RAILWAY TIME-TABLE.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LV, Issue 14131, 10 February 1910, Page 6

RAILWAY TIME-TABLE.

WAIRARAPA PROTESTS. REASONS ADVANCED FOR AN ALTERATION. A PATHETIC INCIDENT. The Pahiatua Chamber of Commerce is tho latest public body to interest itself in the recent alteration of tho railway time-table, and it has passed the following resolution-“ That the Minister of Railways bo strongly urged to reinstate the old morning tram from Masterton, which left at 6.30 o’clock and which passed through Pahiatua at 9 o’clock; that a train should run to connect with the Main Trunk trains north and south at Palmerston North; and, further, there should be no unnecessary delays at Woodrille and Palmerston North.” And yet, notwithstanding the protests that are made daily along the. whole of tills part of the island the Minister of Railways says that it is only Mastorton and Eketalmna people who nro objecting to the time-table (says the Masterton correspondent of tho Now Zealand Times). Practically every resident between Palliser Buy and Napier is condemning the present state of affairs. The inconvenience and loss which the whole of the Wairarapa and Forty-mile Bush is suffering through tho altered time-table is simply scandalous. One or two incidents only need bo cited in order to bear this out. For instance, pupils attending country schools who obtain Proficiency certificates entitling them to two years’ free education at a district high school are now unable to avail themselves of the opportunity of improving their education owing to train arrangements preventing thorn from reaching their destination till some hours after school has opened for the day. The large number of pupils , who camo from the north to attend tho Masterton district high school cannot now reach Master! on till I o’clock in the afternoon, while tho free pupils who attended the Groytown secondary classes are even worse off. What is the result of this bunglingP Simply that the children drift away to employment before their education is completed, and are robbed of benefits which they have worked hard for at school, through apparent iucompotency in framing a railway time-table. Then, again, farmers cannot get their produce and sheep to market with anything like regularity, there being insufficient trains and lack of facilities. Dairy companies are put to inconvenience, and also suffer loss, through not being able to got thocroam from their creameries to the main factories as promptly as formerly; tho travelling public nro caused no end of annoyance, inconvenience, and loss owing to passenger trains being turned into* goods trains and rarely running up to time, being on many occasions an hour or more lato. Tho annoyance that is suffered by those-travelling on trains as a result, of the lack of punctuality is exemplified in the following incident: —Two or three weeks ago a resident of tho Wairarapa received word that his daughter in Christchurch was dying. He hastened to .Masterton in order to take train to Wellington and catch the steamer for Christchurch the same evening. The train arrived at Masterton twenty-fivo minutes late, and lost more time before it reached Cross Creek. The gentleman in queson his way down telegraphed to .tho' shipping company, engaging a berth. There were also some (fourteen other passengers on the train desirous of reaching Christchurch by the steamer leaving Wellington that evening, and so anxious were they becoming about missing the boat that a telegram was dispatched to Wellington to the, shipping company, and n 'reply received that tho steamer would he delayed twenty-five minutes. Anxiety was turned to despair when the train was bowling along the sen front after leaving Potone, the lights of the steamer being seen ns she proceeded down'the harbour. The gentleman aforementioned had to stay in Wellington that night, and next day received a telegram that Ids daughter had died three-quar-ters of an hour after the steamer had arrived at Lyttelton, and she, knowing that ho was to come by the boat, had cried out piteously to tho last for him ! If tho old time-table had, been in vogue there would have been ample time to catch the steamer, a father would have ■been able to see his dying daughter, and fourteen other passengers would have been saved tho inconvenience and expense of staying a day in Wellington. This is, „no doubt, only one of many instances which could bo quoted. The stopping of trains on the Rinmtaka incline. which has occurred with monotonous regularity recently, is duo to tho present time-table, as the department cannot deal properly, with tho goods traffic, and have to utilise passenger trains for the purpose of relieving to some extent tho congested state of affairs, I have been informed that a movement is on foot to hold simultaneous mootings of protest against the present time-table in the various centres in the Wairarapa and Forty-Mile Bush. If Masterton’s Mayor were alive to the seriousness of tho position ho would'have taken a course similar to this long' ago, and havo called together public meetings for the purpose of protesting strenuously against tho present time-table.