13. RAILWAYS AND TRANSPORTA TION. The great problem which Australia has had to face in the development of her vast territory has been one of means of communi cation. Living on an island so large that it has been rated as an additional continent un like any other in its makeup, a land of vast plains bounded and crossed at frequent inter vals by stretches of hill country, devoid, for the most part, of extensive river systems, and beset by hostile native tribes, the people of Aus tralia have been called upon to face conditions such as never confronted the upbuilders of any other continent. In both the Americas vast river systems have stretched forth the hands of the temptress to those adventurous and daring spirits for whom the unknown ever holds an attraction. Australia has had her explorers, but their pathway has been constantly beset by many and great difficulties. They have had to battle with heat, wind, apparently intermi nable stretches of sand and prevailing tropical diseases, all forming a foreground to the con stant hostility of the natives and working in conjunction with a still more terrible enemy, thirst. These same enemies have continued to oppose every step taken in the direction of the establishment of ways of communication by the government of the various states of Australia, upon whom has fallen, for the most part, a task which, in most other countries of recent development, has been undertaken and carried through by private enterprise. Naturally, therefore, Australia's communication has been largely by way of the sea and this, in turn, has developed her coast lands at the ex pense of her vast interior regions, most of which still remain partially or altogether un settled and unspanned by railways and other highways, byways or trails. Most of the 22,000 miles of railways of government and private ownership of Australia are situated in the south, southeast and southwest, in the states of New South Wales, Victoria, Western Aus tralia and Queensland. A line planned to cross the centre of the island from north to south is partially constructed, most of the finished part being in the south, though the Federal government has lately completed 200 miles of track from Port Darwin to Catherine in North ern Territory. The present plan is to continue this latter road through Queensland to make connection with the state road running out of Brisbane westward, and to extend another branch southward to Oodnadatta, the northern end of the state railway system of South Aus tralia. But all this railway construction, en couraging though it may be, is but a compara tively small part of the railway facilities de manded by Australia's vast territorial expanse. When the comparatively level nature of her territory is taken into consideration, Australia has made less progress in railway construction than many other countries with fewer facilities and needs for ways of communication. This is due to the fact that railway construction on the island continent has been almost alto gether in the hands of the various states of the Commonwealth, who early developed rival interests which reached a point where the wel fare of the country as a whole was forgotten in the antagonism of state against state. In
the early days of Australia's development, the various states were so effectually separated from one another that they formed, for all practical purposes, separate political entities; and even when the Federal government began to exert itself for greater Federal unity and the subjection of state interests to those of the island as a whole, the states continued to develop a policy of commercial rivalry which strongly approached antagonism and formed a harrier to the political unity of the Common wealth. This policy of localism runs through out the history of the railroad promotion and construction of Australia. Owing to this politi cal isolation of the states of the Union, and the consequent weakness of the Federal govern ment and its comparative poverty, practically all the railway construction undertaken in Aus tralia for public uses has been done by the various states. As the states voted the money for the building and maintenance of all new railways, this part of the nation's development became strongly subject to local politics. Each member of the local legislature, in conjunction with the local politicians, found it to his inter est to secure railway concessions for his own particular district; and the local districts ob jected strongly to voting money for the exten sion of railways into other districts where the population was nil or too sparse to force the attention of the state legislature. The result was that scores of comparatively short lines were built at the state's charge as feeding lines to the more populous centres. Most of these ended, as a noted Australian writer has said, ((nowhere.° This policy, or want of policy, was bad enough, but the commercial rivalry and jealousy of the various states forming the Commonwealth intensified the situation by ceaseless and tireless efforts to divert trade from its natural channels in what were consid ered state interests, rights and necessities. Thus even after railway lines had been extended practically across state, they were not allowed to be continued to the border of the neighbor isg state lest the government of that state should make railway connection therewith and thus be in a position to divert trade to its own capital, seaport or other important com mercial centre. The railways of the various states established cut rates lower and more demoralizing than were probably ever put into effect in any other country. By this means the trade of interior towns and districts was di verted from its natural market often less than a score of miles away, and carried across state by rail to the state capital or seaport. In sup port of this restrictive policy, Australia, with scores of the finest natural ports in the world, remained with her waterfront comparatively undeveloped, because each state seemed to think that trade could be better controlled for local interests by having it go through one great port. So strong was this feeling of localism that even the state ports were, to a certain extent, jealous of commercial rivals; and thus, when one port succeeded in getting the lead of all the others in the state, it was able to maintain this lead through its political and commercial importance.