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READJUSTMENTS OF AND EXTENSIONS TO PRESENT AREAS AT
HAPPY VALLEY AND QUEEN'S RECREATION GROUNDS.
13. We have given very careful consideration to the question of how the area at present allotted to the Polo Club at Queen's Recreation Ground could most fairly and usefully be employed for the purposes of recreation, and have heard evidence in detail from all points of view on this subject. We have noticed that whilst this area is on the one hand nominally reserved for a comparatively small body, viz., the playing members of the Polo Club, in reality it forms a playground for many hundreds of children of the locality, when not in actual use for polo, and we are informed that the Polo Club has offered the use of the ground for other games on the whole of Saturdays and Sundays throughout the year when the ground is not ordinarily used by the Polo Club and subject to no serious damage being done to the turf. We realize further the importance of the game of Polo in the training of Army Officers and would be loth to do anything that would impede the continued existence of the game in the Colony. We understand from the Club's repre- sentatives however that if an alternative ground is offered in the Aberdeen Valley the Club would have no objection to transferring there, its stables remaining where they are now and ponies being walked out to the new ground prior to play.
14. We recommend therefore that when a space is made available in the Aberdeen Valley, the Polo Club, as now occupying ground which might more suitably be allotted to other clubs with more numerous membership, should be re-allotted a ground at Aberdeen, and that meanwhile the Polo Club should continue in the use of its present ground. We would deprecate however the strict fencing in of the present ground by any new allottees in such a way as to prevent its present use as a playground by the children of the neighbourhood unless an alternative public playground is provided.
15. We have been struck with the very congested state of the ground at present used by various cricket clubs and a football club at the north end of Happy Valley. We recommend therefore that as large an area as possible of the land at the base of Morrison Hill at the junction of Morrison Hill Road and Gap Road should be reserved as an open space to provide for extensions of the overcrowded playing field area now occupied by the 'Civil Service,' the 'Police', the 'Craigengower' and 'Hong Kong Football' Clubs.
16. It has been represented to us that the stables of the Mounted Infantry Com- pany on Queen's Recreation Ground detract seriously from the amenities of the Chinese Recreation Club, and prevent much needed extension of the playing fields area in this neighbourhood. We consider that this representation is justified and recommend that Gov- ernment should if possible provide alternative accommodation for these stables elsewhere.
17. With regard to the use by the Royal Hong Kong Golf Club of Happy Valley, we consider that as this was the original home of the Club, and the course here performs in some respects the functions of a municipal golf course, being convenient of access and involving players in the minimum of expense for travelling and thus allowing many to play the game and obtain exercise who could not otherwise afford to do so, the Club should not be required to give up playing here any more than is absolutely necessary. It was suggested to us however, that the club might be willing to forego the use of the ground for perhaps one or two afternoons a week in the summer months so that those. who wish to play football or baseball during the summer might have ground available. We consulted the Golf Club in the matter and it replied that it was willing to give up the use of Happy Valley on Saturday afternoons next summer for one season as an experi- ment. We understand that the permanent Recreation Grounds Committee will make use of this offer in its work of allotment for next season.
18. Our last recommendation in regard to the recreation grounds in the Happy Valley Queen's Recreation Ground district is that when a scheme has materialised for providing further extension of playing fields on the south side of the island at Aberdeen Valley the possibility of locating the Navy Recreation Club on a bermanant ground of its own on some of the grounds thus rendered vacant or available on the Victoria side of the island should be given every consideration. In making this recom- mendation we are prompted by the considerations that the Navy has hitherto been unfortunate in having no settled ground of its own, and that it is desirable that the men of the Navy, who cannot afford much in the way of travelling expenses, should have