THE GLOBE. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1879.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1775, 28 October 1879, Page 2

THE GLOBE. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 28, 1879.

In dealing as they have done with the vexed question of private streets, the City Council have done one of the best things for tho city that has boon done for a long time. For years past, owing to tho laxity of former Councils in dealing with this subject, the question has been neglected, until now these private streets have become a positive nuisance in the city. Not only so, hut they are in many instances perfect hot-beds of disease. Under the old system owners of land simply cut it up into building allotments, and sold it to purchasers with frontages on streets laid off on papor, Tho result has been that landowners have pocketed tho money leaving the city in many instances to form tho streets. By the resolution passed last night, however, this system will no longer obtain. Anyone wishing to cut up sections into building lots, will now, before any houses are built, have to form, metal, channel, and asphalte those streets, thus providing for the health of the residents and the city at largo. Why this has not been done before is a mystery. An observer need only walk down tho wretched little alleys dignified with tho name of streets, which abound in Christchurch, to recognise the urgent necessity for some such legislation as this. The inhabitants of Christchurch have gone on from year to year perpetuating and increasing the evil in their midst until there have grown up regular nests of courts and alleys, which, as the city grows in importance and size, will bo found to be merely refuges for crime, and tho propagation of infection. Now that tho Council have at last taken the matter in hand it is to be hoped they will carry out the provisions of the resolution most stringently.

Another phase in the great comedy of the municipal designs has been reached. The Council have determined that the two pretty pictures of the elevations of the proposed buildings, as delineated by the authors of “Avon’’and “Well Considered,” shall be exhibited to the admiring gaze of the ratepayers. What practical end is to be attained by this it is difficult to see. The plans, with all details, have been before the ratepayers for some period. They were inspected by a large number of people, the majority of whom left the room in which the exhibition was held very little wiser than when they went in. Therefore, it is very diffi- , cult to know what reason there is for exhibiting these very pretty pictures again, except as a cheap show. Surely the Council do not intend to ask the ratepayers to accept one of these plans on their mere authority, or the still more hazardous basis of a display before a public meeting of the highly colored elevations. If Christchurch is to have a Town Hall, the plan must be decided on by some more reliable method than this. The ratepayers require to have the report of experts as to whether the plans selected by the Council will answer the requirements before committing the city to the expenditure of some £30,000. With all duo respect to the wisdom of the City Councillors, it may bo questioned whether the more fact of their having been elected to that high and honorable position endues them with knowledge sufficient to deal with so important a question almost entirely without professional guidance. Wo contend that this is a subject properly and entirely for decision by experts, who alone would be able to give an opinion upon which the ratepayers can come to a sound decision as to the plan bast suited for the city, not only as it is now, but in the future. To place these two pictures before the ratepayers and ask them to choose between them seems absurd, and only on a par with the way in which the matter has been dealt with from the first, and which has resulted in making the City Council of Christchurch anything but renowned for wisdom in the eyes of the colony. Not a single argument was adduced in the course of the discussion last night why those pictures should be shown, nor was it stated what end or object the Council have in view in so doing. The ratepayers only know this —that through their representatives they are committed so far to the plans of the details of which, and of the reasons which le d to their selection they themselves are completely in the dark. The probable conclusion of the affair will be that the Council will find itself in the position of having to re- commence the whole proceedings, and that tho ratepayers will decline to go blindfolded into a largo expenditure without some guarantee from those competent to give an opinion that the money so spout will give what is needed.