THE CITY'S BIRTH

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 226, 18 June 1919, Page 8

THE CITY'S BIRTH

HOW WELLINGTON WAS

PLANNED

NEW LIGHT ON OLD HISTORY

The reason why Wellington is often quoted as an example of bad town-plan-ning was explained in part Inst night by the Rev. Father Gilbert in the course of, a paper, read before the Historical* Section of ,lho Philosophical Institute. .The subject of the paper was "The Surveying and Planning of_ tho Mew Zealand Company's First .Settlement."

During September, 1830, said Father Gilbert, Colonel Wakefielci made a hurried examination of the Lower Hutt. Valley, the Te Aro flat, Mid the Thorndon flat, with the object of selecting a site for the settlement proposed by the. New /'ealand 'Company. He _ wisely chose the Thorndon Hat as tho site for the town, and instructed Smith., the whaler, to inform tho Surveyor-General accordingly. The survey partv, headed by Captain W. M. Smith, Surveyor-General for ilie settlement, had not reached Port Nicholson at that time. On October 4, 1839. Colonel Wakefield left Port Niehol6on, and he did not return until January 18, 18-10. In the meantime tho company's barque Cuba hud arrived with tin?'survey party aboard. ' . The instructions of tjie company with regard, to the laying out of the town were ambitious. "In laying out the plan of the town," ran the instructions received by Captain Smith, "you most as closely as possible adhere to the conditions, oil which the land orders have been sold. The directors wish that in framing the plan of tin town you should make ample reserves for public purposes, such as a,cemetery, market place, wharfage, and probable public 'buildings, botanical gardens, a park, and extensive ..boulevards. It is desirable (Jfcit the whole outside of the town inland should be separated from the country sections by, a broad belt of 'land which you will decla re that the company intends to be public property on conditoin that no buildings be ever erected upon it. 'The framing of the plan must necessarily lie left ■ to your own judgment and taste. Upon this subject the directors 'will only remari that you have to provide for -the future rather than for the present, and that they wish' public .convenience to be consulted, and the beautiful appearance of the future city to' be secured so far as these objects can be accomplished by the original plan rather than the immediate profit of the company. It is of essential consequence that the town land should be ready for settlement as soon as possible." The difficulty of the task set the surveyor does not, appear to have. been appreciated iii .London. There were, to be' 1100 town sections of one acre each, and the same number of country sections, which were to consist,of the most valu-able-land at the disposal of the directors in the first settlement. It had been stipulated that the town sections were to be .flat. The barque Cuba had taken five months to make the voyage to Port Nicholson, and Caplain Smith knew that the first batch of settlers were lo have sailed from England six weeks after the Cuba's departure. 'He had to .expect therefore, that the settlers were close upon his heels,, and that there would be a very early demand for the i>lan of the future town in order that the settlers, armed with the company's orders, initrlu select their sections in the priority already determined !>y the drawing of lots. , Captain Smith replied that if he laid out the. town oil the site that had been selectecrby. Colonel AVakefield, fully half of the town acres and reserves would have to be placed on hilly lay had .io be avoided, , since .within a lew weeks hundreds of land-hungrv col: onists would be clamorous for their sections. The Hutt Valley appeared to the surveyor to be free from the limitations that confronted him at Thorndon. The 1100 town , sections, plus the reserves, could comfortably be laid out oil level ground in . the Hutt Valley. 'Caulnin Smith decided to lay out the. town there and hp had startedMvork when Colonei Wakefield returned to Port Nicholson on January 18.t'18W. Colonel Wakefield probably resented this, suggested Father Gilbert /but being untler the impresnon that the directors of the company had given the Surveyor-General authorit.)-. be did not interfere. He naturally wished the- survey to proceed without any unnecessary delay. On January 20 the ship Aurora, with the first batch of settlers, ; arrived at the Heads. ■ ' The survey of tho town in the Hutt Valley proceeded during February, 1840. But Captain SmitlT found that there were obstacles he had not foreseen, j The land was flat, but it was .covered with dens 9 forest, which made' the work of the surveyors very difficult, and much of ■it was waterlogged. The settlers, who had ben placed in temporary quarters on the beach at Pito-one, to be known in later years as Petone, examined the situation for themselves 9nd did not approve of the change of sito that had been made. They began to put forward their views and bring pressure to bear upon the officers of the company. Then on March 2 a- report of a flood in the -river/ reached tho beach camp. Colonel Wakefield visited the river settlement the next day and reported that the tales of the flood had been exaggerated. But he had to .admit that' the water had been eight, inches deep in' some of the houses already erected. " , , ; •„ , Captain Smith suggested. that,, the danger of flood in the Hutt River could be-removed by diverting part of the waters of the river to tlie next stream to the westward,' the' Waiwetu, there being a difference of four feet in the levels of the two rivers. He prepared plans for a ohunnel, but the settlers had learned -that the river had moods and they were strengthened in their desire to revert to tho Thorndon site. E. J. Wakefield, writing to his father, Edward Gibbon Wakefield, on March 3, 1810, pointed out that if the town was placed in the Hutt Valley and tho Thorndon flat was treated as country land three or foitf fortunate persons would become the owners of-the site of what undoubtedly would become a considerable town. He . thought thai: it would ,be : better to treat the, Thorndon flat as town land even if the original town was situated in tho Hutt Valley. Then all the early colonists could have Thorndon sections and unfairness would be avoided. Within a few days of the Hutt flood the ship Adelaide arrived with the sccond batch of settlers. These settlers required somewhere to squat while the, survey was proceeding, and they iver» given temporary locations at Thorndon. There they decided to remain. Their vote was almost unanimous on this point. ,

•Probablv the deciding factor in causing Colonel Wakefield to revert to the original site, said Eather Gilbert, was a letter addressed to him by a number of the most prominent colonists. Tinoriginal document is in the Mitchcll Library at Svdnoy. It is dated March 15, 18-M), and contains the following "We, the undersigned, very earnestly and solemnly press upon your attention our belief that our property aiul the prosperity of the colony would be destroyec: by fixing the town'on the River Hutti ami that, on the contrary, a site eligible in the highest degree is presented in the land i>o!'deriug upon Lambton Harbour. . . . We feel under the painful necessity ot ijii'onnii}£ you that in the event of tho location being made where now proposed on the banks of the river, a very large proportion of itiie colonists, both landowners and labourers, have made up their minds to abandon the undertaking altogether. We beg, therefore, earnestly lo request that you will return to your original proposition to make the first and principal settlement at Lambton harbour." , This letter was signed by George Samuel .Evans. E. Daniell, Daniel Hiddifnr'd. D. S. Durie, Henry Cole, J. J. 'l'iiine, and other colonists.

The survev of the town on its present site was begun a little later, the Unit Yallev site having been abandoned. When the survey began there were almost two thousand settlers in Port Nicholson clamouring for land. The Sur-veyor-General had an inadequate slafi', and he was faced with a serious difficulty in the attitude of the Maoris, who insisted that they had ..not sold..their land. The Maoris put every possible obstacle in the way of the surveyors. They uprooted pegs and obliterated marks, But the plan was prepared, and it was. laid open for . the inspection of the colonists between July .20 nnd 27, 1840. The selection of sections began

oil July 28 in a wooden building that became Barrett's Hotel. The selection was stopped on July 31, the reason alleged being a mistake in the plan. Father Gilbert suggested that probably the real renson was that Captain Smith, in tho original plan, hatl made provision for wider streets than now exist, and that the plan had to be amended in order to reduce the streets, and so Ret sufficient land for all the settlers. The selection began again on August 10. Very early in the history of the settlement it was recognised that the town had been badly laid out. Father Gilbert did not think that the blnme belonged to the Surveyor-General, who was not responsible tor the faulty arrangements made by the New Zealand Company, and whe was given an almost iniiwssible task lo perform within an inadequate period; He had to find 1100 acres of level land, or alleged}- level land, aud he was pressed by settlers who were so. anxious to get their seclions that Ih'ey cared nothing about the narrowness of the streets and the failure of tho streets lo follow tho contour of the land. The blame for faulty arrangements rested very largely on "Colonel Wakefield. . llr. Elsdon Best, who was in tlfe chair, said he agreed that the directors of the company and Colonel. "Wakefield had b6Cn responsible for extraordinarily bad arrangements. Considering the way in which Colonel Wakefield was sent out to New Zealand to buy land, the way in which lie bought the land—or thought he bought it—and the. way in.which, the settlers were sent out, it was remarkable that the settlement succeeded at all. He believed the settlement had been saved by the fact that the Port Nicholson Maoris were surrounded by enemies, with most of their own fighting men away i.it the Olinthams, and so were rather glad to have the protection afforded by the presence of European settlers.