CITY RELIEF WORKS.

(RESULTS IN TWO YEARS.

[REMARKABLE IMPROVEMENTS

[TOTAL EXPENDITURE £52,500.

DEVELOPING WASTE PLACES.

'Auckland is riot aware of the civic fisscts that have been created during the last two years by unemployment relief ■works. total sum expended, including Government subsidy, is £52,569. The extent to which the amenities of the city have been extended by this expenditure pannot be realised unless one makes £ tour of the various areas treated. In the past the city has purchased pleasant places for park purposes. The policy followed in creating work for unemployed has been to transform practically waste places and render them suitable for organised sport or for play. After & tour of the works so carried out, one is convinced that through the plight of the unemployed the city has gained tremendously in those tilings which can hardly be .valued in money. Every new playing area, fevery fresh breathing spate, has a present and potential value assessable only in the health and well-being of the people. Labour Only Subsidised. 'A clause in the conditions governing State subsidies for the relief of unemployment states that where the number of unemployed in a district is sufficient to warrant local bodies in undertaking relief works, subsidies of 50 per cent, on the laboui; costs will be paid on a wage basis of 12s and 9s a day for married and eiuglo tnen respectively, provided that the (works have not been included in any schedule of works for which loan authority has been obtained. In regard to such works carried out by voluntary subscription a pound for pound subsidy will be granted on the cost of materials as well as labour, and the subsidy on labour will not be limited to relief rates of pay.

Thns a higher proportion of the cost has been/provided by subsidy in respect of tho/expenditure on the stadium from the. Mayor's unemployment relief fund. iThe total there expended under this echome was £BBB3. Under the unemployment. loan the sum is now £5987.

The land that has been developed at the fetadium is six and a-quarter acres, out of the total of 20 acres that will be enclosed by the high fences now being erected. / Within the track is an area of two three-quarter acres, now a beautiful sward of young grass. It will be a magnificent sports and football ground. Surrounding it is a cinder track measuring 440 yds., and then a concrete racing track with cambered circular ends. It is a natural arnpitheatre, and the slope on three sides has been terraced in concrete.

/ Originally Swamp, Most of the ground treated was originally a swamp embraced in the waterworks reserve, and another part was formerly the site of the abattoirs. The ewainp portion was filled in with earth from the necessary excavations, the average depth of filling being sft. A good road has been constructed from the Great North Road to a wide area where cars may be parked on the south side of the Btadium. Another entrance is from Old {Mill Road, on the north side. On the .west side the fairly steep ridge is covered with pinus insignis, planted some ten years ago, and the trees give a fine setting to a ground which will bo a credit to Auckland. It should be ready for use by tho end of tho year.

Between the stadium and the Great North Road is a fair area, which, with a little levelling, would add to the playing fields of the city m a very convenient place. Splendid Playing Fields. Another remarkably fine playingground has been prepared by "uneinliloyed" in Walkers Road, Point Chevaier. The area is 12 acres, secured by the city for £B2OO. It was part of a subdivision block, and the City Council took the opportunity of adding to the area that had to be set aside for reserve purposes./ With an expenditure of £6700 practically solely on labour, this splendid piece of land was levelled and graded, and is no\v divided into six full-sized football grounds. The grade is very little, about 1 in 70. A splendid sward has been produced, and the ground that is bounded by four roads will supply much-needed accommodation for games Another great asset developed by subsidised relief work is the Harbour View Reserve at Point Chevalier. A seawall was constructed along the whole length of about 300 yards, and what formerly •was a rough, scrub-covered bank has been sloped off and planted with pohutukawas. On top, the flat fringe is in grass. Already it is a pleasant sea park; when the trees grow it will be exquisite. The cost was £2IOO. The Williamson Avenue end of the Grey Lynn Park has also been developed. At a! total cost of £4165, a rough gully, simply a waste, has been filled in and levelled for the purposes of a children's playground. In Epsom rough rocky corners have been treated. Some £6OO has been spent in the Pencarrow Avenue reserve, making a small, but useful playing space. In St. 'Andrew's Road, tho expenditure of £2OO on the reserve has prepared a space suitable for a few tennis courts. In the Epsom Domain, adjoining Gillies Avenue, £2OOO/has been spent in levelling an area of the big rocky waste, through which a road will be constructed. Harmony in the Domain.

Familiar to most people is the work done in the Auckland Domain, where altogether about £15,600 has been expended in laying out the surroundings of the War Memorial Museum and tlio winter gardens, and constructing roads. This essential work brings harmony to the whole place. The situ of the old hospital annexe, the last remnant of the exhibition buildings, has been levelled arid made ready for grass and the probable laying out of tennis courts in ideal surroundings. Further, an old scoria pit behind the new portion of the winter gardens lias bee» prepared, at a cost of £I3OO, for a fernery, and at the moment a contractor is building the covering pergola. The Domain has thus been vastly improved. Unsightly corners have been cleaned up, and the huge amount of earth-work dona around the museum building gives it an appropriate setting. About £4OO has been spent in developing the Waiatarua Park. One and a-quar-ter rhiles of road formation has been made along the northern side, mostly side-cut-ting work, and beside this pleasant wind ing highway a footpath is also being made.

In all this work the city is building for to-day and a greater to-morrow. The impression sometimes indicated that relief work is usually of no real value is entirely wrong. It has been done thoroughly and well, even if every worker was not :v competent navvy, and the city is very much the gainer.