TOWN PLANNING

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 138, 6 March 1920, Page 8

TOWN PLANNING

On Wednesday night a large audience filled the Khandailah Public Hall to listen to a lecture on town-planning. Mr. Lynnberg, president of the Onslow Progressive Association, introduced the speakers, and'for over two hours the audience gave cjose attention to a programme comprising moving pictures, lecture, and lantern slides. The moving pictures, which, with the machine, were loaned by the Y.M.C.A.. depicted a lour of Now Zealanders through London, New Zealand ,camps in England, a Y.M.C.A. trip up the Thames for "diggers," scenes in Edinburgh, and a "movie" of Wellington, showing sornO of the needs of better planning. The second part of the programme was taken up by Mr. A. Leigh Hunt, president of the Greater Wellington TownPlanning Association, in a lecture on town planning. He showed what town-plan-ning really meant and how vitally it affected the well-being _of every* citizen, and of future generations. Mr. Hunt illustrated his remarks by a very fine selection of lantern slides, contrasting the beauties and efficiency of town-planned suburbs, and cities with the haphazard conditions prevailing in many parts of Wellington andJ the Dominion generally He said that in place of the long, straight, characterless streets' so common in' New Zealand, properly planned towns usually had curved street?, which, if too wide for ordinary traffic, were planted with grass or trees on either side, or in the centre, accoording to local circumstances. Mr. Clutha Mackenzie, who received a hearty welcome, 6poke of the urgent need of planning the new towns in various parts of the, country, so that the evils existing in the larger cities might be prevented and thousands of pounds saved in the process He paid a compliment to the early settlers who Jiad started Wellington on right lines, but whoso plans had not been carried out by succeeding generations. The need for a good town-planning Act was alio stressed—an Act that would make the State itself amenable to its conditions.' At the conclusion a vote of thanks was passeil to Mr. Hunt, Mr. Mackenzie, Mr. Cresswell, of tho Y.M.C.A. (who opsrntod the kinema), and to tho Y.M.C.A. for tho loan of tho moving pictures and machine. In reply, Mr. Hunt thanked the audience for its closo attention, and urged the gentlemen present to back up the Onslow Progressive Association, which was doing so much useful work for the district.