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The New Zealand Railways Magazine, Volume 3, Issue 8 (December 1, 1928)

[section]

New Zealand's first Commerce Train was organised by the Auckland Chamber of Commerce, in co-operation with the Department of Industries and Commerce, and the Commercial Branch, New Zealand Railways.

The train left Auckland City on 26th October, 1928, traversed the province, and returned to the city on 4th November. The tour was in all respects a complete success.

It was a happy inspiration, carried through to a thoroughly satisfying conclusion, that prompted the experimental running of a Commerce Train over the Government railway system in the Auckland provincial district during October and November.

The purpose of this tour, unique in New Zealand, was to create a better knowledge in the city of the resources of the country districts served by the railways and to foster a closer co-operation between the two and the development of those resources to their common benefit. The idea originally presented itself last year to a number of Auckland business people and commercial and railway officials in Wellington. Subsequent discussion on the subject resulted in the inauguration of the “get-together train,” as some care to call it. There was a deep and earnest desire on the part of leading city commercial men to gain a more intimate knowledge of the great province at their gates; the only matter at issue was how best to accomplish that desirable end. The Railway Department supplied a most satisfactory solution by arranging the organisation of a special train cruise on which a large delegation could embark and view all parts of the province with a minimum of trouble and expense. Many business men, like many farming people, have of course made trips through parts of the provincial territory, but without the advantages of seeing everything that could be secured under some special organised scheme. That scheme was drawn up, and the outcome was the despatch of a train, on a kind of roving educational commission, north and south and east and west.

Railways and Commerce at Grips. General Manager of Railways (Mr. H. H. Sterling) greets Mr. H. T. Merritt (left), President of Auckland Chamber of Commerce.

Railways and Commerce at Grips.
General Manager of Railways (Mr. H. H. Sterling) greets Mr. H. T. Merritt (left), President of Auckland Chamber of Commerce.

It was a novel adventure, combining business and pleasure in a fashion that it was impossible to secure so fully and so easily in any other way. It was a train on which the passengers could live while they moved about the country for a week or more—the actual duration of the tour was nine days—viewing the farming districts, the mills and factories, the flocks and herds, the experiments in the treatment of soils, the forests indigenous and page 26 exotic, gold mines and coal mines, the growth of the provincial towns and villages, the landscape glories and wonders that all have their part in adding to the wealth of the country. Such a tour could only be carried out by a judicious combination of railway and car—rail for the greater part of course— and by a careful co-ordination of all details so that time and cash could be expended to the utmost advantage, and so that the commercial tourists should be able to meet and talk with the people whose information and advice were most likely to be helpful. All this took a great deal of thought and careful management, backing up the enthusiasm with which the scheme had been received at the start, and that thought and expert management resulted in the carrying through of the project to complete success. It was a great experiment, well thought out and well executed.

Train Living.

The Commercial “home on wheels” consisted of a special train with ordinary first-class Pullmans for day occupation, four sleeping cars (each accommodating 20 passengers), a most comfortable lounge car; a kitchen car, where light refreshments, tobacco, confectionery, and sundries in everyday use could be obtained; and a wagon fitted up as a shower-bath carriage. Among the other conveniences furnished were a telephone, postal service, and gramophone. Each day a four-sheet newspaper was published on board by the Publicity Manager of the service. Nothing was missing in the fitting-out of the train that would assure the comfort and pleasure of the eighty men who made the “nine-days'-wonder” tour.