THE TOWN BELT.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 308, 22 September 1908, Page 6

THE TOWN BELT.

Many years have passed since the first awakening of the citizens of Wellington to their gradual loss of the Town Belt that was set aside as a city reserve in the clays of the New Zealand. Company. At different times, after a large portion of the city reserves had been .filched from the citizens, there have' been agitations similar to that now current, and some of these have been successful. But the history of the reserves is for the most part a history of the citizens' apathy and want of public-spiritcdness. , There is at present before Parliament a Bill promoted by the City Council which proposes to empower the corporation to lease portions of the Town Belt to sports clubs and associations. Under this Bill the council will have power to lease areas of not more than 2i acres on terras that will completely take away from the citizens the right''of access to the leased areas. Areas of more than 2i acres will be leased subject to provisions that will give the public the right of access on cortain occasions. It seems to us that the spirit of this measure, however good the intention, is opposed to the citizens' rights over the shrunken remnants of the land originally set apart for public recreation. There has been a ceaseless attack upon the reserves for many years. Of the 1519 acrcs originally set apart, over 400 acrcs have been taken away for one purpose and another. Of the original area, 200 acrcs were taken as Nativo reserves. In '1872 143 acrcs were taken for the college, asylum, and hospital reserves. •' Forty acres were taken for a hospital and orphanage reserve, and further areas were lost to the citizens as sites for the Terrace Gaol, the Point Jerningham Battery, the signal station, the Gardens Battery, the observatory, and the Mount Cook Gaol.

To-day we find the original purpose of the city reserves so entirely lost sight of that it has even been proposed' in tho Legislative Council that the Town Belt should be cut up into sites for workmen's homes., We are glad to say that the suggestion encountered some very strong opposition, and wo commend to the City Council and to the citizens the observations of the Hon. G. Jones, who, although all his interests lie in distant Oamaru, is able to feel indignant at any suggestion that another inch of the Town Belt should be diverted to purposes entirely alien to thoso for. which it was originally conferred upon' the people of this' city. What is wanted is not merely tho creation of a strong public opinion on the' necessity for preserving what is left of the Town Belt, but the creation of an anxiety on the part of tho citizens to recover as much as possible of what has already been filched from them. It is a rule which nobody •willi dispute that when a gift is made for a- certain purpose, 1 ' it should revert to the donor when it ceases to be used for the purpose for which it was given. Muoh of the lost area of the original reserves has been diverted from the purposes for which it was granted. The Government, when it ceased to use as an observatory the sito granted for that purpose, should havo handed the land back to the city. So,' too, as there is now no' Gardens Battery, .the Gardens Battery site should be considered as having reverted to the citizens for their free use.. If a strict account were taken of thoso lost areas which arc no longer used for the purposes for which they were granted, the city's breathing spaces would bo considerably enlarged. With tho rapid growth of population the necessity for a strong defence of the remaining reserves grows greater.