Electric Trams.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXX, Issue 12003, 22 October 1906, Page 6

Electric Trams.

TO TF« EDITOR.

Sir, — I agr.ee with "Another Ratepayer" that "if we can pay our way» and have a profit of £30 — or even if. we had no profit at all, we should have an electric service." But when we are told by a gentleman of Mr Chamberlain's standing in the electrical tram world that we will require to earn something avore c£l0;000 per annum to make expenses, surely the proposal to adopt such a system for Wanganui ia folly personified. "Another Ratepayer" must surely know that tho Bteam motor 'bus on rails as proposed is as far removed from the old Wellington steam serA'ice which he quotes as the present day locomotive is from Stevenson's' "Rocket." The old Wellington service was a locomotive type of engine drawing carriages. The system sanctioned by the ratepayers here is a motor (steam) 'bus on rails. The question of first cost is to a great extent immaterial. The vital factor "is cost of running versus earning power. The Mayof, I note, states he is going "bald headed," whatever that is, for an electric service,. The Council and ratepayers would do well to go on the good old principle of "creep before you walk." — T am, etc., RATEPAYER.