Wairarapa Times-Age FRIDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1943. AN IGNOMINIOUS RETREAT.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 October 1943, Page 2

Wairarapa Times-Age FRIDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1943. AN IGNOMINIOUS RETREAT.

TN an address to (lie Rotary Club yesterday, the Masterton Town Clerk (Air'G. T. O’Hara Smith) dealt in ruthlessly frank terms with what he rightly called the retreat Irom’town planning in New Zealand. The story he unfolded is one which gives every self-respecting New Zealander cause to blush with shame. Not infrequently we are told that we are-a progressive people. Where town planning and regional planning are concerned, however, we are, on our record to date, as little progressive as any people in the world —lair account being taken of relative opportunities and advantages. As Air O’Hara Smith reminded his hearers yesterday, what appeared to be a promising start was made when the Town Planning Act of 1926 was passed, but in the) seventeen years that have elapsed since that date nothing worth speaking about has been built upon what was then supposed to be the foundation of a great community reform. This is not a party political question because a succession of governments have alike shown themselves spiritless and lacking in courageous initiative in dealing with town planning, as they have in regard Jo the larger enterprise of regional planning, and to the intimately related problem of modernising our absurdly antiquated and inadequate system of local government. Responsibility for this unhappy and humiliating state of affairs rests much less on the politicians of all colours who hate bowed so meekly before those who object to the substitution of order for disorder —that in a nutshell being what regional and town planning amount to —than on the people who elect politicians. The advantages to be derived from a wisely-directed planning and regulation of urban and other development are apparent to any moderately intelligent human being \\lio. gives them even a little consideration and thought, lhe root difficulty to be overcome is that most people either are unaware that these advantages are within reach or regard them with apathetic indifference.

Air O’Hara Smith contended yesterday that town planning should be insisted upon and enforced whatever the cost. In the long run, however, good planning is a means of keeping down costs by ensuring that a maximum return shall be obtained on whatever outlay is made on development and that money shall not be wasted by working on confused and ill-considered lines. The architectural and other standards to be instituted in a given town, and the extent to which it is to provide amenities of various kinds, are matters to be determined in accordance with the aspirations of its citizens and their available resources. At any time, however, and in any circumstances it is economical, as well as wise on other grounds, to plan the development of a town, instead of allowing that development to proceed by chance. Examples of the penalties that are invited by a neglect of planning arc to be seen in towns like Masterton, as well as in the confused and congested development of Wellington and other large centres. Thoughts are turning at present to post-war (development and expansion. If that development is to lead to an elevation of industrial and housing standards and to an improvement of lhe conditions of community life generally, it must be based on the methodical planning, not only of towns but of countrysides. We shall make poor and stumbling progress if the retreat from planning continues.