A Railway Handicap.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXIV, Issue 955, 27 December 1933, Page 6

A Railway Handicap.

Dear Sir,—l formed one of the many people who, during the holidays, made use of the train to get out of the city. I have no complaint against the train, nor against the service provided, and I have nothing but admiration for the zealous manner in which the railway officials looked after the travelling public. But good tram 6 and good services, plus all that efficient officers could do, could not make up for our awful railway station. We are -used, in Christchurch, to suffering all sorts of things humbly, but I could not help wondering when I was struggling through the crowd on the railway station how much longer we are going to tolerate this anachronism without protest. The station simply is incapable of catering to the needs of a big crowd such as assembles during the holiday rush periods. Even in normal times the station is bad enough when express trains are arriving or departing, but when normal travelling crowds are augmented by the holiday rush the position becomes almost ridiculous. The Christchurch station was built years ago to meet the demands of that time. The city has grown enormously since then, but we have still to put up with accommodation designed to meet the needs of our fathers (or should it be grandfathers?). It is high time, I think, that we in the south dropped some of our expensive humility and made some approach to asserting our rights. Auckland is vocal and clamant, and Auckland has a palace for a railway station. Wellington has a habit of saying what it wants and Wellington is going to have a new and adequate station. Christchurch is dumb, and is treated accordingly. Perhaps we are to blame after all.—l am, etc., CROWDED.