Doomed chapel’s backers blasted

Press, 22 June 1989, Page 1

Doomed chapel’s backers blasted

By

ANABRIGHT HAY

Those fighting for retention of the Christchurch Hospital Nurses’ Memorial Chapel have been criticised by a Canterbury Area Health Board committee which yesterday recommended its demolition*

The planning and resources committee said the chapel should be demolished but its interior relocated. The board’s chairman, Mr Tom Grigg, said, “It concerns me that at this stage there should be an attempt by a relatively small group of people to thwart what the board is doing in the interests of Christchurch.”

Mr Grigg said there had been opportunities in the past for people to voice objections to the board’s development plans for the hospital. Correct planning procedures had been followed and the plans had received the approval of a wide group including nurses, church leaders and the Christchurch City Council. Mr Grigg said a proposal by The Friends of the Chapel to retain it and build another did not take account of the cost of fitting out the new chapel. Carparking in the area would continue to be a problem.

“Stage 4 of the hospital development plan cannot go ahead in the form intended if the chapel stays and we must plan for the future,” said Mr Grigg The board’s project director, Mr Bruce Hancock, confirmed that stage 4 would be jeopardised if the chapel remained on its present site. Other committee members spoke in favour of the chapel’s demolition. They said this would allow better internal and external traffic access to the hospital.

“Are we going to listen to the people who use the chapel or see it locked away as a mausoleum?” asked Mrs Margaret Ferner. “The people of Christchurch want a health service they can get to,” said Mrs June Gardiner. The Christchurch City Council and the Mayor, Sir Hamish Hay, were criticised by several members for lending support to the preservation of the Memorial Chapel at a council meeting on Monday.

"It was incorrect and unwise for the leader of the city to make such a statement having seen only one side of a very emotive issue,” the committee’s chairman, Mr David Lawrence said. Mr David Close, a board member and a councillor, said the retention proposal had come before the council “like a bolt out of the blue.”

He was not surprised that the council had been attracted to the well-presented proposal but said that it had not made a decision, merely expressed support. “I don’t think we have all the facts to make a decision. We have got to be seen to be considering the proposal in a thoroughly fair fashion,” he said.

Mr Close’s motion that the board give more time to consideration of the Friends’ proposal was defeated.

Mr Grigg emphasised the urgency of the board’s making a decision given that the Historic Places Trust was planning to have the chapel’s classification upgraded. A spokeswoman for the Friends of the Chapel, Ms Fiona Ciaran, ah art historian, said the demolition had -already been brought forward three years. This might have been because of the trust’s proposed upgrading. She strongly disagreed with the committee’s comments that the demolition was in the interests of Christchurch.

Ms Ciaran challenged the board to publicly release a plan for stage 4 redevelopment. She said many people believed it would never go ahead. Mr Hancock confirmed a starting date for stage 4 had not been set. The Friends believe stage 4 can go ahead with slight modifications allowing the chapel to remain where it is.

The Historic Places Trust yesterday praised the City Council for its decision to vest the chapel as a historic reserve.