionately less. What I claimed in, my letter of In'l week, and what I claim to-day is thi-: Originally it was intended to lay down a line with all possible despatch to the Jit. Egmont quarries to assist the local bodies from Wanganui to Stratford, fiy the action of putting this line into a gravel pit and not to its original destination I claim that these local bodies Ilivc been "side-tracked,"' and every fair-minded person who knows anything at all about the line will bear me oin. And I am convinced that so long as the line remains where it is, so long will local bodies lie unable to obtain tha cheap metal they require. You say that yon prefer the opinions of the (!overnment engineers on this opinion, I challenge you to prodltico one that will prove that what 1 claim is not correct. The crushers at. present installed ire capable of crushing Si) trucks of metal per diem. Will you lay before the public the opinion of a (kivernment en gineer as to how many trucks of metal, that is, stone, not gravel, sand or dirt, can be obtained per diem from the present terminus of the line? The answer. 1 venture to say, will astonish your readers and your worthy self. Again, do you really think that Parliament voted the sum of £54,157 15s lid to put a line o'/ 2 miles long into a gravel pit- or to obtain stone for the Railway Department and local bodies from Wanganui to Waipuku from the bed of a stream not one chain wide? I venture to say not. And yet this is exactly what has l>een done. Is it an exaggeration* In your former subleader you stated that crushing had been in progress for some time, that the crushing could not lie urged any further, and that anxiety for the line need not further disturb the minds oi our public men. What did this mean if it did not mean to convey to your readers the notion that the object for which the lino was laid down was "an fait accompli"? And yet now you explain that the crashing you spoke of

was "the exhaustive trials of the builders prior to handing the work over to the owners who will run it." I leave you on the horns of this dilemma. You spoke of my reference to the empty cottages at Waipuku as an exaggeration in keeping with my other "wild assertions," but I notice you do not- refute it; instead, you draw a red herring across the scent by declaring my statement to be a liliel on the contractor who erected the buildings, who. 1 hap|)en to know, is one of the finest tradesmen who ever set foot in this Dominion. But, .Mr Editor, supposing you had built a house at Waipuku—it's not exactly 1 dry spot—and supposing you had tajyn even «reater pains with its construction than the Government diil over the Waipuku cottages, what state do you reckon the wall paper would be in it 11 yon had left your house empty for say |ls months* And with regard' to Ihese self-same cottages that I have referr'-d to, how much longer are they to remain in their present uninhabited condition'; Do you call this businesslike administration? I don't. T note that you state that the working Railways Department will take over the line on April Ist if everything is satisfactory. Well, well, well! They could not have chosen a better date So far as the taxpayers are concerned. Ijast April Fool's Day the department wrote to all the local liodies in this district asking what amount of stone they would require from tlio Mt. Eginout works during tin coming year. But 110—this is an exaggeration; the letter was actually written in June, as a matter of' fact. " 'Null sed."—l am, etc.. •r. SMITH.