THINNING ONLY

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 80, 5 April 1938, Page 6

THINNING ONLY

FAIRLIE TERRACE TREES

PRESERVING HILL-TOP VIEWS

In" answer to a protest made to the City Council by members of the Wellington Beautifying Society, last night against the cutting down of any trees in Fairlie Terrace, the Mayor (Mr. T. C. A. Hislop) said that there was no intention of cutting the plantation down. All .that was proposed was to thin the trees near the top of the Captain S. S. Holm said 'that'^ the Beautifying, Society objected on principle to trees tyventy and thirty years old being cut down at all. Too much wanton destruction went on in Wellington, and it was of little use for the society to plant trees if the City Council and other bodies were in the future to cut them down. They admitted that it was rather hard that people should have their view obstructed, but the time for them to object was when the plantation was started. In any case people lost their views when buildings

were erected. In reply to Councillor C. H. Chapman, Captain Holm said that the society was not against cutting down trees .tinder all circumstances, for sorrietimes it was-necessary, but that was not so^ih Fairlie Terrace. " Mr. Hislop said that requests had been made by people in the neighbourhood thai something should be done to 'restore tlie view they had previously enjoyed. The locality- had been visited and it was "decided that the position could be remedied by thinning out near the top.of the ridge, without taking', away from the beauty*, of the plantation-as. a whole. The council was fuljy in'accord with the Beautifying as to the desirability of planting bare hillsides, but there was no necessity io plant hillsides to the very top. The council, with the assistance of the Beautifying Society, wished to give the hills a clothed aspect and at the same time to preserve the beauty of the views from residences or roads on the hill tops. There never had been any intention to cut out the whole plantation or to spoil the effect as a whole.

Mr. Hislop mentioned the growth of trees on the hillsides about Brooklyn, from which suburb some of the very finest view;s of city and harbour were to be had. Probably it would be necessary in the near future to remove some of the trees on the higher Revels so that such views would not be lost, but that would not spoil the clothed appearance of the hills when seen from the lower levels.