CHEAP RAILWAYS.

Wellington Independent, Volume XXVI, Issue 3146, 13 March 1871, Page 3

CHEAP RAILWAYS.

[From the New Zealand Mail.] No one doubts at the present day that railways are the best and cheapest roads which can be made in a new | country ; and it would therefore be a waste of time to expatiate on the advantages they possess over the common road, or on the benefits they must confer upon the community when wisely and economically constructed. But whether railways should be undertaken by the State, by private companies under a State guarantee, or by granting the land through which they pass to railway contractors has not yet been decided. Each system has its merits and demerits, but the last appears to us to be the most impolitic and indefensible. "We have not, like the Americans, a whole continent at our disposal ; and, therefore, it is as necessary to economise as to develop our resources. It would be unwise and improvident on the part of the State to debar itself from reaping any benefit which would accrue from the enhanced value given to the land through which the railway passes. If it would pay a company to take land in lieu of money, it would pay a wise and colonizing Government to keep the land and pay the money. Differences of opinion on such a subject are, however, to be expected ; but what appears to us the most strange and unaccountable ia that any differences of 1 opinion should exist with reference to the guage which would be best adapted to meet the means, circumstances, and requirements of this colony ; and that there are men of intelligence, influence, and position who are 'in favor of the broad guage in a country like New Zealand. We should have most certainly doubted the fact had we not seen it broadly stated in the report of Mr -Stafford's speech at Timaru, that he was the only member for Canterbury who advocated the narrow guage as the best and cheapest for opening up the country. If ultimately the broad guage were to be adopted, still at the present time the narrow guage should have the preference on the principle that we must creep before we can run. There is no reason why a still narrower guage than that sanctioned by the House should not be adopted, or why a uniform guage for the two islands should be insisted upon. It is not swift but cheap transit which we require, and this the narrow and not the broad guage will afford us. "We have often felt doubts whether the estimate of the cost of a cheap, narrow guage railway, founded on its cost in other countries, would not, when applied to this colony, prove fallacious. Norway is not New Zealand. Wages are not the same here as in Europe. Hence we feared that the cost of making railways in New Zealand would be found to be greatly underestimated. We are glad to find that our fears were groundless; that a railway, which will exactly answer our purpose, can be laid down in New Zealand or Australia, over any ordinary country, at a cost only of £3700 per mile. Mr H. E. Nictor, a civil engineer in Victoria, who has had for a number of years practical experience in railway construction says : — " If the public would be satisfied with passenger traffic at twenty miles an hour, including stoppages, their goods to be carried at twelve miles an hour, and running only between sunrise and sunset, with four hundred tons over every mile in the twelve hours, a good sound, permanent lino of railway could be laid down over any ordinary country, where the gradients do not require to be more than one in fifty, and the cmrves sharper than ten chains radius, with fair rolling stock and station arrangements, for £3700 a mile on the present guage, exclusive ol compensation for land or law expenses." He calculated that on this expenditure passengers at 2d per head and freight at 2d per ton per mile would, after leaving a fair margin for working expenses and maintenance, pay five per cent. Would not such a railway meet all our requirements? Is it not the very thing that is wanted ?

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