SERVICE FOR ALL

Southland Times, Issue 19837, 7 April 1926, Page 6

SERVICE FOR ALL

BIG CITY PROBLEMS. WATER, DRAINAGE, OFFENSIVE TRADES. NEW FORMS OF CONTROL COMING. So far as New Zealand’s metropolitan populations are concerned, the system of control of water and drainage by one urban local body seems to be drawing near to its limit of efficiency; and the problem of management by water and drainage boards, representative of all the districts served, is. forcing itself to the front. So also is collective control of offensive trades. There is an increasing tendency, in main centres of population, to create special boards to administer services that affect an area far bigger than the area of any one of the local bodies concerned. For instance, tfie supply of water to the people around Port Nicholson and in the Hutt basin is a problem passing beyond the mere confines of Wellington, even of a Greater Wellington. So far, the local bodies not included in Greater Wellington have been able to supply their own needs, and have not been compelled, like some of the suburban boroughs in Auckland, to buy water from the metropolitan city council, which sells to them at a profit to itself. But though this grievance may not exist in Wellington, the time is at hand when the waterways of the Hutt basin—as well as the Wainui-o-Mata and Orongorongo supplies now owned by the Wellington City Council —will have to be considered in relation to the supplying of the whole population within their geographical range. In other words, the problem must be envisaged as a whole, and it is admitted that the question of establishing a water board with collective responsibilities will have to be faced, not only in Auckland, but also in Wellington. With the growth of population, the suburban influence in all the main centres will increase, and it will find in the collective control of water and drainage its first means of expression. CHRISTCHURCH OFFENSIVE TRADES. There are, however, already other questions that call for the exercise of powers over regions beyond the scope and jurisdiction of any one local body. Christchurch this time supplies an example. There is a movement to set aside a special area for offensive trades, and of course various local bodies are directly interested, either in the present locations of such industries, or in the question of their new location. It is proposed to establish a board to deal ■with the matter. Without such a board it seems to be impossible to focus the views of the various local bodies, unite them in a general policy, and give effect to it. Offensive-trade grouping is, of course, a part of town-planning. The Health Act gives powers to deal with offensive trades, and defines them in a schedule. To that extent, and in certain other ways that cannot be referred to here in detail, the Health Act has anticipated town-planning legislation. Some people object to "piecemeal” attempts to improve cities, and say “Wait for a Town-Planning Act.” Other people, with less faith in Parliament, urge that something should be done with the powers that exist, instead of waiting for new legislative powers the materialisation of which is uncertain. Meanwhile, Christchurch is apparently bent on doing something with regard to offensive trades. At the same time, in Wellington, the Government has commissioned Mr Hammond, designer of the new Lower Hutt suburb, to help in the work of drafting a Town-Plan-ning Bill. HOW TO GET THINGS DONE. In any movement to regulate the grouping and location of offensive trades, some sort of board or collective body with statutory powers is an essential to any real progress. Mere conferring by several local bodies generally, gets nowhere. Certain trades are community-necessities, and at the same time are unpopular neighbours, and no district is ready to carry this baby voluntarily and cheerfully. In a conference, everybody expects someone else to do the nasty part; nobody is willing to be "it,” and a conference has no power to compel anybody. But a properly-constituted board, j roceeding tactfully, and at the same time forcefully, has power to compel the grouping and location of various trades. Partly by compromise, and partly by pressure, the thing gets done. Independent authorities award Christchurch the palm among New Zealand cities for collective action in the matter of sewerage. As a flat city, Christchurch had jjeculiar difficulties that do not confront a city with a sewerage outfall to the sea. Perhaps that is why Christchurch became united and bent its back to the task. Christchurch has an effective system of drainage, and a sewage farm. It provides the only example in New Zealand of the broad irrigating of sewage on poor land, using Nature’s emans of purification, and at the same time greatly improving the land so treated, and securing from it a productive yield.