PUBLIC SHELTERS

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIV, Issue 64, 12 September 1942, Page 8

PUBLIC SHELTERS

SERIES OF DELAYS

For one reason and another the public raid shelter programme.in Wellington has been interrupted and delayed a good deal, but the work has never wholly stopped, and the accomomda■tion, in completed shelters, is now something over 25,000, allowing full official space for each person, and far over that on tram-car standards. That is apart from shelters in business premises'for staff use, school and hospital shelters, wharf and waterfront and other groups of shelter for State and Service personnel. First delays were caused by the transfer of most of the men on shelter work to defence construction. By last month these works were well ahead and men were again becoming available for shelter construction when the earthquakes hit Wellington and the Wairarapa, and again the completion of the shelter programme was set back. . , There appears how uncertainty whether it will be taken tip in full, depending upon the developments in the Pacific areas in the next weeks or months, just as, up. till now, no clear decision has been announced in regard to removal of plate glass windows, one authority having indicated, with safeguards, that removal is not necessary, and another subsequently, having spoken of replacement or protection of plate glass as a probable requirement. The only section of workers to carry right through with shelter work in Wellington has been the tunnellers, whose special skill could most usefully be employed in the two schemes started early in the shelter programme. They have finished tunnelling, but have since worked on the concrete lining of drives, both at Thorndon and Te Aro. Wellington country does not stand well when driven through and possibly the tunnels will have to be lined right through to give them stability for more than a year or two. LOG CABIN TYPE. Recent additions to shelter accommodation are the log cabins near Courtenay Place and a multiple compartment shelter off Lambton Quay. Whereas other surface shelters in Wellington are in part excavated, the log type is above the street level; they are damp to thoroughly wet after heavy weather, for the. shingle roof * protection lets the water through; but they are not intended as sleep-in shelters. The new shelters off Lambton Quay, built into the strengthened foundations of the building which formerly stood there, - are particularly well equipped, as shelters designed for protection from brief raids go. They are divided into eight, sections and have seating for about a thousand people, allowing good elbow room, but could hold four times that number sheltering from a brief raid. They are quite dry, above and below, and have an independent lighting system run from storage batteries; each compartment has toilets for women and men. The only large-scale public shelter work now in hand and well ahead is a similar adaptation of the foundations of a burned-out building in the Lambton area, to shelter about the same number of people. Construction of shelters, either public, combined, or purely ■' staff, in city buildings has also slowed down during recent weeks, and there appears to be the same doubt whether it is to be taken up with the rush that characterised the early construction, or is to mark time, or even be abandoned.