THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES THURSDAY, JUNE 11, 1936. BROAD VIEWS AND NARROW BY-LAWS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22904, 11 June 1936, Page 8

THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES THURSDAY, JUNE 11, 1936. BROAD VIEWS AND NARROW BY-LAWS

There are people who, having an agricultural bias, think ever of making two blades of grass grow where one

grow before. Wc rather admire them. There are others who, being urbanminded, yearn ever to see two houses standing where one stood before. They, it is generally conceded, need watching. They have a subdivision complex. Enterprise in building as a contribution towards the solution of the housing problem merits dhcouragement so long as it complies with necessary conditions. The law is wise in its provision that housing must conform to requirements of air space

devised in the interests of health. Nobody can suggest that Dunedin is a congested city in which the population cannot be housed properly unless families draw more closely together. Yet that idea would really appear to be permeating the fountain-head of local municipal authority. The argument at the City Council's meeting this week over the matter of two applications, one for a subdivision, and the other in respect of the erection of a block of residential flats, was distinctly illuminating. It showed in what direction what his Worship the Mayor designated as the “ broad view ” of the dominant party is likely to lead. The members of this class-conscious and political-minded section of the Council have on many an occasion claimed credit for their avowed intention of clearing up slum conditions in the city, the existence of which they have not been reluctant to ascribe to pre-Labour administrative laxity. Yet how adaptable is the human mind, how devious and unexpected sometimes its reasoning! Far from wanting to strengthen the very by-laws relative to building permits which are framed in the interests of the health of the community, these councillors now appear to be coming to regard them as a thoroughfare through which they may drive as occasion suits. The Works Committee acknowledged that the application in respect of the building of the block of flats did not “comply strictly ” with the by-law provision for open space, but none the less recommended it for approval. It was a “corner site,” it scntentiously pointed out. It was left to Councillor Shepherd to illuminate the position by pointing out that what was submitted for approval was merely that on an area of twenty-two poles—two poles only in excess of the space prescribed for one residence —the equivalent of five residences should be placed. All the Mayor’s special pleading about broad views and wide roads did not, in the absence of certain members from the meeting, avail against Councillor Shepherd’s reasoned argument. His Worship would bring another ten thousand people within the city services without the creation of slums. It is an almost subduing aspiration. Rather heartlessly, Councillor Shepherd drew attention to an aspect of progression in relation to the proposal that was under debate. A building, he observed, might be a block of flats to-day, the tenement of the near future, and the slum of a more-distant date. The proposal was clearly out of conformity with the letter and spirit of the law, and in itself seems to have lacked any intrinsic charm. The locality is pleasantly suburban, and if Councillor Allen was right in describing the- projected building as a terrace rather than a block of flats it may be imagined that the residents in the vicinity will not be suffering any sense of deprivation. Regarding the other debated application, the subdivision of land in Levon street, Roslyn, against which the protest was unsuccessfully offered, it was made apparent, not for the first time, that if his Worship admires broad views he has no objection to narrow entrances. The bydaw prescribes twenty feet, but thfc circumstances were deemed by the majority to justify a municipal dispensation cutting this precisely in half. From Councillor Silverstone there was a concession that the strongest point made in opposition to the recommendation was that long right-of-ways, or “ leg-ins ” as they are sometimes called, were apt to be dangerous places. lie even introduced a designation of a terrifying significance to nervous persons in remarking that there was a tendency for them to become “ garotters’ alleys.” But Roslyn is one of the city’s more delectable suburbs, which in the opinion of the majority of the councillors evidently —not in this instance alone —made all the difference in the world. The broad view in these matters, it seems, is by no means necessarily the hygienic or aesthetic view, but by-laws must not be permitted to obstruct it.