SPOILED LANDSCAPE

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 51, 24 November 1930, Page 9

SPOILED LANDSCAPE

Dunedin Men’s Protest ATTACK ON HOARDINGS Believing that the beauty of the country side was being ruined by hoardings, four Dunedin citizens, all medical men, recently armed themselves with axes and cut some offending hoardings down. Having registered their protest in this' way they were willing to pay the fine subsequently imposed. The four men—Drs. F. R. Riley, W. H. Borrie, James Thomson, and C. M. Focken—have since made a joint statement explaining why they acted as they did, in order to focus public attention upon the question of the desecration of the landscape by advertising signs. The brilliant and glaring hoardings, shouting the merits of one brand of goods or another, they say, are absolutely out of keeping with the charm of the counI tryside. Most of the hoardings are erected by overseas companies which make huge profits out of New Zealand and spend a portion of those profits in despoiling the country. “Our scenic routes are strewn with placards, sheds and roofs of buildings are daubed with advertisements, even the trees, fences and rocks are not immune. No Place Sacred. "The craze for advertising has reached such a pitch that no place is sacred; the greater the natural charm, the more opportunity for vulgar display. Each advertisement yelps, if possible, more loudly than the next, in the hope of attracting attention and gaining some business advantage. With such a discordant chorus, how can a lover of nature find peace?’’ Unfortunately, the statement continues, an extremely bad example is set by the Railway Department, for wherever the railway skirts the road there are serried ranks of hoardings on railway property, however grand and charming the scenery. The Tourist Department spends thousands of pounds in advertising New Zealand as a scenic resort, and the Railway Department is doing its best to despoil it, and, not only that, but the Railway Department is strenuously advertising the goods of its most dangerous competitors. While recognising that the Railway Department is in financial difficulties, they do not admit that those difficulties should be met by the disfigurement of New Zealand. Law Suggested. After referring to the lengths to which the advertising sign craze has been carried in England, the statement urges that steps should be taken at once to restore the beauty of the New Zealand countryside by removal of blatant signs, and suggests that an Advertisement Regulation Act is necessary, possibly under the administration of the director of town planning. Rural advertising, they maintain, should be banned absolutely. In conclusion the writers say that they have no regrets for the action they took. “Advertising has its legitimate sphere. . . Our protest is directed against rural advertising. Surely the road-users have some rights. Why should they be compelled to see w’hat they don’t want to see? Why should their love for the beautiful. which is one of our highest ahd most possessions, be outraged at every turn? We appeal to all lovers of New Zealand to resist the desecration of our country before it becomes too late.”