More Offices In St. Elmo?

Press, Volume XCII, Issue 27764, 15 September 1955, Page 10

More Offices In St. Elmo?

The Christchurch City Council has probably left it too late to do anything effective to check the commercial invasion of the university precinct, which has been accelerated by the proposal to convert the whole of St. Elmo Courts into commercial offices. The council probably has no power, either, to prevent this waste of firstclass housing at a time of housing shortage. The council’s most recent mistakes in excluding St. Elmo alone from the block earmarked for the civic centre and in tacitly acquiescing in the conversion of the ground floor for government offices seem irretrievable. The immediate result is that 42 tenants (with those evicted from the ground floor), who were comfortably housed in St. Elmo, have to And new and much less convenient homes. The cost of these new homes, with the heavy cost of converting flats into offices (for which the building was not designed), would go a long way towards providing a more central block of government offices, thus releasing other premises for private business. This transaction is, incidentally, an illustration of the folly of trying to concentrate top large a proportion of building capacity on houses. If, as a result, flats and houses have to be converted into offices, as is happening steadily in Christchurch, the apparent housing gain is illusory. The longer-term result of the St. Elmo affair is that commerce has quickened the pace of its approach to Rolleston avenue. Perhaps this process could not have been stopped once the Canterbury University College Council, with the approval of the City Council, made the initial error of deciding to move to Kiccarton. But the City Council has made a very half-hearted attempt to hold this neighbourhood, with its pleasant atmosphere, for housing. After the loss of an appeal before the Town and Country Planning Appeal Board, the council gave up the struggle without really trying to see what other courses were open to it. It may still not be to late to approach the Government to see if anything can be done to preserve at least a little of the character of the university precinct, although that would unfortunately discriminate against some landholders. The Prime Minister (Mr Holland) should be particularly interested, because he is a Christchurch member. If nothing can be done to save St. Elmo Courts for their original purpose, it might well serve as a useful example of the weakness of town planning in New Zealand and of the need to do better. It is an example that the general public can I easily understand.