TOWN PLANNING

Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 October 1943, Page 2

TOWN PLANNING

ITS FUTURE POSSIBILITIES IN NEW ZEALAND POSITIVE DIRECTION NEEDED. INACTIVITY IN THE PAST DEPLORED. The retreat from town planning in New Zealand and possibilities for future planning were dealt with by the Town Clerk, Mr G. T. O’Hara Smith, in .an address at today’s luncheon of the Masterton Rotary Club. Referring to the Town Planning Act of 1926, Mr O’Hara Smith said the Act aimed at some correction of the haphazard and uncontrolled development of towns and cities in the past and the direction and control of their future development. The Act directed that every borough of 1000 population or over should prepare a town planning scheme before 1930. The reaction to town planning was a policy of masterly inactivity and the Government deferred the terminating date to 1932 and later to 1937 and then made no .dpnd when the latter date expired, Aj(he Town Planning Director’s t4rm of office expired and the position had remained vacant to this day. One or two boroughs, recognising the benefits, decided to go ahead with their town plan. One town engaged a town planning surveyor, who prepared plans and with the borough solicitors, the clauses vo implement the plans. That work took five years. The scheme was adopted by the borough and a date fixed for it to come into force. Some property owners took action to have their claims for compensation brought before the Court. Compensation was claimed at high figures. That was sufficient to throw the council into a state of financial panic. The Government agreed to give the council power to withdraw or modify the provisions of its scheme and the borough proceeded to sterilise its own scheme by emasculating therefrom the provisions which might, if enforced, involve it in payment of compensation.

Passing on to the possibilities of town planning for the future, Mr O’Hara Smith said there must be positive direction which would lead the public and overcome both passive and active objectors. In post-war planning there would be need of vision to ensure a planned town where industry could be developed in its proper place. The preparation of such a plan must be insisted upon by legislation, with no line of retreat permitted, either by the Government in office or by the borough council responsible for carrying its plan into effect. The preparation of a town planning scheme was a job for a specialist, but there would be unlimited scope for all citizens who possessed a sense of civic responsibility to give good service in furthering the planned development of their town.

Objections to town planning, said Mr O’Hara Smith, came from two main sources, those who believed that there was no necessity for planning and those who objected because of the cost. It was only logical that a town should be properly planned for its future development. Common sense cried aloud for it. Nearly £20,000 was paid out for planning the Centennial Exhibition, yet it was questionable whether Wellington had ever spent one-fifth of that amount upon planning its future development and in rectifying mistakes due to lack of vision in the past. The planned development of any town should not be choked by anyone or any body of persons upon the ground that it was going to mean expense. The policy of drift which had characterised the development of towns in New Zealand, wherein everybody’s business was nobody’s business, cried out for prompt arrest and remedial treatment. That, however, could never function while the fountain head, the Government, continued to violate its’ own legislation through invertebrate inaction.