THE FAIRLIE LINE.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13954, 14 July 1909, Page 4

THE FAIRLIE LINE.

Tin; meeting lipid at Pleasant Poinj last Friday night seems to bo a satire on tlio raihvay management. Here is a lino of raihvay that lias been open about a quarter of a century, during which time the settlers in. the country about and beyond it have been multiplied many times, and yet tho train service, and consequently "the mail service, is so inefJicient that it is proposed to augment the latter by privato enterprise. AVo doubt whether such a proposal lias been thought of in connection with any other railway lino in New Zealand. The Minister of Kail-

y ays would probably prove obdurate if asked to increase the railway scrvico on tho I'airlio line at present. liis

one idea is to make tho railways pay, and he is applying this principle to small branch lines about which it is easy to make out adverse returns of profit and loss, especially if their value

ua 1 coders to main lines is unfairly excluded from the calculation. This element does not, of course, appear in tho case ol the Fail-lie line. The unprofitableness of the ilurunui-UlulF system cannot be wholly due to tho >'-«»ch Jmes-tho Otago Central perhaps provides a good share of tho deficiency— the double express Service must be largely responsible for it lfc seems to us that it would repay investigation to what extent these trains serve useful purposes, and whether express passenger services could not bo provided that without increasing their number would be of much greater service to. the people of the districts they pass through. Tho Railway Department is decidedly slow to adopt new ideas, therefore there is not much room lor hope that the suggestion which was made at the Pleasant Point lneet-

ing will bo adopted, namely, that a sort ot railway motor-ear .service might lie tried, hi Germany, wo learn, largo ears are run on the railways, electrically driven by means of accumulators, charged at the termini. Here, however, the familiar petrol motor would doubtless be cheaper as well as more generally applicauie, until some of our

big rivers art, "harnessed." It is quite unreasonable that a large body of fanners and three townships should have to make private arrangements to improve their mail service, when a. railway runs through the district, and one. which, in spite of all assertions to the contrary, will be believed to be a, profitable lino until the figures are produced disproving it.