HUTT VALLEY LAND

Evening Post, Volume CXXVIII, Issue 136, 6 December 1939, Page 13

HUTT VALLEY LAND

INDUSTRIAL FUTURE

CLAIM FOR COMPENSATION

INSPECTION BY COURT

The Compensation Court hearing the claim for £ 17,244 against the Minister of Public Works for 21 acres of land at the estuary of the Hutt River, taken by proclamation in October, 1937, for reclamation works, today inspected the land taken. Evidence is being given of property values in the Hutt Valley, which is stated to.be in an incomparable industrial position for large firms with a Dominion-wide distribution, and to have grown phenomenally since 1929. The Court consists of Mr. Justice Blair, with Mr. F. W. Furkert and My. H. F. O'Leary, K.C., as assessors. The claimants are Alexander Kenneth Scobie Mackenzie and Cheviot Wellington Dillon Bell, solicitors, as registered proprietors, and Mrs. Margaret Sara Johnston, wife of Mr. Justice Johnston, Mrs. Iris Brenda Rolleston, widow,- of Wellington (temporarily in England), Miss Beatrix Enid Bell, of Wellington (temporarily in England), Mrs. Violet Caroline Denniston, of Wanganui, and C W. D. Bell, as beneficial owners. . Mr. P. B. Cooke, K.C., with him M*. R. C. Christie, is appearing for the claimants, and Mr. A. E. Currie, with him Mr. C. H. Rogers, for the Crown. Compensation is claimed at £800 an acre. Continuing his opening address, Mr. Cooke said that in 1937 the Ford Company'had bought land in its unfilled state at £995 an acre. Altogether that land costs £1390 an acre, yet the Minister of Public Works offered £5000 for the 21 acres. Mr. Cooke suggested that the land had'been taken by the Government because it saw the commercial value of i the land and the future it possessed, j C. W. D. Bell said in evidence that when the, land was taken the claimants were left with 10 acres 27.13 perches, of which 1 rood 25.2 perches was sold to Associated Motorists, in May, 1938, at the rate of £1250 an acre. LAND AT £5500 AN ACRE. In reward for a man's honesty, when the Bell homestead in Lowry Bay was being used as a military hospital in the Great War, the late Sir Francis Bell sold him two acres of Cramp's Paddock (now Waiwetu and of which j the 21 acres is part) at £100 an acre. Later, the man complained that the i land had been sold at too high a price J (he wanted it for pigs), but he refused to take the money back. Subseqquently, half an acre, with a corrugated iron building on it/ was sold at the rate of £5500 an acre. Industrial development in the Hutt Valley, said Mr. Bell, probably dated from the, Hutt Valley Settlement Act in 1925, and had been aided to some extent by the Petone-Waterloo branch line. In 1935 the Wellington Harbour Board was negotiating with the Caroline Bell trustees for the purchase of the' 21 acres. It then contemplated dredging a harbour in front of the land. ' ■■ ■ - , The advertising value was shown by the fact that the property had a long road frontage, lying on the main route j to the various harbour bays. At weekends and on holidays literally thousands of cars passed the land. In j that respect, the witness continued, the land was quite different from Park: Road, which had, in his opinion, little I or no advertising value in comparison. There v/as also a big advertising value from-the sea frontage. The Ford I Company made use of that value in its large sign, which could be seen j across the harbour. . He had been approached by the j Exide Storage Battery Company, and he told the principal that the price was £1500 an acre. The principal said that although that price was higher than other land quoted in Park Road he thought the advertising value well compensated for the difference. He was, however, concerned with the drainage position, and as at that time negotiations with the Crown on that aspect had not been completed, the witness could give no assurance. The company bought land elsewhere at £1190 an acre. GROWTH OF DISTRICT. The growth of that area since 1929 had been phenomenal, said .the wit-i ness. There was no other part in or near Wellington that was suitable or available for factory sites. There was about 70 acres left in that industrial area, including the 21 acres taken by the Crown" and the 10 acres -.remaining' with the claimants. In its filled state the 21 acres- was definitely the best of all the land in that locality. There were the advantages appertaining to an industrial area—freedom from complaint by neighbours about smoke nuisance, noise, etc.' It was the only area around Wellington where a man could get immunity, or semiimmunity, from potential actions' for injunction. It had the advantage of access, a first-class road, arid' a railway just across the road, pointed—and designedly pointed—towards the Point Howard wharf. All the goods from a I factory on that site would most economically be shipped from that wharf. Land had been sold in the area bounded by Park Road, Gracefield Road, and