HEATON PARK SITE PURCHASED

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 76, 22 December 1937, Page 3

HEATON PARK SITE PURCHASED

—Press Association.)

Erection of New Mental Hospital VILLA-TYPE LAY-OUT

(By Telegraph

WELLINGTON, Last Nightw The purchase by the Government Ifrom. Mr. Alexander Stuart of the Heaton Park estate between Bulls and Marton for the purpose of erecting a new mental hospital was announced by the Minister in Charge of Mental Hospitals, Hon. P, Praser, this evening, "This estate is approximately 541 acres in extent, and the new institution to be built there will be conducted on the yilla system," Mr. Praser said. The number of patients at Porirua was now much in excess of that foi which the institution was designed, and, furthermore, the layout of the buildingj there was not in harmony with modern xequirements, continued Mr. Praser. It had become, therefore,' a matter oi urgent necessity to secure for the mental hospitals department a property which would lend itself to the establishment of a villa mental hospital to be conducted on the principles which had been so conspicuously suceessful at Kingseat, Auckland, and at Stoke in the Nelson district. The Heaton Park estate was approxi« mately 541 acres in erient and situated just off the Bulls-Turakina road and about five miles from Marton. "There is ample room,'' said Mr. Praser, "for the erection of numeroaa villas, which with laundry, workshops, stores and other aecessurv buildings, will constitute the new institution as well as for farming operations, which always form an important part of hospital aetivities. • "The new institution, which will take several years to complete, is intended to serve the neads of the Taranaki, Manawatu and northern portion of the Wellington provinee, and Porirua, which in the mmntime will have \ ery considerable struchiral altei* ations made, will function as a niesropolitan mental hospital. "It is proposed to begin the preliminary work at Heaton Park early in the New Year," concluded the Minister.