1959-1960 — Page 6

GENERAL SURVEY

THE year closed with a surplus of operating revenue over expenditure of $4,542,016.45 which is the highest since the year ending 31st March, 1951. The Profit and Loss Account also shows the highest profit for the same period at $2,668,861.92.

2. Gross income was $8,638,167.15 the highest since the financial year 1950/51. Unfortunately there was a higher operating expenditure of $4,096,150.70 or $489,355.63 more than the previous year. This was brought about by circumstances beyond the control of the Department; firstly by the increase in salaries, pensions and gratuities arising out of the 1959 Salaries Revision and secondly by a considerable sum spent in restoring damage done by the torrential rainstorms.

3. Local passenger traffic continued to show an upward trend with an increase over the previous year of 14.15% in the number of journeys. This increase was mainly due to the rapid increase in popula- tion of the New Territories. The movement of passengers to and from China varied considerably during the year: in all 885,953 passengers were carried, an increase of 31.56% over the previous year.

4. The number of passengers carried on Ching Ming Festival Day, 5th April, 1959, 85,560 persons was once again a record. This figure would have been even higher if more rolling stock had been available.

5. In the case of goods traffic, both the export tonnage and import tonnage increased compared with the previous year, the export tonnage by 24.21% and the import tonnage by 20.88%.

6. The import of live pigs has traditionally been an important feature of incoming goods traffic. The total imported during the year was 256,307 head which was 8,421 less than the previous year.

7. The Department suffered a loss of $171,015.13 as a result of the torrential rainstorms in June 1959. Extensive damage was done to the cuttings and embankments at various sections of the main line. The worst landslip occurred at the high cutting opposite the Railway Work- shops at Hung Hom where several hundred tons of boulders and earth buried the railway track which had to be temporarily re-aligned before traffic could he resumed.

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