Opinion - time to knock off the knockers

9/9/2008

Dunedin citizens owe it to the coming generations to keep adapting to change and changing circumstances; to plan with the future in mind; and to keep the sense of vision that our forefathers had, Robin Charteris (1957-60) argues.

So, Dunedin is dying, is it? Nothing but gloom and despair ahead.

The city's losing jobs; can't attract new industry; is only good for couch-burning and albatross-rearing.

Robin Charteris

Just a one-horse-town heading for oblivion. Again.

That refrain's done the rounds in New Zealand for more than a century.

And, very often, it's we Dunedinites who have sung it the loudest.

If New Zealand is deemed a nation of knockers, Dunedin is the brassiest knocker of all.

At least we're New Zealand-best at something.

But whither Dunedin today? What would a first-time visitor from overseas find?

How about a strong, vibrant, extremely-liveable small city in an incomparable harbour-hugging setting with amenities, attributes and a lifestyle for which countless millions of people elsewhere would give their eye teeth and a great deal more.

A friendly, relaxed and caring place that anyone with family values would be proud to call home.

This is a city which I, my family and most of my friends wouldn't dream of swapping for any other. It's in our blood and in our hearts.

There are thousands of others like us here.

Most of us make up the silent majority who don't bemoan our fate, don't constantly criticise social and civic endeavour, don't think our weather is persistingly awful and who are extremely grateful not to have the pressures and pitfalls of living in a successful modern metropolis.

The worst naysayers of Dunedin are not our neighbours to the north; they are those of some of our neighbours in this very city who see peril in every change of business activity, who root themselves in pessimism and who wag their fingers in warning at any step outside the square taken by those who do not deign to accept their firm belief that Dunedin's glass is always half empty, never half full.

They've been here ever since the gold ran out late in the 19th century.

They heralded our business decline, the loss of national company headquarters, the drift north, the misfortunes of our sporting teams, the closure of this, the closure of that.

Go through the files of the Otago Daily Times for the past 100 years, as I have done, and you can read of the glass-half-empty brigade and their prophecies of doom.

Process their letters to the editor, as I did for a decade, and shake your head in wonder, if not despair.

But look at Dunedin today, and pity those diehards for their negativity.

Our other ancestors, those who got on with life in this city and accepted that society and living constantly change and evolve, have left us amazing amenities.

Had the earlier naysayers had their way, Dunedinites today would neither have the biggest (and probably at the time most expensive) Town Hall in New Zealand, nor the greatest railway station, university and medical and dental schools, the two world-class museums and modern, inner-city art gallery, so many outstanding Victorian and Edwardian buildings, perhaps not even the best (and only?) Town Belt in the country.

Nor would we have the outstanding Moana Pool.

I worked on the pool as a labourer installing ceiling panels for A and T Burt in the early 1960s and can recall the dissent raised by the local pessimists over the size and the cost and the need and the effect on rates and the grandiosity of it all.

Tell that to our children and grandchildren of today, for it is them - and us - who have reaped the rewards of those contentious but farsighted decisions of yesterday.

It is to these younger ones and the generations to follow that we must address our present concerns about the dying of Dunedin.

We owe it to them to keep adapting to change and changing circumstances; to plan with the future in mind; and to keep the sense of vision that our forefathers had.

That said, we have a responsibility as well to mix prudence with vision, especially when considering projects the size and cost of the proposed new multipurpose stadium.

Some of our present naysaying brigade are among the ranks of stadium critics, their shrill cries tending to muffle the warnings sounded by the more sober to which the stadium proponents would be wise to listen.

Some of the opponents of the stadium are friends and acquaintances of mine.

They are sincere and thoughtful people.

They have raised issues of cost and cost-sharing, of wants and needs, and of true multipurpose use with which the community must grapple.

It's all very well providing a first-class amenity for the future; it mustn't come with so many fish hooks that it drags the city under.

But our community representatives - the city council, regional council and stadium working committee - seem to be addressing the issues and problems responsibly.

The majority of voters gave the councillors a mandate at the recent local body elections (and the city council, in turn, gave the working committee a task to perform); and I believe we expect our representatives to get on with the job, and the vision for our city, with proper prudence.

Too much carping by the anti-stadium brigade, and not enough vocal and visible support from the silent majority, tend to reinforce Dunedin's fatuous reputation as a dying city.

Such rank pessimism is contagious.

The laid-back need to stand up and give the lie to it.

Like a fair proportion of Dunedin residents, I'm a superannuitant now (from this month), without substantial other income, and, yes, local body rates are a burden.

But more than a retired journalist and a pensioner (what a harsh, compartmentalising word!), I'm a father and grandfather and a citizen of Dunedin and Otago.

I want a bright and assured future in this wonderful city and province for the two of my children and four grandchildren who live here.

I want to enhance the value of the current goldfields that are our educational facilities by making Dunedin even more attractive to national and international students.

I want stay proud of where I live.

I want others to be proud of Dunedin.

I want this city to visualise its vibrant future.

And I accept there will be a cost.

To paraphrase that University of Otago advertisement, I say to the knockers in our community: Dunedin, get over it.

And add: Dunedin, get on with it.

Robin Charteris retired last year after 10 years as editor of the Otago Daily Times. He was raised in Dunedin and has lived most of his life here.