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May 24, 1909.]
construct the line Wes entered upon, and the Governor in his speech on Thursday said the consulting engineers were responsible that the estimates are adhered to. Well, the Colony will be interested to learn what results now that the original | estimate has been more than doubled, and may be trebled before the work is completed -for, be it noted, besides the cost of possible land resumptions, mentioned earlier, His Excellency has a misgiving that there will be some addition to the estimates in con- sequence of defective bridge-work. All the explanations which have been furnished to account for the enormous excess over the original estimate may be perfectly intellig. ible and satisfactory to the consulting engineers, but the public generally will continue to think there is something wrong somewhere when an estimate by an experi- enced and well qualified railway engineer is exceeded to such an enormous extent. If Dr. MORRSON had been told this story of a railway constructed under Chinese supervision, imagine what a telegram he would have sent about it to The Times!
II.
(Daily Press, May 20th.) We do not know whether the public has been as satisfied as doubtless it has been interested in reading the defence of the Railway Estimates published in our columus yesterday over the signature of Mr. MURRAY STEWART as Chairman of the Hongkong Branch of the China Association. The members of the Committee we are told "have no valid reason to suppose that the cost of the actual work done is excessive, and this being so, they protest against the advocacy of the belief that there has been gross mismanagement in the construction of the British section of the Kowloon-Canton, Railway.' In the opening paragraphs of the letter it is mentioned that the prevalence of this impression is indicated by certain Press comments upon His Excellency the Governor's speech in Council on the increased estimates. So far as we may be concerned in this comment we have only to say that we have not yet said, and do not feel competent to assert, that there has been any gross mismanagement" in the con- struction of the line. We do think, however, that when the estimated cost of the con- struction of the line is more than doubled a prima facie case exists for a searching enquiry into the causes in the interests of the community which has to pay the bill. We are somewhat reluctant to enter upon a criticism of Mr. MURRAY STEWART's defence of the estimates, but as this defence appears to us to conflict in several important particulars with statements made in Council by His Excellency the Governor, we deem it to be in the public interest to make some further reference to the matter.
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First, however, we would like to make an observation or two upon Mr. STEWART's somewhat airy statement that it is a common experience in such undertakings that the estimates are exceeded. We know that to be a fact in several cases where the under- takings have been entrusted to the Crown Agents for the Colonies; but can Mr. STEWART produce, apart from these, any instances where the cost of constructing a short line of railway has been more than double the amount of the original estimate? With the defence of the constructing engineer the community has been made acquainted. It would now be in- teresting to learn what the Consulting Engineers have to say on behalf of the engineers whom they sent out to make the preliminary survey and the estimate
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT.
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which has proved so hopelessly inadequate. | sea, enclosing large tidal areas. The bridges Mr. STEWART writes: "How rough an estimate it was (that Mr. BRUCE made] may all have to be founded on wells which would necessary for letting the water out would be gathered from His Excellency's comment have been very costly requiring a large in relation to the earthwork. | amount of plant." There is nothing in this He said it is difficult to know exactly what statement to suggest that Mr. BROOE had rate Mr. BRUCE had calculated at, because not calculated upon this costly method of no drawings or calculations of quantities carrying the line along the sea shore; and and rates were supplied with the estimates." we can find nothing in the official papers to On this we may remark though these support the suggestion that His Excellency drawings and calculations were not supplied, imperfectly represented the matter when it does not follow that Mr. BRUCE's he stated that he had been assured that the estimates were not made on a careful alterations in the alignment would involve calculation of rates and quantities. It no extra cost whatever. is not said in the extract quoted that the estimates were not based on calculations of quantities and rates: it is merely said that Mr. BRUCE did not supply these to the Go- vernment. The original estimate set out how much was estimated for earthwork, how much for tunnels, for bridges, for the per- manent track, and so on, aŭd in the absence of any statement to the contrary, the estimate has to be accepted as one by which, in the opinion of the experienced expert who made it, and the Consulting Engineers who approved it, the Colonial Government could safely be guided.
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Nor are we able to reconcile with the official information Mr. MURBAY STEwart's explanation of the increase shown in the latest estimate for the tunnel.
"One reason he writes" for the increased cost of Beacon Hill Tunnel is to be found in the varied character of the excavation, and another in the phenomenal hardness of the rock met with in parts of the hill, neces sitating the use of specially heavy drills, and an enormously increased use of explosives." It is true that the Chief Resident Engineer in his latest report when showing that his 1907 estimate for the tunnel is exceeded by $1,800,000, says this great increase is principally due to the unusual hardness of the rock; but this seems irreconcilable with the statement that "the cost of tunnel-driving was very much reduced during 1908.
The average costs per lineal foot of heading, enlarging and bricking-in during the year were $70.49, $140.86, and 113.54 respectively. Up to December 1907 the figures were approximately $134.00, $275.00 and $221.00 respectively." His Excellency the Governor in conveying this in- formation to the Council remarked that if it were not for these very large reductions per lineal foot the excesses would have been something he dreaded to con. template.
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Mr. STEWART in his letter makes much of the fact that "the alignment which Mr. Bauce proposed [between Lokloha and Taipo], and on which this rough estimate was based, had subsequently to be altered because the typhoon of September 1906 showed the shore edge to be unsafe." Mr. STEWART proceeds to explain that "the change of alignment, removing the track out of reach of the sea, entailed much heavy cut- ting not contemplated by Mr. BRUCE, and the boring of three additional tunnels, of which that undertaken at Taipo is in itself a considerable enterprise." The inference to be drawn from the statement is that this new alignment was responsible for an enormous increase in the cost of the line. Now, or
this point His Excellency the Governor in a report he made to the While we have felt it to be our duty to Legislative Council on February 6th 1908 point out how the statements made in the said: The alterations which I have des. official reports conflict with those in Mr. cribed in the alignment of the railway, I am MURRAY STEWART's letter, we are no more assured, involve no extra cost whatever, and competent than the local Committee of the the Chief Resident Engineer says he is China Association to express au opinion perfectly certain that the Consulting one way or the other as to whether Engineers will bear him
out in
this the Colony is being called upon to pay statement." What are we to make of these for the Colonial section of the Kow- two contradictory assertions-that of the loon-Canton Railway considerably more Chairman of the local branch of the China than the work 19 worth bat We Association and the statement in His do conceive it to be a public duty to Excellency the Governor? We have been suggest in view of what the Governor told that His Excellency's statement has described
"the most un- conveys an imperfect impression, by reason satisfactory showing of the estimates of its brevity, and that what was really that the Colony, which has to pay meant was that the new alignment would the bill, is entitled to be assured on cost no more than the old when account is competent authority that it is not paying taken of the additional expenditure the extravagantly for the line. The Unofficial typhoon experiences had shown would be members of the Legislative Council early necessary in constructing the line along last year manifested a good deal of anxiety the sea shore. That may be so, but on the point, and asked the Government for in the statements on the railway laid the fullest possible statements on the subject. officially before the Council not one word has The Hon. Mr. KESWICK thought "a most ever been said about "the several lessons unsatisfactory state of affairs" had been taught by the typhoon of September 1906," revealed, and the action taken by the Hon. and the only references we can find to the Mr. HEWETT and the Hon. Mr. OSBORNE OD alteration of the alignment rather suggest that occasion indicate that they were much that the change was decided upon before of the same way of thinking. No Unofficial the typhoon occurred. The Chief Resident Member of the Council has made any public Engineer arrived six months previously and reference to the matter since reports on His Excellency the Governor informed the the progress of the work have been Council that " on
arrival, the Chief periodically submitted to the Legis Resident Engineer, after making a detailed lative Council, and in view of the letter survey, decided to run the line from the published by the Committee of the neighbourhood of Shatin to Taipo somewhat China Association it would certainly be more inland than had been arranged in Mr- interesting now to learn from the Unofficial BRUCE'S." What the Chief Resident Engineer Members of the Council whether the himself said on the subject in his report to reports laid before the Council during the 31st December, 1907, was simply this: "The last sixteen months have served to remove original alignment was very far out in the from their minds the impression which they
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