CIVIC PROGRESS FORESHORE IMPROVEMENT. RECLAMATION AND MARINE DRIVES

Evening Post, Volume XC, Issue 77, 29 September 1915, Page 10

CIVIC PROGRESS FORESHORE IMPROVEMENT. RECLAMATION AND MARINE DRIVES

ARCHITECTURAL AWAKENING. Reclamation, has done a great deal for Wellington in the past, and it will doubtless do much in th« future. At the one-time dock site, and down on WateT-loo-quay, many .acres have been added to the city proper, and between Water-loo-quay and Kaiwarra there is another area plainly marked out to be reclaimed when war no longer menaces finance. Some day, perhaps, even the Oriental Bay question will be satisfactorily settled, and the lack of a finish, to the parade in that direction will no longer strike unfavourably the aesthetic eye of the visitor. KILBIRNIE AND LYALL BAY. Outside the waterfront immediate to th© city, the most notable reclamation work in progress is that at Evans Bay. The reclamation that has here added so much to the Kilbirnie recreation ground has been gradually extended for some time past, and is now not far removed from the appointed limits. 'Id total, the area- will be about 23 acres. People who remember Kilbirnie as approached by a narrow coastal road, turning sharply round a cliff, would hardly recognise the new landscape presented today. The cliff-face has receded inland and the level reclamation has extended seaward, by the simple process of breaking down the hillside and trucking the spoil to the shoreline. Consequently the road now passes between two level areas. Where the cliff was is now found a series of flat building sections — really flat, not like the bits of mountain-side which an agent labels euphemistically (and obviously untruthfully) as "splendid level building lots. " From a city-building and recreation point of view, this chff was matter in the wrong place, and its removal and dispersal on the shore-line has conferred a double benefit on both its new and its old site. As far as part of the former cliff area is concerned, the City Council, by purchase of the land as it stood before the excavation, has reaped both the benefits, and now holds, in addition to the reclaimed ground, the levelled sections as an asset. Those sections nearer Kilbirnie were not pur chased, and remain in private ownership. As the owners have a much improved property in return for surrender of the spoil, they have not done badly. Much of the reclaimed area is already grassed, and makes a handsome block of ground, somewhat detracted from by the existence of a group of private residences in one corner. All things considered, however, this combined levelling and reclamation at Kilbirnie is one of the most satisfactory of the many valuable civic improvements effected in Wellington in the last decade. On the sandhills of the isthmus the city has, with the aid of the Government, secured the setting aside of over a hundred acres, which, as time goes on, will become an increasingly valuable asset to the eastern suburbs in particular and to Wellington in general. Levelling has been proceeding steadily, and now covers about thirteen acres and a-half, ■which will be increased to about thirty acres. The patch of green sward, contrasting with the grey sand, is one of the finest features of the new Lyall Bay as viewed from the overlooking hills. The word " new " is used advisedly, because the spread of settlement has in a few years transformed the Bay end of the Isthmus. The " bach " and "week-end" era has been overtaken by the residential. BETTER BUILDING SINCE THE ■> BOOM. Better still, a finer class of residence is being erected / and this is a notable feature in more than one part of Wellington. The past, of course, has been deplorable. In the old days, when bylaws had practically no virtue, the city became cursed with narrow-frontage residences. In many cases, the frontage of the section was so cut down that there was not room for a two-room cot-tage-front with front door, and passage. The cottage, if it can be called such, had to be built end-on, with a oneroom width ; the rooms being added one behind the other till they found the back of the section. These thin, end-on places are still to be seen by the score, and some of them are — in point of time — of comparatively modern construction. Then came "the boom." When this movement was at its height, (en or a dozen years ago, the bylaw influence xvst& not uivfelt, but arcß-itootrXixsii taste was in a very rudimentary stage. In " boom" times a great many structures were rapidly added to the so-called housing accommodation of Wellington, but (even where bylaw observance compelled a reasonable frontage) the quality was such that the net benefit to the city was limited. It was the day of the "jerry builder." Material, architecture, and workmanship were all unsatisfactory, and row upon row of these boxes, aggravated rather than relieved with some filigree work, went up. So the net result of the "boom" and the pre-boom" periods includes a huge proportion of huddled or ugly dwellings that are no credit to Wellington. This being the case, it is all the more pleasant to visit new suburban areas like Hataitai, and its extension, and to see the admirable character of the dwellings now being erected. This new Wellington is a great improvement on the old. Much of it has come into existence lately, and it is quite clear that in these recent "quiet" years Greater _ Wellington has benefited— in quality, if not in quantity — far more than in the hectic period of "the boom. " And Hataitaiis not an isolated though a notable instance. As mentioned, the new Lyall Bay is not perpetuating some of the obvious mistakes of the older Kilbirnie. And — to leave the eastern suburbs — Kelburn is keeping up' its good reputation, and in other localities better standards are being set. And in one or two of the most huddled streets of the city proper new brick buildings are appearing whose contrast with their neighbours is positively startling. PARADES AND FORESHORES. From this digression into the new architecture let us return to the seafront. The coast road from beyond Oriental Bay (Point Jerningham) to KHbirnie could be much improved by some easy and comparatively cheap embanking. A sample is seen m the neat wall and railing which curves round a point on the Kilbirnie side of the Patent Slip. It extends only for a short distance, and it was rendered necessary by erosive action of the sea at this point, but it is a striking example of what could be done to improve this seaside parade. There are some who look ahead to a. more ambitious scheme, but there is for the present ample- scope *or industrial reclamation at the head of Evans Bay without encroaching on its flanks. Recreation purposes in this district will be met by the Kilbvrrie reclamation and the isthmian 'land-levelling scheme, whose potentialities are set forth above. Of a different order is the foreshore lying seaward of the Q,ueen's-drive, between Lyall Bay and Island Bay. Here, amid the fringe of grass,, sand, and jock,,

where the retiring waters leave fishing pook for the children, is an ideal resort for picnickers and tired seekers after an ozone atmosphere; and it is one of our best civic achievements (though perhaps insufficiently recognised] that all the foreshore (with the exception of one limited piece) between the two bays, and also all the foreshore between Island Bay and Ohiro Bay (Happy Valley), has been secured by the City Council for public purposes. As the city grows, this foreshore will be prized more and more. The popularity of Lyall Bay will extend along the coast in such a way that the tramlines of the two bays will eventually be linked up. It is easy to foresee a big future for all this part of Wellington. Ohiro Bay and Happy Valley are also becoming better known. The improvement of the old valley road, and the construction of a fine wide thoroughfare between Ohiro Bay and Island Bay, have made this route popular with motorists. Though there is still some pioneering and improving work to be done on Miramar Peninsula, Wellington can now offer a length and variety of marine parade of which no city need be ashamed.