Modern Cities Should Be Planned. City planners have in mind both usefulness and beauty. that will be efficient and beautiful. city is growing at the present time.

They work for a city Almost every American Year after year, houses,

Wide avenues, civic centers with radiating approaches, public parks, and fine examples of architecture make it one of the world's most beautiful cities.

shops, and factories are being added. In America there is a peculiar opportunity to plan the new parts of our growing cities.

The greatest work for the planning of cities lies in the future. Communities have come to realize this, and therefore have appointed special city officials to guard the future growth of their city. City engineers and planning commissioners are helped by the real estate dealers of each

locality to develop in that community beautiful homes as well as orderly districts.

A splendid opportunity for city planning may be found in the rapidly growing suburbs that stretch out from most American cities. With improved trolley and railroad service, and with the wide use of the automobile, suburbs are

ARGYLE PLACE, BUFFALO, N. Y.

Careful city planning is shown in the layout of this boulevard.

springing up near all our cities. They should be made into a series of well-planned garden cities.

The automobile has brought a new need for city planning. Parking places must now be provided unless the streets are broad. It was the custom in some parts of the United States fifty and one hundred years ago to lay out new towns about a public square, around which the horses could be hitched. These spaces can now be used for parking cars; but these limited spaces are quickly outgrown in growing cities.

Moreover, plans must be made for routing through traffic, both freight and passenger, around our cities, so as to free the streets for local vehicles.

Zoning Systems.

Your city is spreading, let us say, toward the north. Long before any houses are built, your city planning board should take a map of the section and

Courtesy American Telephone & Telegraph Co. BROADWAY AND JOHN STREET, NEW YORK,

IN 1890

decide where parks, squares, schools, playgrounds, fire stations, and other public improvements I will be needed. If this is to be a residence district, no factories or shops should be permitted. In this part of the city people will live. At the same time, the people must work. Therefore another portion of land is set aside for manufacturing purposes. This industrial center is placed convenient to rail or water transportation, or both. And then, if possible,

the residence center and the industrial center will be so located that the prevailing winds will blow smoke away from the residence district. Such a plan is called "zoning a city." The larger cities by "zoning" ordinances are now limiting the height, character, and distance from the street of buildings in the several zones into which the city has been divided for residential, business, manufacturing, or other purposes.

Provision must also be made for street car lines over which the people in the residence district can go to the factory district. By such means a residence neighborhood is kept clean and quiet, and at the same time supplied with the necessary public improvements and comfortable means of access to work.

And the market place must not be forgotten. In the smaller cities and towns a place is needed where farmers can sell their produce; and in the larger cities large market centers should be handy to the residence sections.

Housing Legislation. The city authorities often go even further, telling the owner of a lot that he may not build on, say, more than sixty per cent of the space of his lot. In other words, twofifths of every lot will be yard space. This prevents the construction of great, solid blocks of houses covering most of the ground space. And further, on a narrow street some cities forbid the lot owner to put up a building more than a certain number of stories high. This prevents the shutting off of sunlight. Such regulations, carefully

Courtesy American Telephone & Telegraph Co. BROADWAY AND JOHN STREET, NEW YORK, TWENTY YEARS LATER The overhead wires have all been put underground. Not only the safety of the public but the security of telephone, light and power services demand this improvement in modern cities.

enforced, prevent the kind of congestion that is met with in most of the large cities of the world.

In the chapter on health we saw the benefits obtained from such building regulations. Ordinarily, in large American cities about sixteen or seventeen people die yearly for each thousand of the population. Sickness and death are materially decreased by good city planning. In one European city the death rate was reduced from seventeen to eleven out of a thousand by careful city planning. Better

NEW YORK SUBWAY SYSTEM UNDER FORTY-SECOND STREET In the center is Grand Central Station and below is shown the intersection on different levels of the Lexington Avenue and Queensboro Subways with the elevators, escalators, and ramps by which the different levels are reached. built, more thoughtfully arranged cities have purer air, better sanitation, improved working conditions, more adequate transportation, and many other improvements that necessarily result in better health.

Care for Traffic Conditions. Housing must not be considered alone. A city engineer must also think of the prosperity of the city he serves. Industrial development means prosperity, so every aid must be given to allow industries to grow. Increased industrial growth means increased traffic problems, so that the city engineer in planning the city must provide for future, as well as present, traffic.