Old Post Office Site

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 1007, 25 June 1930, Page 10

Old Post Office Site

GOVERNMENT NOW REASONABLE

THE conditions upon which the Government is willing to let the Citv Council have the old Post Office site, Shortland Street, as a new traffic outlet bear little resemblance to tinterms upon which negotiations of earlier years were based.

The council has long held the wish to make a connecting link from Shortland Street to Fort Street, the idea being to continue High Street through to Quay Street by way of Commerce Street 'and a new thoroughfare across the existing railway station property. The stumbling block, however, was finance, the then Government's price upon the old post office block being regarded as far beyond the means of the council.

The Postmaster-General, the Hon. J. B. Donald, in announcing Cabinet's latest offer, describes the terms as not harsh.

Cabinet decided that a piece of ground 57ft 3iu wide on the Shortland Street frontage, with a depth of 50ft, is to be retained for post office purposes and the price to be charged for the remainder of the propertj 7 is £69,100. In addition to this, however, the council will be required to make oveito the Auckland Law Society the piece of land at the back of the present Supreme Court, for the sum of £2,000, it being understood that the society will make over to the Justice Department the block in question, on condition that the Justice Department spends a further £2,000 on the new Supreme Court library, and keeps the balance of land as an open space. “RIDICULOUS FIGURE” The late Government’s requirements were that the council should pay £212,000 for the post office building and site, a. figure the council deemed ridiculous in view of the fact that its own valuer nominated £IOO.OOO as a reasonable sum. Next the council offered to buy a strip of 40ft between Shortland and Fort Streets. Had the Government

met this offer one effect would have been to expose as a street frontage the whole of the bare brick wall of the National Bank which runs through from street to street. The Government did not countenance the scheme. Another proposal was that the road should be put through in the form of a covered way, with clearance as high as the second floor of a building to be erected overhead. The Government, however, still did not approve. NO EXCHANGE Having also made fruitless offers to exchange land for the Shortland Street site the City Council sent a deputation in March. 1928, to wait upon the Minister of Public Works, but the answer was a political one—the question would be considered and was being considered when the Government went out of office. The site has a frontage to Shortland Street of 102 ft Sin and to Fort Street of 94ft lin. The depth on the west side is 136 ft lOin, and on the east 142 ft 2in. Excluding the area to he retained for a post ofllce, the frontage to Shortland Street is about 45ft. Taken on a basis that land fronting Shortland Street in that position is worth about £7OO a foot and that the Fort Street frontage is worth between £4OO and £SOO a foot, the Government offer is not an unreasonable one. There is the further consideration that no contribution is being ask -d for the construction of the new post office. In view of these terms, Cabinet has evidently considered that the area at the rear of the Supreme Court should be sold by the City Council for the low figure of £2,000, which must be about £5,000 less than the price which would be asked ordinarily. The council will consider the offer tomorrow evening.