RESCUE OF GOLF COURSES

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 556, 8 January 1929, Page 9

RESCUE OF GOLF COURSES

TOWN-PLANNING CONSIDERATION Owing to the demand for houses, the golf links in the neighbourhood of our large towns are always being threatened with buiiding development, states an English writer. As the Land rises in I value, there is a contest between the ! golfers, who wish to retain their I courses as open spaces, and speculative I builders who propose to build. For* ; tunately for the spaciousness of cities it is now possible, under the Town I Planning Act, to schedule golf links as | private open spaces that cannot be I built over. This does not mean that the link* can be taken away from the owner, but that the local authority j responsible and the proprietors of the ! golf links have come to an agreement I that it shall be marked in the town- ' planning map to be preserved as an open space lor ever. This procedure j has been adopted by a number of farsighted committees of golf links around London.

I hear, too, that landowners in the vicinity are beginning to lind that they can demand higher prices for land adjoining any open space that is permanently restricted from building, and that the value of their property as a whole is increased by the sterilisation of a part. In this way, without any compensation being given, it is found possible to preserve those open spaces that are so urgently required both for the sake of health and amenity.