Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1917-06-17
NEW LINE FINISHED
NS.CONTINENTAL LINE iE AUSTRALIA MEANS MUCH
Comparable in Way With Opening Of Union Pacific Nearly Half Cen" 5. tury AQo-State Reads Form
 Connecting Links.

F'orty-one miles of track are now needed to complete the Australian transcontinental railroad, according to correspondent of the Philadelphia Commercial museum. The importance of this news can hardly be overesti- mated, for the completion of this small piece of trackage promises to have an influence on Australian development comparable in a way with that exerted upon the development of this country by the opening of the Union Pacific nearly half century ago. The imme- diate effect will be to link up the capi- talS of the five continental states Ot the Australian commonwealth by es" tablishing an unbroken line of com- through Sydney, Melbourne and Ade- laide, to Perth on the west, distance just a little short of $500 miles. The Australian transcontinental rail- road has been long in the building, and is the result of linking up of isolated stretches of lines constructed in and by the different states rather than of a carefully matured program of develop 1 ment. By the year 1889 railroad com munication had been established be- tween the four capital cities of Bris- bane, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide, q distance of 1,790 miles, through the connecting at the borders of the state railroad lines of Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and South Aus 1 tralia, which line was in time extended 1 from Adelaide northwest to Port Au- l gusta, 26O miles. About the same time West Australia had built a state railroad eastward 373 miles from Perth to Kalgoorlie, in the heart of the gold | fields.
 Nothing was done looking toward the tracking of this 1,O63-mile gap between Port Augusta, in South Australia, and Kalgoorlie, in West Australia, until l 1907, when the Australian government ordered a preliminary survey of line 1 to connect these extremities of the ex- isting lines from the east and west. AS a result of that survey the common wealth decided, four years later, to con- struct the railroad as government
 line. Work was started at both ends,
 September, 1912, and construction has
 progressed so rapidly that there now
 remain only Al miles of track to con-
 meet the Port Augusta and Kalgoorlie l divisions. 5i- f+ It is improbable that the opening of l the first Australian transcontinental l line will have the same immediate ef-
 feet as did the opening of the first 1 American transcontinental line. The
 Australian railroad, and more particu-
 larly the 1,000-mile stretch between Port Augusta and Kalgoorlie, passes
 through relatively poor and barren
 land, which does not now seem suscept-
 ible of the same agricultural develop
 ments as the land pierced by the Union 1! Pacific.
 The largest results cannot be expect
 ed from the Australian trunk line be-s
 cause of the: lack of. uniformity of
 gauge throughout its length, a defect
 traceable tossthe' different gauges adopt-
 ed by the different states in the first
 days of railroad building.
 In the trip from Brisbane to Perth
 four transfers of passengers and
 freight, will be necessary, and the trou-
 ble, delay and added expense of these
 transfers, already of appreciable mag
 nitude along the eastern section of the
 line, will naturally become more seri-.
 ous along the entire line as the volume
 of business increases.
 Notwithstanding the defect, which
 the government is already preparing to
 remedy, the completion of the trans.
 continental railroad will undoubtedly
 facilitate interstate trade and, in con-
 junction with it's principal branches,
 will allow the produce of inland areas
 to find it's natural outlet at the nearest
 port. -