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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 76

Will this Scheme of Construction Pay?

Will this Scheme of Construction Pay?

If worked on the Stage System it will not only pay, but yield a large profit. If worked on the present no-system, it will greatly increase our loss, but not to the same extent that the present gauge would.

Last advices from home tell us that there are now before the British Parliament, Bills providing for the construction of 500 miles of these railways. If they are good enough for England—and they are expected to do great things there—surely they are good enough for New Zealand. On these distant lines of ours it is not possible that there can be much traffic for many years to come, and when it does come it would be easy work to lift and relay them for branch lines, or, better still, lay another track. If from the first our lines had been 2ft. 6in. gauge, we could have had an up and a down line throughout for less than half the cost of the present lines, and certainly the country would have been better served.

In order to encourage the opening up of the country, I would give to County Councils power to borrow money for the purpose of constructing these narrow-gauge railways. For the construction', maintenance, and working of these county railways, the counties should be responsible. They should also have the right to appoint their own officers and men, and fix their own time tables, and run as many and as few trains as they may think proper. The Government, however, should stipulate that all lines and rolling stock are to be precisely the same as the Government lines, that the charges are to be the same, and that the Government may run on them. Any profit made on these lines to belong to the counties, but to be used for railway construction only.