Victoria Square 'plans’ a prank

Press, 7 May 1986, Page 3

Victoria Square 'plans’ a prank

One Canterbury University student doubts he will get a summer holiday job at the Christchurch City Council again. The geography masters student staged a prank that saw two Christchurch radio stations broadcast fake plans yesterday for the redevelopment of Victoria Square. News releases on City Council notepaper were delivered yesterday morning to the stations as well as to Christchurch newspaper offices and a television studio. Access to the official council notepaper was easy for the student, who

worked at the council during the summer. He said yesterday he had staged the prank, which announced plans for Victoria Square including a jet boat service on the Avon River and a helicoper pad where the statue of Queen Victoria now stands, “just to create a general stir, really.” He thought he had succeeded. So did the Capping Committee at the university, with which the stunt was registered on Monday afternoon. The word from the Students* Union yesterday was 10 out of 10 for orilnally and flair. <4ie City Council,

alerted to the hoax on Monday when bogus advertisements were sent to newspaper offices, was not quite so amused. But the Town Clerk, Mr John Gray, whose “signature” appeared at the bottom of the hoax release, entered the; spirit of the joke.

It did not take the council’s “sleuths” long to deduce who the culprit was. Mr Gray arrived yesterday morning at the Students* Union building, flung open the door and pointed an accusing finger.

“His face was a study,” he said of the hoaxer, who thought his j®:e had suddenly gone soijr.

However, concerned as the council is about the use of a false signature, it will not press legal action.

“We are not without a sense of humour,” Mr Gray said. “But obviously we hope this is not a precedent” The student said he and a fellow geography masters student had put together the plan and sent it out to about 35 groups and organisations so that they would turn up at today’s works and traffic committee meeting of the council to demand more information.

Mr Gray said those groups had now all been

notified of the hoax. The student said the release and advertisements had taken a reasonable time to prepare.

The fake news release included a map and a covering letter, with Mr Gray’s signature, saying the proposals had been approved in secret at a special works and traffic committee meeting in April. It also included a special report from the committee’s chairman, Cr Maurice Carter, and had his name but not his signature at the bottom. As to his prospects of future employment by the council, the student don’t think I’ll