BETTER TRAIN SERVICES

Waipa Post, Volume XXIV, Issue 1681, 3 November 1925, Page 5

BETTER TRAIN SERVICES

SLOW TRAINS SPEEDED UP. SEVERAL ALTERATIONS MADE. Though no official intimation has yet reached the Te Awamutu Borough Council or the Chamber of Commerce, Tve are informed from a reliable source that the Railway Department has decided to put into operation on 15th November an improved train service that should assuredly be appreciated by the travelling public of Te Awamutu and neighbourhood. It will be remembered that on the occasion of bis recent visit to Te Awamutu, the Prime Minister announced that the daylight express trains between Auckland and Wellington would stop at Te Awamutu to pick up and set down passengers. The train from Wellington to Auckland is timed to leave Te Awamutu at 7.58 p.m., and reach Auckland a few minutes before 11 p.m. The train for Wellington will leave Te Awamutu at 10.56 a.m., and •presumably will cross the Taumaru-nui-Frankton train here unless the latter train's time-table, of which intention (if any) we have at present no advice, is altered. However, other trains affecting the lo»al service are'being speeded up, notably the one which leaves Frankton at 4.5 p.m. At present its time for departure from Te Awamutu is 5.35 p.m, Otorohanga 6.50 p.m.. arriving at Te Kuiti at 7.40. On and after Monday, 15th November, this. mixed train will reduce the time of the trip by one liour, reaching Te Kuiti at 6.40 p.m. The time of its departure from Te Awamutu has not yet been stated, but probably it will be about 5.15 p.m.

The Frankton-Taumarunui train, leaving the former place at 1.45 p.m. ■daily, is also to hurry up, for it is to arrive, at Te Kuiti thirteen minutes ahead of present schedule. Its departure time from Te Awamutu will be "2.37 p.m. instead of 2.42 p.m., as at -present. The " cuss " train —that is, the one -which so frequently blocks traffic on Pirongia Road for anything up to half an hour on most evenings—is to reduce its time for running between Te Kuiti and Frankton by no les9 than an "hour and a quarter. This in itself Avill necessarily obviate the big inconvenience caused by blocking the Pirongia roadway. This train will leave Te .Kuiti at the same hour as now, 4.30 p.m., and reach Frankton at 7 o'clock, instead of 8.15 p.m., or even later.

There is a goods train that rattles through Te Awamutu towards Frankton at some unearthly hour after .midnight, but after 15th November it is to "have its time-table altered (except for Saturday nights) to leave Te Kuiti at 7.50 p.m., nearly three hours earlier than formerly. On Saturday nights this train i 3 \o leave Te Kuiti at 10.30 p.m., .fifteen minutes ahead of the present schedule. All these alterations will be accepted as improvements, and the department officers responsible are to be commended for their evident desire to give better service. We had hoped that the train leaving Taumarunui at 7 a.m., Te Awamutu 11.6 a.m.,, would nave come into the schedule of altera ations, but perhaps considerations that are not apparent to us have compelled -adherence to the present time-table, which, we would again point out, compels passengers travelling by it for •stations north of Frankton to spend an nour and fifty minutes at that junction.