City Council using radio in planning

Press, 17 September 1976, Page 11

City Council using radio in planning

By

KEN COATES

The Christchurch City Council is using radio in a bid to promote wider understanding of town planning needs, and to find out what people think should be done in the city. So far, Radio New Zealand has broadcast an hour-long “Town Planning Talkback” from 3ZB on September 1, 8 and 15. Surprisingly, this has been scheduled in the evenings, from 8 o’clock until 9 o’clock, at a time when a great many residents are watching television.

From a braodcasting point of view, however, the slot gave the advantage of an hour without commercials (the City Council met the cost of the time that would have been devoted to advertising). Starting on Monday, Radio Avon will braodcast 60-second interviews with a cross section of residents on town planning topics.

These have been prerecorded and will be broadcast throughout the day and in the evening. As the programme planner. Graham Parsonage, points out, many people vitally concerned with community needs are young married couples and it is important that the broadcasts span times when they are listening. The public will be encouraged to telephone the station, off-air. Responses and opinions will be recorded and will be communicated to the City Council which wants a Islands post

A Christchurch man, Mr lan Fogelberg, has been appointed general manager of the Cook Islands Tourist Authority. The authority was established under New Zealand’s aid programme to the Cook Islands, to promote and develop tourism there.

cross-section of opinion. The best of the comments from the public, or any views which stimulate further thought and discussion, will also be broadcast. The town planning series on Radio Avon will extend over three weeks. The assistant city planner (Mr Bill Williams) confirmed yesterday that the City Council was paying for the programmes. Radio New Zealand had been most generous, he said, and it might broadcast further programmes next year. The deal with Radio Avon was on a commercial basis and was costing several thousands of dollars, he added. Use of the media was only part of the City Council’s programme of communicating with professional groups, local community organisations and the public on town planning. The district town planning scheme was to be reviewed next year, and the council, considered it important’ to have a feedback on what people considered was the needs of their city. Radio New Zealand’s talk-back sessions were on residential areas, suburban shopping and community and neighbourhood. The producer, Rod Neale, said that the programme on suburban shopping areas was the most productive and prerecorded inserts of pertinent comment helped. The last programme in the series on community needs, broadcast on Wednesday evening, was patchy. In the studio was a panel consisting of Mr Williams, Cr. Neil Hattaway, Cr Peter Blaxall, and

the city engineer, Mr Peter Secular. Several callers asked questions entirely unrelated to the subject under discussion and the programme was thrown off direction. And when some answers were given, such as the explanation to the Sumner resident worried about draining from a new hill subdivision, they were so couched in officialese as to be unintelligible. But at least the programme offered the opportunity to ordinary residents to ask pertinent questions of the people who make important decisions affecting the city, and this is rare. The City Council’s initiative in using radio follows a similar effort in Wellington where the City Council there spent $lO,OOO on “Capital Plan” designed to involve Wellingtonians in redevelopment of the city.