CITY AND PORT.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 19212, 19 January 1928, Page 7

CITY AND PORT.

TO THB EDITOR 0* THB FBZSB. Sir, —In view of our City's declining status as an overseas port, it is imperative that we make the best of a bad situation as an overseas port, and make our minds up to develop the place to the best of our ability on more restricted lines. The main point to consider so far as we here are concerned is the economic, and that point of course is chiefly concerned in the cost of cartage to and from the ship. The tunnel road will probably do this, and may be the final solution so rar as the main ooean liners and tramps arc concerned, and Lyttelton will P ro " vide ample room for these, even if more water space has to be occupied by large, double wharves with sheds thereon. Having admitted that, I_ would like here to advance the claims of the Sumner entrance as a secondary port to cope with the coastal trade proper, till time shall prove its capacity to deal with a more extended itinerary. By doing this, we shall give Lyttelton the extra room required through doubling the width of 6ome of the wharves, in the comparatively restricted water area, and at the same time raise the prestige of this district by th? provision of what is already provided in the other three main ports, namely, the "spectacular" element. It may seem a slight foundation on which to build one's hopes of a great city and port, but it is really very important. People are attracted to a place which has something spectacular about it, and when they go to live at that place they take care if they can afford it to live on a site from which they can view the spectacular. This attracts population and population attracts trade, and so the world moves on Those people who object to progress of this kind naturally move out. They are natural bom countrymen, and wider spaces cap be found for them. My contention is that it would pay us handsomelv to this spectacle on this side of the hills, facing the estuary. It seems to me just as right to spend several hundred thousand pounds that way. in fact much more so, considering the two objects, than for instance in spending say a couple of hundred thousand pounds ori Town Hall or any other public building that can very well be done without till such time as the provision or the above facilities has caused trade to expand sufficiently for us to afford

them. Those iu favour of the tunnel road should amalgamate with thoso in favour of developing the ostuary. Between the two of us we shall certainly make the money fly, but it may prove the beginning of better things hero. If we do not make an endeavour on these lines, people will drift away to places where there is moro to be seen and clone. If a city in a new country like this is not to be n trade centre, for what purpose can it exist? Wo have not sufficient people of wealth to keep the town gome without increasing our trade, and the way to increase it is to make it moro like our successful neighbours. If it cannot be built, up by its overseas trade on account of its" position, then by all mcaiis equip it for an expanded inter-colonial trade, till wo have actually won s position by our own .local efforts. At different, periods ever sine© the foundation of the district discussions have nrisen on this subject. We have accepted tho present, order of things and declined, so far, any further measures of a revolutionary character, with tho result that the City has reached a point in its career which threatens to become a fixed one for r» time, preparatory to a movement back to where it started. —Yours, etc. COASTWISE.