THE EXHIBITION

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 69, 18 September 1937, Page 10

THE EXHIBITION

PUBLIC ACCESS

AERODROME COMPLICATIONS

DISTANCE FROM

TRAMS

Though the proposed plan of the Centennial Exhibition buildings and the Jay-out of the grounds make full use of the area which can be made available at Rongotai there are doubts in the minds of some with wide knowledge and experience of transport whether the means of access proposed will guarantee the fullest success of the Exhibition. The grounds and access road proposals do not include a direct tramway approach to the main entrance, and tram passengers will be required to walk a considerable distance from Coutts Street, or, alternatively, to enter the grounds

and buildings from the rear.

The Exhibition site has an area of approximately 50 acres and is part of the levelled land at Rongotai, but is divided from the aerodrome by Kingsford Smith Street. On the south side is Lyall Bay Parade; on the north side the Rongotai College and grounds and a line of dwellings which front on Coutts Street (the main tramway route to Mirarnar and Seatoun); on the west side there are the dwellings which face Apu and Puru Crescents. Further west is Onepu Road, which carries tram traffic to Lyall Bay. LIMITING FACTORS. There were several difficulties to be overcome in planning the buildings and surroundings at Rongotai. - The most important of these are the limited area of city-owned land available (extended to some extent by the arrangements made to utilise a part of the Rongotai College grounds); the direction and strength of the prevailing winds, from the north, north-west, and south (determining the main ground plan so that the central cruciform open court is protected by the surrounding buildings, and largely determining also that the main entrance and main avenue shall face the east, from which the least "weather" is experienced); and, most limiting of all factors, the proximity of the site to the Rongotai Aerodrome. It is this last factor which has introduced the greatest difficulties to the design of the buildings and the arrangement of public transport. Aeroplanes which may. pass over the Exhibition must, under the requirements jof the civil aviation authorities, be allowed a long gliding angle, and this has necessitated restriction of the heights of buildings or other structures on the eastern side of the Exhibition site. Further to the west, and further from the boundary of the aerodrome, the line of the descent or take-off of planes gives a greater clearance and building heights may rise, permitting, at the extreme west, a central tower feature. On the Kingsford Smith Street frontage of the site, however, heights are rigidly restricted under the limitations required by the aviation authorities, and as the overhead wiring and poles of a tramway service in Kingsford Smith Street would considerably exceed the permissible height trams may not be laid down and past the main entrance. Tramway passengers will have to alight in Coutts Street, near the end of Kingsford Smith Street, and to walk about fourteen chains to the main gates. There is still the alternative tramjway access via Onepu Road, which service may be brought nearer the grounds by a loop through Resolution and Endeavour Streets, but those who travel by these cars will enter the Exhibition from the rear. WET WEATHER WALKS. This tramway access disability is particularly open to criticism. In good weather the walk from Coutts Street, something over a quarter of a mile to the main building, will be of little account, but the weather is not always good, and one unpleasant experience will deter many people from subsequent visits when the weather is doubtful. If a loop is laid from Onepu Road to carry tram passengers directly to the rear entrance the wet weather difficulty would be overcome, but the unsatisfactory first impression which which would be left on the minds of, say, a Napier excursion crowd carried to the back entrance, or, alternatively, having to walk a quarter of a mile in the rain and wind from Coutts Street, would not assist the directors of the Exhibition in their endeavours to bring more visitors to Wellington. The tramway access leaves a very great deal to be desired, and as by far the greater number of those who will visit the Exhibition will travel by the public transport systems, this is a serious matter. BUSES A COSTLY ALTERNATIVE. A solution readily offered in words, but not nearly so easily in fact, is to substitute bus transport for trams, but the outlay, for: a few months, would be enormous. The alternatives are to endeavour to obtain an easing. of the restrictions imposed by the aviation authorities if that can be done without introducing dangers to air passengers and the public generally, or to amend, even at ; the cost of some disharmony in the general conception, the lay-out of the grounds in front of the main buildings ', to permit trams to be turned south from Coutts Street past the buildings, : and to return by a new length of line ' along Lyall Bay Parade to Onepu 1 Road; or to carry trams along the northern side of the buildings, be- ! tween the buildings and the proposed location of the amusement park. CHOICE BETWEEN i DISADVANTAGES. Either of these plans would detract ' from the ground arrangement now pro. > posed, but the difficulties are great, i and thg choice appears to lie between some interference with vistas —and admittedly serious interference—and a main public transport system so unsatisfactory as to have a serious effect upon attendances. Even though the most adequate provision was made for the parking of cars—and the published plans and sketches do not indicate that this has been possible— the success of the Exhibition will rest with the far greater numbers who will » travel by public transport, day after { day, wet and fine, and unless Welling- C , ton is to go to enormous expense for ',' a few months only, the tram service 3 will remain the mainstay of those pub--3) lie services.