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There’s art and there’s street sculpture …

The chainsaw carvings in Victoria Avenue were an eyesore. Good riddance to them. I’m sure that sculptor Merv is a very nice bloke and I’m sorry that his feelings were hurt, but his masterpiece was my blot on the landscape.

There’s a place for chainsaw sculpture but that place isn’t a permanent spot in a tree-lined avenue. An avenue is, by definition, a street lined with trees.

Living trees.

… and then there are trees

And while we’re on the subject of trees, what about replacements for the missing trees in Victoria Avenue and myriad streets all around Wanganui? Trees help to absorb the noxious emissions that we fill our city air with. As well as being easy on the eye they help to reduce city temperature extremes by absorbing heat and by shading asphalt.

Have you wondered why the temperatures shown on the evening news are a lot lower than what you suffered under during the summer days? It’s because of the vast areas of asphalt on our roads and ever-expanding heat retaining tar-sealed car parks.

Cities are invariably significantly hotter than the carefully selected places where the weather data are recorded. How many times do we look at the TV weather figure for Wanganui and say “Yeah, right”?

In my own little street I’m confronted by patches of flourishing weeds surrounded by concrete edging. These patches of ugliness were intended as tree sites. How difficult is it to sort that out?

Won’t put much strain on the rates.

And to stir a little controversy

It would be nice if the Victoria Avenue trees could be progressively replaced with natives. Won’t hold my breath on that one. I suspect that would be a minority view and I’ll bow to public opinion if that’s the case.

But we need lots of natives to replace lost trees in many other streets of our city. Beautiful Victoria Avenue is one of the reasons that so many visitors are surprised at what a pleasant city we have. Let’s add to that pool of beauty.

A dearth of decency

Michael Laws and offensive people I have known

I recently gave the Red Eye Café a swerve because some inconsiderate idiot had parked precisely dead centre between two car parks leaving no space for my little Freelander. I headed for Oggie’s Café instead. On the way I spotted a man pushing a beat up van in the opposite direction to mine. I stopped 100 yards up the road and walked back to lend a hand.

By the time I got to him he’d stopped pushing, but the van was still in the middle of the road. “May I help?” Said I.

He looked at me dead-faced and said “No.”

Nothing more. No thank you, it’s OK, or kiss my backside. Just a flat expressionless “No.”

“You’re welcome.” I said, and walked back up the road to my car. I was not pleased. Perhaps for the first time in human history, the Good Old Days really did have something going for them.

What’s this got to do with Michael Laws?

I’m sure that Michael is not an inconsiderate parker.

Well, I’m almost sure.

But his crusade to sort out the Whanganui DHB may have more chance of working if he gave some thought to the feelings of the other folk who’re trying to do the same. He and Clive Solomon appear to be lacking in the basic skills necessary to make a team work.

His recent confrontational behaviour at board meetings can do nothing to further the aims he espoused which persuaded folk like myself to give him their vote. Whether his views are correct or not, a more reasoned approach to people and problems would be more likely to produce results than the confrontational and aggressive behaviour exhibited recently at board meetings.

See for yourself in this Wanganui Chronicle report.

Makes me wonder whether or not Clive Solomon’s community support is standing on shaky foundations too.