THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. FRIDAY, OCTOBER 1, 1926. AUCKLAND'S PROBLEMS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 19447, 1 October 1926, Page 12

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS. FRIDAY, OCTOBER 1, 1926. AUCKLAND'S PROBLEMS.

The City Council's invitation to othei local authorities to confer with it on matters of common interest is a step in the right direction. It should bo welcomed by every one ot those bodies. They are not asked beforehand to commit themselves to anything. There is no suggestion that by accepting the invitation any of them oppresses a willingness to subordinate its administrative powers to those of the inviting council. The purport of the invitation is plainly stated as that of providing a means to discuss, in a round-table fashion, suggestions for the more efficient administration of affairs affecting the area under the control of the group of authorities participating in the conference. Those suggestions may come from any one of them. There are certain matters named in the council's resolution as having recently impressed it with the desirability of concerted action. They arise from three recent Parliamentary enactments: the Motor Omnibus Traffic Act, the Town Planning Act, and the Local Government Loans Act. The purview ol' the conference may well include others, and it will be competent for any of the participants to raise and advocate them. Such a conference is fraught with great possibilities of good, and the invitation places equally upon the council and each of the invited authorities the onus of making it serviceable. The invitation's refusal by any to whom it is sent would be regrettably prejudicial to success. Unanimity on the subjects discussed may be too much to hope, but a unanimous agreement to confer can at least be expected.

Auckland's rapid development is fast forcing upon the attention of its pqople and those of its suburbs the. necessity of combined endeavours to provide essential services. Already, as in drainage and ' electricity, this necessity has been acknowledged. Considerations of efficiency and economy impel the extension of concerted action to other services. A compromise between this and separate administration has taken place in water supply, some adjacent authorities buying their supply from the city. In tramway transport a working arrangement between the city and some suburbs has had to be made. Th'e implication of these facts is inescapable. For many purposes the region administered by a multiplicity of local authorities must be viewed as a unit, if fully efficient and fully economical services are to be maintained. In the propounding of rival ideas as to water supply this necessity has been difficult of denial in any convincing way. It would be palpably absurd to have competitive services in operation side by side : and it may be taken for granted that co-operation on the largest possible scale is an ideal policy. For concerted action in passenger transport the case is equally clear. There is much t,o be said against a monopoly of control by a single local authority over an area stretching beyond its own territorial limits; but there is everything to be said for control.by a metropolitan board representative of the whole region served by a common system. The position created ! by the Motor Omnibus Traffic Act, which vests licensing powers in bodies whose ordinary administrative bounds do not extend to the outer limits of the omnibus services they license, is an anomaly justifiable only as a tentative expedient. The whole traffic problem is one to be handled in a comprehensive way by a fully representative body. As to town planning, it is obvious that this cannot be safely left for piecemeal handling by different local authorities whose boundaries, historic and arbitrary, do not coincide to-day with natural confines. The result might be a grotesque patchwork—the absolute negation of townplanning principles. Including in its invitation all local authorities from Henderson to Manurcwa, as well as the four boroughs of t.he North Shore, the City Council has wisely had in view an area already closely knit by some common interests and destined to be one thickly populated as a unit. On the fringe of this area are local bodies that may hitherto have felt themselves aloof, but the coming of motor transport has annihilated distance and is fast making them an integral part of the city. The day will come when even they will be part of Greater Auckland. But it would be folly-to wait until that day for their taking what was well described in the council's discussion as "a greater share in Auckland's greater problems." In the council's invitation the opportunity to profit by co-operative action is offered. Whatever may or may not be clone to unify contiguous boroughs in a Greater Auckland eventually, the step that the local authorities are asked to take promises to give them all a share in deciding what shall be done about essential services. The procedure suggested, that of a preliminary conference on general principles, followed by committee consideration of various subjects for detailed report to a further conference, is calculated to promote clear understanding. This is the one t'ning needful at this stage. Tt is to be hoped that the action taken by the. City Council will be ko fully appreciated by the invited authorities that they will at once express their readiness to co-operate in frank discussion of the problems that circumstances are compelling them all to face.