HANDS OFF THE BOWLING GREEN.

Evening Star, Issue 20613, 13 October 1930, Page 8

HANDS OFF THE BOWLING GREEN.

” Well begun is half-done ” is an old saying. When the scheme envisaged is one that requires new buildings for addition to public services or amenities, it cannot bo said to be well begun until the right choice has been made of a site. That is most frequently the first 'difficulty, and the parties that are primarily concerned in the provision of a now maternity hospital in Dunedin, to supersede St. Helens and the Batchelor Hospital, have not been exempt from it. Possibly it Would be an exaggeration to call the difference they have had till now a ” battle of tho sites,” but it is capable of being extended into a battle if the parties are sufficiently unwise. A conference between the Hospital Board and the University Council considered two positions—oiio in London street and the other in Cumberland street, on the Hanover street side of the Nurses’ Home, and gave its preference to the first. Tho Medical Faculty of the University, however, preferred tho second, which caused the whole question to he reopened. The opinion of tho facility deserves great weight, as its members, and the students they control, will ho concerned directly with the working of this new institution. The advantage which they found in tho Cumberland street site ns being nearer to tile hospital was not one to bo lightly gainsaid, and their preference lor- this position Jins been endorsed more or loss tentatively by the Minister for the reason, among others, of its comparative cheapness. Since the Government is finding £50,000 towards the cost of land, buildings, and equipment, tho opinion of tho Minister is important. It would bo Unfortunate if a difference, which should be easily solvable as it stands, should be complicated by the introduction of a third site, challenging the interests of no small section of the and So extending the original ground of dispute, and threatening to make it a real “ battle of the sites.” Wo do not know for cex--tain that this lias happened, but un-

easiness has been caused by the belief that some of the members of the combined committee which will mate its recommendation on the matter tomorrow have had their desires diverted to the north end of the Cumberland street block, on the other side of the Nurses’ Hpnie, which would mean destruction of a much-honoured bowling green if it were taken for a location. The Dunedin Bowling Club has raised its voice against that real or imagined danger, and the Bowling Centre has lost no time in supporting it. They will not want for other and general allies if the danger should prove a real one. It is not an ordinary bowling green which may be threatened. It is the oldest green in Dunedin, and famed for its quality. For sixty years it lias fur* nished delight for bowlers; to history and to sentiment it is dear. The time may come when all of the block in question will bo needed for hospital purposes. The experience of larger cities may bo said to make that prospect as certain as it is melancholy. But the time is a long way off yet. There Would bo nothing but folly and outrage in anticipating it. “ Whilst other sites ate available,” the Bowling Centre has pronounced, it will resist any seizure of the Dunedin Club’s courts by every means possible, and the words quoted make the whole point. If the new hospital is to be built in Cumberland street another site is available —that, covered now by decrepit buildings to which no general sentiment attaches, on the block’s south side. There is no cause in the world why the bowling green should bo wanted. A bowling green is not made in a day; it takes yeafs to develop its quality. The public was subscribing generotisly to the Obstetrics Fund,, which, has. made a new hospital possible, a few weeks ago. It would bo a base requital of its generosity to deprive it now of one of its chief playing fields because that fund has been successful. Instead of being well begun, the great scheme would bfe launched under the worst auspices. There are other considerations which should make this threat unthinkable. Hospital and bowlifig green are by nature allies. One seeks to repair health; the other preserves it. The wise rulers of cities do their best to conserve open spaces and playing grounds ill their congested areas. We have not always followed that law in Dunedin. The Museum Reserve, not far off from this site, has been reduced by successive invasions of the training college, a police station, and a post and telegraph Office, as well as of the Museum itself, till it presents now no more than a mockery of its original intentions. There must bo no more violation of the principle. Wo hope the report which has provoked the concern, and promises to provoke all the militancy, of more than bowlers in Dunedin has been only a foolish canard. If the design imputed has inveigled the minds of any proportion of the joint committed which is to make, or bodies that are to receive, a recommendation, the only wise thing they can do, in the interests of their great undertaking as Well as- of the citizens who liavo been alarmed, wilt be to dismiss it from their minds.