Wellington City Council has "fielded more than 300 public submissions on what to do with the Basin Reserve," according to Damian George of STUFF. One even offers an "unlikely solution of moving the cricket ground to the Hutt Valley." Public submissions on what to do with the venue closed last month, "after a call from architects Tennent Brown for Wellingtonians to provide feedback." Calls have been made "for the ground's scoreboard to be replaced." A total of 340 submissions were received within a month. Among them "were calls to discard the ground altogether, make indoor spaces available for community use, install lights in order to host day-night limited-overs matches, and establish a crescent-shaped stand at the western end for concerts." There were also calls to "demolish the earthquake-prone Museum Stand," which has been out of action since '12, and attract more events to the ground outside the cricket season. Cricket Wellington CEO Peter Clinton said that Tennent Brown was "ultimately in charge of sorting through the submissions, and it was too early to tell whether any of them held any weight." He said, "A lot of people would like to see the Basin's history reserved, and it's uniqueness. They don't want to see a built-up area. At the same time, they're also wanting it to remain New Zealand's premier test venue" (STUFF, 10/11).
