THE DREAR SURREY SIDE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXV, Issue 252, 24 October 1934, Page 13

THE DREAR SURREY SIDE.

THAMES IMPROVEMENTS. LONDON, September 20. For many years one of the things that has impressed Americans visiting London, and has been the cause of considerable comment among English people themselves, particularly Londoners, is the extraordinary contrast between the north side of the River Thames and the south. On the north side, Victoria embankment is Hanked by excellent buildings, tasteful gardens and rows of green trees. On tho south a medley of dirty, unsightly buildings and decaying factories meets the eye. But all this is soon to bo altered. For the London County Council lias beforo it a plan to lay out the south side, between Waterloo Bridge and Westminster Bridge, on a scale similar in dignity to that of the north side. The London County Council, which is controlled by the Labour party, thinks London has been needing development of this sort for many years, and now it is in control intends to press forward with it. It proposes to buy outright property and sites worth £1,500,000, and to do this, the highways committee recommends the council to promote legislation empowering the acquisition by compulsion of the necessary buildings and lands. Mr. Herbert Morrison, the loader of tho London County Council, in a recent interview, said that he hoped for a promenade on the south side of the river with flower beds and gardens. Behind the gardens will rise dignified buildings of Wfcich the London County Council will be the landlord. They will be built as suites of offices, or flats, for the middle class, with a possibility of a huge hotel overlooking the Thames as the central piece of tho picture.

"Whatever typo of building is erected," Mr. Morrison said, "this improvement is going to be architecturally worthy of London, with an eye to the future. Good Londoners have been much ashamed of the drear appearance of the south bank for too many years. We are out to make London proud of this important part of Central London, and to make it a thing of beauty instead of an eyesore."