A SUITABLE SITE

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 140, 14 June 1924, Page 13

A SUITABLE SITE

DOMINION MUSEUM

TO THE EDITOR.

Sir, —Tlie time is apparently not far off when the authorities concerned will be selecting a site for the long-antici-pated Dominion Museum. The suitability of sites for some of our national buildings has in the past been characterised by .such lack of vision that I should like to be permitted a fow remarks. Take, for instance, the allocation, layout, and approach of the most important site in the Dominion—that of the Houses of Parliament. What kind of lay-out have we here? An irregular, none too large pieco of turf cut up with meandering paths Which in their informal character bear absolutely no architectural relation to the building itself. Surely the setting of a building of such national importance should be invested with a little more dignity. ' On ceremonial occasions, which possess far greater moral value than some of our Labour friends will admit, it is surely only fitting that such a building as this may be approached along some broad, symmetrical, processional avenue laid out- on severe, geometrical lineslines which play as great a part in the design of such a building as civilised man's apparel does towards his respectability.

There are many interesting analogies between buildings and the humans who design and inhabit them. The front of a public building is like the face of apublic man—it owes a special courtesy to' the world at large. If one of our worthy statesmen were a principal actor upon some ceremonial occasion (like the recent Naval visit), he would hardly be so impolite as to turn his face away from the principals on the other side. So with a public building—-we -want to be able to look it in the face when we approach, without having to rest our chins on our shoulders. Consider for a moment the main approach to our Houses of Parliament. Of all the insignificant, furtive, apologetic entrances I know none to beat it. And the building keeps its face turned rudely away all the time we're approaching it. I "know a squatter with a more imposing entrance to his own home. One sole cause for gratitude we have—the grounds aro green. That's something for the heart of Wellington. The marvel is that they were not laid. down in ahphalt. If there's one thing we're strong on, it's ahphalt. If some of it at present gracing several of our civic beauty spots were transferred to what appears to lie the site for the main road to Eastbourne, several garages would be thrown out of business and sundry skilled mechanics relegated to a more, suitable occupation, cutting grass where once was ahphalt. This is merely by the way.

Altogether the site in question was unworthy the purpose to which it has been put—the seat of government of so stout a little Dominion as ours. It could, with the exercise of a- little imagination and a. clearer appreciation of true values, have been made worthy. A little drastic town-planning could have done it. If those two not-very-important city blocks between Lambton quay and Aitken street had been ruthlessly demolished and so opened up the face of the nation's chief monument to the city's main northern approach, we would possess what could be made as fine a civic centre as any in the world. But that's town-planning. And town-planning, as we all know, is nothing but the idle, Utopian dream of a few well-meaning but idealistic fools. Why, think of the cost! It would run into hundreds of thousands. Even Paris spent only forty-seven millions upon similar improvements. No, Sir, this is a commercial city—what we want is every square foot covered with sevenstorey buildings—and plenty of asphalt.

That is the good old Wellington spirit, and- while that prevails, those with 'enough vision to look ahead, not ten or twenty, but a hundred years, when Wellington will be a city of half a million people, may talk town-planning in vain. What is most urgently wanted is the stirring-up o? a spirit of civic pride in a city which could, if developed upon the right lines, be made in the course of time one of the finest in the world.

Are we, or are we not, the first city of this Dominion? Auckland is again shaming us by another outburst of public spirit in the establishment of a civic centre—which will probably cost a. shilling: or two. Are we, "Suprema a situ," going to be content to play second fiddle V Let ns convince ourselves and the-Gov-ernment that money spent on drastic remodelling is money not wasted. And when those responsible come to select a site for so monumental a building as a National Museum, let us urge with all our power that a little more knowledge and imagination be brought tp bear than has been shown in the past.—l am, etc., RUBBERNECK. 13th June.