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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 7, Issue 6 (October 1, 1932.)

The District's Resources

The District's Resources.

Popular favour, however, will be no more important than the support to be found in the realm of heavy haulage. The section, Ohura to Whangamomona, penetrates a coalarea of vast extent and hitherto scarcely touched. Oil, too, is in evidence, though its presence in commercial quantity has never been proved. The timber industry will undoubtedly find the railway an essential factor in the expansion of trade. One sawmilling firm with a plant capable of producing 20,000,000ft. of timber per year hopes to utilize the new railway for the distribution of at least 25 per cent. of its output as well as for an extension of its white pine business with dairy companies. Then there is the stock-carrying facility to be provided in an area which, in its present undeveloped state, forwards in one season 25,000 sheep to Taranaki. Droving and road charges compare most unfavourably with the low cost of railing such stock. Bullocks, also, even at the rate of five to a truck, can be transported more cheaply by rail. Although the future value of the line is not to be found primarily in the country which is traversed by its middle section, the carriage of fertilizers will materially benefit this area, and ultimately ensure the prosperity of many a struggling settler. The huge extent of country between Poro-o-tarao and Tangiwai, page 39 and the whole of the Ohura section, embrace numbers of valleys and hilltops which will respond profitably to treatment with suitable fertilizers. It has been stated by one well-qualified to express an opinion that the productiveness of this central area of the route, embracing most of the King Country, will increase by at least 300 per cent. within fifteen years after the line has been in established working order, and the right fertilizers have been in use. The Smart Road manure-works will be the closest to all stations within this area. It is said on good authority that a great refrigerating and meat-packing concern, operating in both Australia and New Zealand, is now contemplating definite alteration of existing plant and extension of facilities, in order to cope with increased business to be brought to its works by this new route.