DEVASTATION IN CENTRAL PARK

Northern Advocate, 3 February 1936, Page 6

DEVASTATION IN CENTRAL PARK

There is no more pleasant spot in Whangarei than Central Park, where the grounds have been laid out with a maximum effect of picturesqueness.

When the Waiarohia Stream overflowed its banks on Saturday night the park and the environs were converted into a whirling pool of yellow waters, sweeping over the extensive lawns and flower beds.

The flood waters overflowed the verandah of the Plunket and Ladies’ Rest Rooms.

The swimming pool, which has been the sporting ground of hundreds of children during the holidays, was held within its stout concrete banks, but the section reserved for the smaller children has been practically filled by a huge deposit of gravel. Just below the men’s dressing shed and near the weir a hollow has been gouged out to a depth of from six to eight feet. Nowhere was the strength of the flood waters demonstrated with more striking emphasis than at the entrance to the park.

Here, at the foot of the footbridge in Lovers’ Lane, a concrete slab about eight feet by four feet and three inches thick has been wrenched from its foundations and thrown like a piece of timber against the bank.

On the other side of the pool, the diving board, which was embedded in concrete, was swept away.

Silted Bowling Green,

On Number 2 green at the Whangarei Bowling Club’s property, where the jubilee tuornament was in progress on Friday, the emerald green of the well-kept turf has been smothered in a deep layer of yellow silt. 1 It is doubtful whether the green will j be in use agaiu this season —a serious matter for the club, whose playing areas now have the added strain of accommodating all players on the one half-day. Near where the water broke over the stop-banks to enter the green, it j gave another instance of its Herculean force, by moving bodily a halfton roller.