Beer-fuelled workers and lunch paper designs slated

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34127, 13 April 1976, Page 28

Beer-fuelled workers and lunch paper designs slated

(From our Wellington reporter)

New' Zealand has a need for a consulting body of sport and recreation planners whose services are available at all stages of survey and appraisal, planning, construction and management of sport and recreation facilities, according to Mr Bill Lovell-Smith, a Christchurch consulting engineer.

He told a symposium in Wellington on the design of indoor sports and recreation facilities that such consultants would have much the same role as town planners specialising in this field, and could assemble by consultation the professional expertise in related disciplines. This could provide a valuable service to local and regional authorities, sports and educational bodies, recreational and cultural groups, architects and engineers, and do much to collate and rationalise the “recreational scene,” Mr LovellSmith said. Cost paramount “In almost all instances, cost has been the paramount design consideration, and good design and construction

techniques have usually been sacrificed on this altar. “It is almost a traditional requirement of sports bodies that they have a grocer-ex-carpenter on their building committee who designs the edifice on a piece of lunch paper and who arranges construction with friends loosely connected to the industry, second-sand materials, and beer-fuelled working bees of willing but inexperienced helpers,” he said. “The results have usually beeen ghastly.” It seemed to be axiomatic to these bodies that professional fees, should be avoided. Local bodies, which should know better, themselves often followed this pattern, encumbering their sportsmen with a sub-stan-dard building and their ratepayers with a maintenanle burden for a hall that could not possibly contribute to its upkeep. Tragedy “The tragedy is that once a mediocrity is foisted on the public the impetus is lost, and the need, the incentive, and often the will to improve on it is gone,” Mr Lovell-Smith said.

“Sports bodies have tended to be entirely independent and parochial. This usually prevents them from

negotiation with others with similar objectives to their mutual advantage, and leads to needless and costly duplication of facilities, often close to each other.” In Christchurch, two organisations (with cash) were striving to build minor sports halls within a couple of miles while a darts club (with cash) sought rooms, a rifle club (with cash) wanted an indoor range, and a tennis club (with cash) sought indoor courts. None of these bodies had sufficient resources to x build anything but a sub-sta'ndard version of what they required but jointly they could, with subsidies, erect a multi-purpose hall serving all their needs, he said. They could then expect more respect and assistance from both local-body and government resources.

The Government’s allocation for sport and recreation might have to be cut this year, but its commitment to the programme remained strong, the Minister of Recreation and Sport (Mr Highct) told the symposium. He questioned whether all the types of facilities being built were what people wanted and needed, anl asked whether all the public money spent had been justified. Since the recreation and sports programme had been introduced in 1973-74, almost s7m had been allo-'

cated from the public purse for the provision of facilities. The scheme had enabled projects worth about s2om tc be built.

“These buildings, whether we like it or not in all cases, have become the physical symbols and heritage of the recreation and sports programme,” Mr Highet said. “I am sure that even with the benefit of only two or three years hindsight we could not say all the money was well spent." Narrow group Facilities were a fundamental need and, too often in the past, it had been the “better-off suburbs with their well-organised clubs” which had benefited. These clubs had often provided facilities only for a narrow range of interests. Versatility had often been missing in planning for facilities. It was “criminal" to have fine facilities being under-utilised when there was a very real demand for places to run programmes and activities. “The provision of staff for recreation centres must become a priority for local authorities,” he said. “We have plans to make the subsidy scheme for recreation staff salaries more equitable and, even though we face a cut in our allocation, the salary scheme will remain.’’