TOWN PLANNING

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 73, Issue 6282, 16 September 1946, Page 5

TOWN PLANNING

“ABSOLUTE NECESSITY” VIEWS OF MINISTRY OF WORKS “It is hoped now that with the general supervision of all planning activities by the Ministry of Works, and the attachment of the secretariat of the Town-planning Board to this office, much better progress will be made in the field of town and metropolitan planning,” said the Ministry in its first report, tabled in the House of Representatives. “It is of the greatest importance that sporadic and unplanned growth should no longer be allowed to take place. The Dominion has reached , a stage in its development when proper planning, instead of being regarded as a luxury, has become an absolute necessity.” As urban populations expanded ap increasing importance must ■ inevitably become attached to the problems of zoning industrial and residential areas; locating of community facilities,, schools, and play areas; steering great .traffic arteries away from residential and shopping areas; providing suitable transport services, traffic outlets, water supply, and similar services and amenities. Contiguous both to Wellington and Auckland there were opportunities for planning in areas now being opened up which, if not taken advantage of, ■would result in an unbalanced development and consequently huge economic loss/ “It is an extraordinary fact that expenditure on planning work has in the past often been prevented or even viewed with disfavour. When it is recognised that for many years ahead the Dominion may expect an expansion of urban housing at a rate of some 10,000 houses per annum, involving an investment of considerably more than £20,000,000 per annum i n total urban capital and the work of more than 30,000 men on the site and. in the various supnlv industries, it will be realised how very important it is to secure the •provision at the earliest possible date of town and metropolitan plans to guide the pattern of development, and, on the other hand, what considerable sums can be wasted if this large expenditure is allowed to take place in the absence of co-ordinated plans. “The greatest problem to be faced in the evolution of these co-ordinated plans, a problem which arises from the multiplicity of local authorities, was the tendency of each local authority to disregard the relation which must exist between its own developments and those neighboring local authorities. . “The general position m regard to both town and regional planning on scientific lines can perhaps be summarised by stating that the object is, from a full study of data available in Government departments and else where, tb determine the best use to which each part of the country can be put, and from these results to devise and implement, through Government and other agencies, policies designed to create trends toward an improved use of land and resources, concluded this section of the report. “The problem is complex, and it is recognised that . only a gradua improvement will be possible, but, m so far as New Zealand is developed in conformity with this principle, so far will future possibilities ot improved living standards be realised.”