Untitled

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1358, 5 December 1872, Page 2

We publish a letter in our present number from a correspondent who emphatically expresses the local public feeling with regard to an impudent attempt to monopolise the river frontage of Greywoutb. Since the letter was received, we notice that carpenters have proceeded to roof in the coffer-dam of which onr*corre3pondent complains, and to-day frequenters of the front street will probably see completed, in the most prominent position possible, one of plainest buildings by which a picturesque township like Greymouth could be disfigured. The picturesqueness, however, is of less import than the principle, or want of principle, which permits such an infringement upon common public rightsi There is no more excuse for offending tho eye, and for infringing upon the purchased rights Jof property-holders in the lower end of the townshipj than there is for doing 30 in parts of the town which pretend to superiority commercially, t morally, or otherwise, and in this instance the offence seems to us altogether inexcusable. The precedent is a dangerous one. From Tainui street to the Gorge there is an extensive aroa every inch of which might be occupied profitably by importers, exporters, or any I other local residents whose business i might be promoted by proximity to the'

river^ frontage. Forsyth and Masters, Hamilton and Nichol, Hamilton and Co., and many others who have selected " back " streets as sites for their business premises might, with permission, have erected buildings which would have been palaces compared with this coffer-clam, but permission was simply impossible without a revolution in the municipal kitchen, and we warrant that tbe men> bers of these firms never for once dreamt of monopolising what is understood to be secured to the inhabitants of Greymouth so long as Greyrmmth is inhabited. To make short of a small matter, this structure had better bo resolved as speedily as possible into studs and weather-boards for use elsewhere, ov tl\e Borough. Council, as at present constituted, should vary the monotony of its existence by meeting and resolving itself into private citizens.