ROSS CREEK PICNIC GROUNDS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26028, 17 December 1945, Page 6

ROSS CREEK PICNIC GROUNDS

Sir, —I see by this morning’s issue that the city councillors are to visit the Ross Creek picnic grounds. Perhaps at the same time they could be induced to stop at the bridge where the Cannington road extension crosses School Creek and there to use their noses as well as their eyes. As your reporter states, this small area of bush is one of the finest native bird sanctuaries near Dunedin, but what irony that through it runs an open smelly drain misnamed a creek! lam sure the medical officer of health will be thrilled to know that small children from picnic parties are often to be seen playing In this creek. A few years ago it contained sparkling clear water; now the water is filthy dirty, greasy, and in parts covered with a repulsive looking scum. Yes, may City Councillors by all means stop at the bridge—in fact, go down to the bed of the creek, and while they stand listening to the lovely calls of the native' tuis and bellbirds (and perhaps, if they are lucky, watch the flight of a wood pigeon) they may also enjoy the delightful odours of what might be called an Imitation open sewer stinking to high heaven. At the same time, the medical officer could roll up his trousers and paddle, as the children do, or thrust his hands into the filthy water to turn over rocks as the “ healthy ” children do. Sir, many months ago. I protested, through the courtesy of your columns, at this wanton destruction of one of the city’s most valuable assets. (I think of it as " officially sanctioned vandalism.”) Nothing was done. Will anything be done now? Are the City Councillors really Interested in this beautiful patch of bush? Is the medical officer a real champion of children’s health? Perhaps, but I shall wait and see.—l am, etc., 4 Jonas. December 15.

Sir, —While there is' obvious justification for excluding the public from the areas of grassland lying between the two storage basins of the Ross Creek reservoir and the floodwater diversion channels paralleling each side of the basins, and also from the grass path along the top of the dam at the downstream end of the lower basin, from all of which surface water could drain into the basins, the reason for excluding the public from the areas of the reserve outside these limits to which access had always been available till stopped for war-time security reasons, is much less obvious. The City Council’s policy is not even consistent as regards the two sides of the basins, since on the western side any active person able to scramble down the steep bushclad slope from School Creek road has free access right to the outer edge of the diversion channel on that side, but such is not the case on the opposite side of the basins. What appears to be called for to restore the position to a reasonable peace-time basis is the re-opening of the section of the reserve on the eastern side of the basins outside the line of the diversion channel on that side, with restoration of access to that area by re-opening the old main gate from Rockside road by the caretaker’s house, and the setting back of the barbed-wire barricade from the foot of the dam below the lower basin to the top of the dam. but outside the grass path on top, so that access to the reserve will again be available by the track up the gorge from the quarry. When surplus unemployed labour again becomes available in a short time for work on the reserves, a new public track should be constructed for the length of both basins on the western side of the bank above the outer edge of the diversion channel on that side to replace the old track on the inner side of the channel, and a new footbridge should be constructed across the creek above the upper basin at a point a little above the point where the diversion channels branch off to run down either side of the basins, so as to provide a complete circuit of the basins. Presumably no water from this section of that creek is allowed to find its way into the basins, as it collects the drainage from a section of Wakari road just above and another apparent source of contamination exists alongside the work shed bordering the stream between that road and the upper basin.—l am, etc., Dunedin, December 15. Free Access.