PHILADELPHIA 
 MrKMAY PROJECT 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 ANNEX 
 
 1002 
 
 
NAC 
 
A 
 
 
 Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924024452314 
 
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 A PLEA FOR THE 
 SUCCESS OF THE PRESENT 
 MOVEMENT IN FAVOR OF 
 A DIAGONAL BOULEVARD 
 FROM THE CITY HALL 
 TO FAIRMOUNT PARK 
 
 ISS.VED BY 
 
 1902 
 
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 
 
 Valued assistance in the preparation of this 
 brochure has come from many hands, and to all the 
 Parkway Association extends its sincere thanks. 
 
 To Mr. A . B. Johnson for the views and plans 
 of the Ca/zada de la Reforma and for the matter 
 relating to the City of Mexico. 
 
 To the publishers of " The World's Work," 
 "House and Garden" "The British Architect," 
 and other magazines to whose courtesy many of our 
 illustrations are due. 
 
 To Messrs. Ran, Sidman, Megger, and others 
 u hose professional skill has added to the brightness 
 of our pages. 
 
 To the T-Square Club for the cut of the pro- 
 posed Art Museum. To Mr. Alfred Morton Gith- 
 ens for the use of his Park Concourse Competition 
 Drawing. 
 
 And lastly, to those forgotten in this moment of 
 going to press whose aid, nevertheless, has con- 
 tributed to the value of this work. 
 
 PRESS OF 
 
 HDWARD STERN & CO., 
 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
The Proposed Parkway 
 
 FOR PHILADELPHIA 
 
 A DIRECT THOROUGHFARE FROM THE PUBLIC BUILDINGS 
 TO THE GREEN STREET ENTRANCE OF FAIRMOUNT PARK 
 
 CONTAINING A REVIEW OF 
 THE VARIOUS MOVEMENTS 
 FOR A DIAGONAL BOULE- 
 VARD AND THE ORIGINAL 
 ARGUMENT IN FAVOR OF A 
 PLAZA BEFORE THE NORTH- 
 ERN FACADE OF THE CITY 
 HALL 
 
 COMPILED AND EDITED BY 
 
 ALBERT KELSEY, Secretary 
 
 WITH AN 
 
 INTRODUCTORY PLEA, by Hon. JAMES M. BECK 
 
 > 
 
 PRESS OPINIONS AND LETTERS FROM 
 LEADING CITIZENS 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 The Parkway Association 
 
 NOVEMBER 
 I902 
 
Property ( 
 
 [College of Architecture,; 
 
 Cornel] University 
 
The Executive Board of the 
 Parkway Association 
 
 JOHN H. CONVERSE 
 
 PRESIDENT 
 
 JOHN G. JOHNSON 
 
 VICE-PRESIDKNT 
 
 JUSTUS C. STRAWBRIDGE 
 
 VICE-PRESIDKNT 
 
 SAMUEL GUSTINE THOMPSON 
 
 VICE-PRESIDENT 
 
 JAMES M. BECK 
 
 VICE-PRESIDENT 
 
 E. T. STOTESUURV 
 P. A. B. WIDENER 
 A. J. CASSATT 
 JAMES ELVERSON 
 THOMAS DOLAN 
 VVM. F. HARRITY 
 WM. M. BUNN 
 ALBERT KELSEY 
 
 SECRETARY, 931 CHESTNUT STREET 
 
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INTRODUCTORY PLEA 
 
 BY HON. JAMES M. BECK 
 
 The Boulevard project will not die. Its vital- 
 ity is due to its inherent worth. Excepting the 
 improvement of our water-supply, which is now 
 happily on its way to successful completion, it 
 may be questioned whether there is any project 
 which means so much to the welfare and ad- 
 vancement of Philadelphia as the construction of 
 the Boulevard. 
 
 To keep pace with its many rivals and espe- 
 cially to pass them, it is essential that a city 
 should be made attractive, and as it is not practi- 
 cable to beautify a city of great area in all its 
 parts, it is most important that a city should have 
 some distinct feature of exceptional beauty, of 
 which its people may justly boast and with which 
 it may attract strangers within its gates. In this 
 sense, beauty is in no sense a luxury but a vital 
 necessity. Without it, strangers may visit Phila- 
 delphia when called by imperative business; but 
 they will rarely visit it to gratify that sense of 
 pleasure which the creation of the beautiful 
 brings to all reasonable men. 
 
 The wealth that has been poured into the lap 
 of Paris by reason of her beauty is simply incal- 
 culable. Millions of strangers from all parts of 
 the world visit this queenly city of the Seine in 
 order to admire the beauty of its streets, the 
 charm of its parks and plazas and the nobility of 
 its buildings. Every municipal improvement in 
 Paris has been repaid a hundred-fold by the 
 wealth which strangers have freely spent within 
 its gates. A municipal adornment, therefore, far 
 from being a luxury, is by all odds the most 
 lucrative asset that a city can possess. 
 
 Apart from the pleasure of our own people 
 Philadelphia should attract the attention of the 
 world most by having some great distinctive 
 thoroughfare, which will yield to none in beauty 
 in any city. Fortunately, it has an opportunity 
 
 such as few cities possess to accomplish this in the 
 most impressive manner and with the minimum 
 of expense. Its two distinctive features at the 
 present time are its great City Hall, one of the 
 largest and most ornate in the world, and its Park, 
 which by common consent has no superior in any 
 city. 
 
 Fortunately, the distance between these two 
 notable achievements is inconsiderable, meas- 
 uring in a diagonal line but little more than 
 a mile. Fortunately, too, there are no great or 
 difficult grades or other engineering problems, 
 and fortunately, too, the tide of improvement has 
 not yet made the work of construction so expen- 
 sive as to be prohibitive. A neighborhood where 
 with few exceptions real estate values are low- and 
 which is marked by gentle grades, makes it pos- 
 sible to construct at less expense than in any city 
 of equal size in the world a boulevard upon 
 which all the resources of modern engineering and 
 art can be expended. It will thus be possible to 
 connect the most ornate City Hall in the world 
 with the most elaborate and beautiful Park by a 
 noble boulevard, and this done and well done, the 
 city of Philadelphia will have an attraction to 
 show its visitors than which none in any part of 
 the world need be superior. Once constructed, it 
 will remain a thing of beauty and a joy for all 
 generations to come. To construct it before it is 
 too late is the plainest dictate of prudence and 
 wisdom. To neglect it would be immeasureable 
 folly, for which future generations would hold 
 the present justly accountable. It cannot be too 
 strongly impressed that the present is not only the 
 best but the only time to do it, and if Philadel- 
 phia, the eighth city in the world, confesses itself 
 unequal to this splendid project, it will admit that 
 it has no just place among the leading cities of 
 the modern world. 
 
THE 
 
 PARKWAY ASSOCIATION 
 
 The Parkway Association has been organized 
 for the purpose of bringing to success that project 
 for a diagonal boulevard from the City Hall to 
 Fairmount Park, which, upon consideration, ap- 
 pears to combine feasibility with the greatest 
 direct advantages. 
 
 The value that such a Park Boulevard would 
 have to the city has been recognized for many 
 years, but the attempts made to secure the neces- 
 sary legislation have hitherto failed, although the 
 subject has enlisted the influence of many men 
 who are recognized as eminent in mercantile, pro- 
 fessional and civic circles. 
 
 A number of these, including Mayor Ash- 
 bridge, Ex-mayor Chas. F. Warwick, Assistant 
 Attorney- General Jas. M. Beck, Messrs. Thomas 
 Dolan, Wm. F. Harrity, Justus C. Strawbridge, 
 J. Levering Jones, Jos. G. Darlington, Chas. H. 
 Cramp, Hon. Wm. M. Bunn, Messrs. James Pol- 
 lock, Wm. J. McAuley, Leslie W. Miller, Thos. 
 S. Harrison, Wm. J. Sellers, and others, held an 
 organization meeting, at the Art Club, on June 
 1 2th last, when officers were chosen and a gen- 
 eral policy defined. 
 
 The following motion, offered by Mr. Beck 
 and unanimously adopted after full discussion, is 
 a clear statement of the aims of the Association: 
 
 Moved, that — 
 
 This conference endorses heartily the plan for 
 a boulevard from the northern plaza of the City 
 Hall to Fairmount Park, and it further endorses 
 so much of the plan submitted to it (a monu- 
 mental plan submitted by Mr. McAuley), as 
 provides for a boulevard of the width of 300 
 feet from Fairmount Park to Logan Square, 
 and of 160 feet from Logan Square to the City 
 Hall. This conference earnestly recommends to 
 His Honor the Mayor and the City Councils of 
 the City of Philadelphia that suitable municipal 
 legislation be adopted without unreasonable de- 
 lay to place such a boulevard upon the City 
 Plan. 
 
 In support of this recommendation it respect- 
 fully invites attention to the following sugges- 
 tions : 
 
 (1) The plan suggested will in effect bring 
 Fairmount Park to Logan Square, and thus make 
 the most beautiful pleasure ground in the world, 
 the most accessible and centrally located of any 
 great public park. The plan contemplates a 
 broad and noble avenue, wider than the Champs 
 Elysees, from Fairmount Park to Logan Square, 
 
 which, when suitably improved by trees and gar- 
 dens, would in effect make Logan Square the 
 entrance to Fairmount Park. 
 
 The triangular piece of ground near the Green 
 Street entrance to the Park, which has recently 
 been condemned, has already been a substantial 
 beginning to this public improvement, while the 
 placing of the Reading Railway underground and 
 the utilization of Pennsylvania Avenue is further 
 helpful in reducing the necessary expense of this 
 improvement. 
 
 (2) The Park avenue, if constructed, will go 
 far to create a suitable open space in front of the 
 City Hall. Philadelphia has spent more than 
 $20,000,000 in the construction of this ornate 
 building, and unless an opening be speedily 
 created on the north side an adequate view of the 
 building will soon be destroyed by the construc- 
 tion of large office-buildings in its neighborhood. 
 The proposed improvement will add materially to 
 the north front of the City Hall, and will create 
 a substantial plaza between the Masonic Temple, 
 the City Hall, the Pennsylvania Railroad Station 
 and other public improvements. 
 
 (3) The avenue as projected will be helpful in 
 the improvement of our city by breaking the 
 monotonous regularity of its streets — a regularity 
 recently condemned by the City Parks Associa- 
 tion. 
 
 Upon the line of the proposed avenue there 
 are at present few buildings of considerable value. 
 As this section has not yet felt the impulse of 
 business growth there has not yet been the appre- 
 ciation of values which is likely to take place in 
 future years. The present time, therefore, is most 
 opportune to condemn the land in question be- 
 fore its value becomes prohibitive. 
 
 The projected improvement would redtem a 
 large section of the city, which will soon be the 
 very centre of its urban growth, and would add 
 many millions of value to surrounding property, 
 from which, of necessity, the city would derive a 
 large and increasing revenue in the form of taxes 
 on increased valuation. 
 
 The plan in question has been prepared after 
 considerable study and consideration by archi- 
 tects and engineers. It has sought to minimize 
 the expenses of the improvement consistently 
 with its dignity and importance. It creates a 
 vista from the City Hall to the Cathedral, and 
 thence to the Park entrance, and, if carried out, 
 would unquestionably become in the near future 
 
one of the noblest avenues in the world, and as 
 such, a valuable aid to the growth of Philadel- 
 phia. 
 
 Resolved, Further, that a committee of not 
 more than seven be appointed by the Chairman, 
 
 A HINT IN STREET LIGHTING 
 
 of which he shall be ex-officio a member, to advo- 
 cate the placing upon the city plan the pro- 
 prosed plan for the boulevard and its ultimate 
 construction whenever the interests of the city 
 will permit. 
 
 After the adoption of Mr. Beck's resolution, 
 Mr. Jones offered a resolution creating a perma- 
 nent organization, and electing Mr. Converse 
 President and Messrs. John G. Johnson, Justus 
 C. Strawbridge, Samuel Gustine Thompson and 
 James M. Beck vice-presidents of the Permanent 
 Association. It was the sense of the meeting that 
 these should also constitute the nucleus of the 
 Committee of Seven called for by Mr. Beck's reso- 
 lution. 
 
 Another meeting was held on June 21st, at 
 which a number of plans, including those of proj- 
 ects advocated in the past, were examined and 
 compared. After careful discussion it was de- 
 cided to recommend and urge the adoption of the 
 plan of which a reduced copy faces the title-page 
 of this pamphlet. It calls for a direct thorough- 
 fare on one straight line from the centre of the 
 tower of the City Hall to a point at the foot of 
 Fairmount Reservoir, to be three hundred feet 
 wide from Fairmount Park to Logan Square, and 
 one hundred and sixty feet wide from Logan 
 Square to the City Hall. At this narrower part, 
 as thus projected, it will still be forty-seven feet 
 wider than Broad Street. 
 
 Motion was then made by Mr. Beck, seconded 
 by Mr. Elverson, and immediately carried, that 
 his Honor, Mayor Ashbridge, be requested to 
 perfect a plan and send a message to Councils 
 recommending its adoption. 
 
 A few days later, on June 27th, the Managers 
 of the City Parks Association endorsed the action 
 of the Parkway Association in a minute, which, 
 with an explanatory letter, were transmitted to 
 the Parkway Association, and are printed here- 
 with : 
 
 Philadelphia, June 28, 1902. 
 The Parkway Association, Philadelphia. 
 
 Gentlemen: I have the honor to transmit 
 herewith a copy of a minute with reference to the 
 proposed Park Boulevard, adopted by the Man- 
 agers of the City Parks Association at a meeting 
 held the twenty-seventh instant. 
 Yours truly, 
 (Signed) Andrew Wright Crawford, 
 Recording Secretary 
 
 Minute -with Reference to the Park Road 
 
 No proposition that has been made for the 
 general benefit of the city has approached the one 
 for a park road from the City Hall to the Green 
 Street entrance to Fairmount Park, as offering to 
 all of its people a greater good at practically little 
 or no actual cost to the city. 
 
 Our beautiful and healthful Park has no suit- 
 able direct approach from the heart of the city, 
 and this projected avenue would supply more 
 
 10 
 
needs of many kinds than probably most citizens 
 have realized. 
 
 In the first place, it would cut through a dis- 
 trict of very poor and undesirable development, 
 and open a large area for improvement. Impor- 
 tant buildings, inviting dignified architectural 
 treatment, would doubtless seek locations along 
 it. It would be a diagonal, with the fine vista of 
 the City Hall at one end and a suitable entrance 
 to the Park at the other. 
 
 The distance from the City Hall would not 
 exceed i mile, and it would afford a short route 
 for the whole northwestern portion of the city, 
 funneling all the parallel streets and bringing 
 every one of the great northwestern section to 
 the centre of business interests and to the City 
 Hall, as well as to what is still more important — 
 the two great railroad terminals. 
 
 When the waterways were the important free 
 highways, business naturally centred along the 
 wharves and adjacent streets. In this way all 
 the great cities of the past naturally developed on 
 these lines. William Penn selected the shortest 
 distance between the two rivers bounding his city 
 on the east and west for his principal street, and 
 High or Market Street was a natural and proper 
 line for that time. 
 
 But the extension of the parallel system of 
 streets has done more to narrow and give a pro- 
 vincial character to Philadelphia than any other 
 cause. Classes have been created in society by 
 arbitrary lines, because the people naturally 
 moved east and west on the routes provided for 
 them, and rarely came in contact with those 
 using other parallel-lines. 
 
 The southeastern section of the city would 
 secure, by the opening of this avenue, access by 
 a greatly shortened route not only to the Park, 
 but to the entire northwestern section. 
 
 Two errors have been made by those urging 
 objections to this measure. The most important 
 of these errors, is the belief, which has been 
 widely encouraged, that the cost to the city of 
 opening the Boulevard will be heavy, imposing 
 additional burdens of taxation upon the people 
 and delaying other pressing needs in the way of 
 new school-houses, improved water-supply, etc. 
 
 We believe it can be demonstrated beyond a 
 shadow of a doubt that the effect of opening this 
 fine thoroughfare will be to enhance the values 
 not only of property fronting upon it, but upon 
 the streets crossing it north and south as well as 
 east and west, and that instead of increasing 
 taxes it will prove a source of revenue from the 
 outset. 
 
 As to the cost, a calculation can readily be 
 made showing that, upon the most reasonable 
 basis, the values of land not only fronting upon 
 
 the new avenue itself, but for a distance of at 
 least 300 feet east and west and north and south, 
 on the intersecting streets, will so far exceed 
 present assessments as to make the current tax 
 rate yield a sum far greater than the interest 
 
 FROM POTSDAM, PRUSSIA 
 
 upon any loan that would be issued to meet the 
 damages that might be found due to owners, (jit 
 is well known that the properties upon streets 
 intersecting important highways are immensely 
 enhanced in value near the point of intersection. ) 
 
 11 
 
To the distance of 300 feet at least, on both sides 
 of streets crossing such a thoroughfare, $10 a foot 
 can be added to the present value of lots on a 
 very moderate estimate. 
 
 Twenty-four streets will intersect the Boule- 
 vard between Broad Street and the reservoir. 
 Estimating for an improvement to the distance 
 of only 300 feet from each intersection, there will 
 be 1 200 feet, including both sides of each street, 
 to be benefited. Twenty-four intersections will 
 therefore involve 28,800 feet of frontage. An 
 increase of $10 a foot upon this frontage, capital- 
 ized at 5 per cent., would create an increased 
 value of about $6,000,000. This increase is 
 entirely exclusive of the property fronting on the 
 Boulevard itself. The value of the street front- 
 age upon it could not be less than $50 a foot, 
 which is probably only one-half of what it will 
 soon bring. At this figure, however, of $50 a 
 foot, capitalized at 5 per cent., the value will be 
 over $8,000,000, which with the $6,000 000 on 
 intersecting streets, would make over $14,000,000 
 of new values. 
 
 Upon this value at the present rate of tax of 
 $1.85, $259,000 would be produced. This is the 
 interest upon over $8,000,000 of city loan at 3 
 per cent. This sum is in excess of any estimate 
 of damages to be assessed, and a net revenue 
 would therefore accrue to the city at once. No 
 allowance has been made for the increase in 
 values at points distant more than 300 feet from 
 the intersections of the streets, special values of 
 corners, etc. 
 
 Much more could be said to show that the 
 city will not incur any burden by opening the 
 the street ; but a more important matter for con- 
 sideration is the fact that this improvement bene- 
 fits the poorer people more than any effort that 
 has been made in their behalf for years. 
 
 Some persons have encouraged the belief that 
 the Boulevard was a luxury for the wealthy 
 classes. Nothing is further from the truth. Its 
 effect will be to bring the benefits of the Park to 
 Broad and Market Streets, to open a short and 
 easy route to the Park on foot for the whole 
 southern and eastern part of the city. To-day, 
 access is almost exclusively by the cars instead 
 of the pleasanter, more healthful and cheaper mode 
 of walking. To those who have witnessed the 
 crowds pouring out to the parks in foreign cities 
 along their attractive approaches no further state- 
 ment is necessary; but the fact is not known here, 
 and it should be given publicity. The thousands 
 who will pour out on Sundays and holidays to 
 the green banks and hills of Fairmount will praise 
 the discretion of the city administration that 
 secures this incalculable improvement. 
 
 The removal of this avenue from the city plan 
 was a deplorable event, and the City Parks Asso- 
 ciation takes this opportunity of expressing its 
 cordial approval of the project now happily being 
 pressed with so much vigor by public -spirited 
 citizens. 
 
 The T=Square Club's Endorsement 
 
 On July 10th the Executive Committee of the 
 T-Square Club took similar action by the follow- 
 ing resolution, endorsing the action of the Park- 
 way Association : 
 
 " The T-Square Club having previously de- 
 clared itself in favor of a Boulevard for the city 
 of Philadelphia, reiterates its former declaration, 
 and again places itself on record as supporting 
 such a movement by unanimously adopting the 
 following resolution at a recent meeting of the 
 Executive Committee : 
 
 "Whereas, The support of the T-Square 
 Club has always been given to those public 
 movements tending to improve and add to the 
 artistic beauty of Philadelphia, and 
 
 "Whereas, The recent presentation of an- 
 other plan for a Boulevard has offered all who 
 understand and appreciate the value of municipal 
 improvement an opportunity to declare them- 
 selves in favor of a project of great importance ; 
 therefore be it 
 
 "Resolved, That the T-Square Club heartily 
 advocates the placing of a diagonal boulevard on 
 the city plan, with a recommendation to the city 
 authorities that, in order_to_gblain_results com- ' 
 jnensurate _wIthJtoJrnpojrtan ce, exper t advice be 
 obtained through ^committee of expertsTsimilar 
 to that now existing for tbe_ improvement" of tire- 
 city of Washington." 
 
 In the meantime, the matter has been placed 
 on the calendar of City Councils, and the news- 
 papers of the city, with few exceptions, have 
 favorably noticed the movement editorially, in 
 several cases repeatedly urging the immediate 
 construction of this long-needed and much-needed 
 improvement. 
 
 While some scattered opposition has devel- 
 oped, this was expected, and, setting aside that 
 in which personal motive appears, it merely shows 
 a difference of opinion as to expediency. The 
 movement appears to have the approval of the 
 majority of the best citizens of our city, and it is 
 believed that if many who have hitherto held 
 silence will now take active part, this majority 
 will be so large and of such character as to sweep 
 aside all retarding influences. 
 
 To develop this unexpressed approval into 
 open advocacy is the purpose of the Parkway As- 
 sociation and of this pamphlet. 
 
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RETROSPECT 
 
 The effort to secure to Philadelphia a suitable 
 approach and perspective for the Public Buildings 
 and to open up a thoroughfare proportional to the 
 massive structures that then began to cluster 
 about Penn Square, appeared first as an agitation, 
 culminating in the-fottowihg ordinance of April 
 10, i8q2, which placed upon the city plan a 
 boul evardone hundred and sixt vJeeTwirie, p"y- 
 ten cTing from th e northwest corrJer~oT"Broad and 
 "Filbert Streets ^ to Cailowhil l Street Bridge, near 
 the entrance to Fairmount Park. 
 
 An ordinance to place upon the city plan a 
 Park Boulevard from the City Hall to Fairmount 
 Park. 
 
 Section i. The Select and Common Coun- 
 cils of the City of Philadelphia do Ordain, That 
 the Department of Public Works be, and is hereby 
 authorized to place the Park Boulevard on the 
 city plan of the width of one hundred and sixt}- 
 feet. The northeast side thereof beginning at the 
 northwest corner of Broad and Filbert Streets, at 
 the distance of one hundred and forty feet south 
 of Cuthbert Street, and thence extending north- 
 westward in a straight line, crossing the west side 
 of Twenty fourth Street about one hundred and 
 twenty feet south of the south side of Hamilton 
 Street, and continuing westward of Twenty-fourth 
 Street on said line one hundred and sixteen feet 
 to a point, thence on a curve to the eastward of 
 four hundred feet radius to a point in Biddle 
 Street three hundred feet west of Twenty-fourth 
 Street, thence northward on a line three hundred 
 feet west of Twenty-fourth Street to the "south 
 side of Spring Garden Street, thence westward 
 along the south side of the approach to Spring 
 Garden Street bridge to the southwest side of Cai- 
 lowhill Street as now confirmed, thence south- 
 eastward along the southwest side of Cailowhill 
 Street, as confirmed on the city plan, to the west 
 side of Twenty-fourth Street, thence southeast- 
 ward on a line parallel to and at a distance of 
 one hundred and sixty feet from the line first 
 above described to Filbert Street, thence along 
 the north side of Filbert Street to Broad Street, 
 the place of beginning, and to make such revi- 
 sions of lines and elevations of contiguous streets 
 crossing the same as may be necessary. 
 
 Approved the twelfth day of April, A.D. 1892. 
 Edwin S. Stuart. 
 
 Mayor of Philadelphia. 
 
 Thepassage of this ordinance by both branches 
 of the Municipal legislature indicated at that 
 time a public demand for the construction of 
 the Boulevard. Unfortunately, however, Mayor 
 
 Stuart felt constrained to withhold his approval 
 oTThe project, so it was temporarily deteated. 
 The 'va-tee-of— t-he-f^ojeetf however, is evidenced 
 by its vitality. While temporarily defeated, it 
 never passed from the public mind, and the 
 action of Councils in placing the Boulevard upon 
 the city plan was warmly commended by many 
 
 Courtesy of ''House and Garden " 
 
 COUNCILMAN HUEY'S PLAN 
 
 of our leading citizens, and this agitation soon 
 resulted in a modified plan for a City Hall plaza, 
 which was favorably recommended to ^Councils 
 by Mayor Warwick. 
 
 " The intention was to condemnthe_p_roperties 
 l yirig~ 5etween Broad and HFifteenthS treets and 
 Pilbert^nd~Cjt1ibert Stre ets, and to lay__ the 
 space out as a public square or park. 
 
 15 
 
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 * THE ''PARK ..&C^p ''PROJECT « 
 
 THE ART FEDSRATRJ*! J>F ppLAEjELPHIA 
 
 Courtesy of "House ami Garden ' 
 
 VIEW FROM ABOVE THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT 
 
 This would have se- 
 cured for about $i,ooo,ooo 
 at least one of the more 
 important advantages ex- 
 pected of the old Boule- 
 vard, and an ordinance was 
 introduced into Councils 
 for the purpose of carrying 
 it into effect. It would 
 have given proper perspec- 
 tive for the City Hall, and 
 would, moreover, have 
 proven a stepping - stone 
 for the Boulevard at a later 
 date by keeping open the 
 point of starting on Penn 
 Square. (Fortunately, the 
 much to be dreaded office- 
 building has not yet come). 
 
 At this time Mr. Beck 
 published his argumenTSri 
 •• Yn e .Necessity ol a uity 
 Hall Plaza," which is en- 
 tirely pertinent to the ques- 
 tion to-day, and the argu- 
 ment is republished as an 
 appendix to this pamphlet, 
 and will be found else- 
 where. No action was 
 taken upon the "plaza" 
 suggestion, as the public 
 preferred a boulevard 
 and would be co nten twith 
 nothing less... 
 
 The next plan brought 
 before trie public "came from 
 Ex^councilman Huey, then 
 representing the Fifteenth 
 Ward in Select Council. 
 His scheme, developed by 
 Messrs. Schermerhorn & 
 Reinhold, provided for a 
 concourse 275 feet in width 
 from the north side of 
 Carlton Street, the first 
 small thoroughfare north 
 of Wood Street, to the 
 south side of Pearl Street, 
 the first small thorough- 
 fare south of Wood Street, 
 and extending from Broad 
 and Wood streets to 
 Twenty - second Street, 
 where it turned north, still 
 maintaining the same di- 
 mensions, the additional 
 width being taken from 
 properties on the west side 
 
 16 
 
of Twenty-second Street. After proceeding north- 
 ward a short distance, it took the line of the sub- 
 way, thus making use of the northern part of 
 Pennsylvania Avenue, and on the diagonal 
 reached the Park. The value of the properties 
 to be condemned was estimated at something 
 less than $2,000,000. 
 
 A similar plan was afterwards laid before 
 Councils by Alexander Crow, Jr., but no action 
 was taken in either case, as there was a general 
 preference for a diagonal boulevard from the City 
 
 of municipal art. Delegates were invited, and at 
 a meeting held at the Art Club on April 10, 1900, 
 representatives from the following bodies were 
 recognized : 
 
 Academy Fellowship, 
 
 Art Club of Philadelphia, 
 
 Architectural League of America, 
 
 Board of Directors of City Trusts, 
 
 City Parks Association, 
 
 Civic Club, 
 
 Drexel Institute, 
 
 Plan of the Proposed 
 — PAR-K R.OAD" 
 
 as Prepared by The Committee oj Experts 
 
 o F 
 
 THE ART FEDERATION OF PHILA. 
 
 Albert Kelse-y , Chairman 
 
 I I I I I I 1 U 
 
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 THE PARK ROAD PROJECT 
 
 Courtesy of 11 House and Garden ' 
 
 Hall. Recognizing this, Mr. Huey magnani- 
 mously gave his influence to an organization 
 which, while advocating a different route, was 
 working for the same important end. 
 
 This was the Art Federation of Philadelphia. 
 On February 6, 1900, a preliminary meeting was 
 called at the house of Mr. Daniel Baugh, at 
 which a plan was discussed by which the various 
 organizations interested in civic embellishment 
 should be associated in a league which could 
 command attention and respect on all questions 
 
 Engineers' Club, 
 
 Fairmount Park Art Association, 
 
 Franklin Institute, 
 
 Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 
 
 Pennsylvania Museum and School of Indus- 
 trial Art, 
 
 Philadelphia Chapter, American Institute of 
 Architects, 
 
 Plastic Club, 
 
 Sketch Club, 
 
 Spring Garden Institute, 
 
 17 
 
i8 
 
Designed by Alfred Morton Githens 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA'S PART IN THE MOVEMENT 
 
 19 
 
 In the yearly competition for the John Stewardson Memorial 
 Scholarship an important problem is set before the competitors, 
 who are often men of long experience in the practical as well as 
 theoretical side of architecture. A recent competition had for prob- 
 lem to develop a plan to create a concourse or formal entrance to 
 Fairmount Park, utilizing Pennsylvania Avenue as the natural 
 approach to the Park. Such a concourse would be the most bril- 
 liant rendezvous in America for fine teams and equipages, and 
 would be one of the show-spots of the world. The plan shown 
 above was submitted by Alfred Morton Githens, to whom the 
 scholarship was awarded. 
 
ALONG THE ROUTE OF THE PARKWAY 
 
 FROM FA1RMOUNT RESERVOIR 
 
 FROM THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT 
 
 FROM SPRING GARDEN STREET AND PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE 
 
 20 
 
ALONG THE ROUTE OF THE PARKWAY 
 
 FROM A ROOFTOP NEAR TWENTIETH AND VINE STREETS 
 
 FROM A ROOFTOP NEAR SEVENTEENTH AND RACE STREETS 
 
 21 
 

 
 ^;^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 T-Square Club, 
 
 University of Pennsylvania. 
 
 At this meeting, at which Mayor Ashbridge 
 was also present, the following officers were 
 elected : 
 
 President — Daniel Baugh. 
 
 Vice-Presidents — James M. Beck, 
 
 His Honor the Mayor, 
 Walter Cope, 
 Mrs. Owen Wister. 
 
 Secretary— Leslie W. Miller. 
 
 Treasurer — General Louis Wagner. 
 
 EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE. 
 
 John H. Converse, Theo. N. 
 Ely, Albert Kelsey, Harrison S 
 Morris, Miss Emily Sartain, Theo. 
 C. Search, Justus C. Strawbridge. 
 Hon. Chas. F. Warwick, and tlie 
 officers. 
 
 COMMITTEE ON BOULEVARD. 
 
 Chairman -James M. Beck, John 
 H Converse, Albert Kelsey, Theo. 
 C. Search, Justus C. Strawbridge. 
 
 In two years upwards of a dozen 
 meetings were held, the Boulevard 
 being the matter upon which the 
 effort of the Federation was concen- 
 trated. Valuable service was done 
 in keeping the matter alive and be- 
 fore the public, and in the further 
 consideration and development of 
 the details of the scheme. 
 
 The following Committee of Ex- 
 perts was organized with notable 
 results: 
 
 Chairman — Albert Kelsey, 
 Theo. N. Ely, 
 John Birkenbine, 
 Wilson Eyre, 
 Chas. E. Dana. 
 
 A suggestion by Mr. Wilson 
 Eyre that the Boulevard be carried 
 around the Cathedral was immedi- 
 ately adopted, and in all subsequent 
 plans drawn out by the Committee 
 it formed an essential part. 
 
 In the subsequent months oi 
 study a scheme was gradually de- 
 veloped, and after having been twice 
 revised by the Executive Commit- 
 tee, the Committee of Experts con- 
 curring, was adopted in the form 
 shown in our plan and drawings on 
 pages 16, 17 and 18. 
 
 In the meantime, while the Fed- 
 eration was thus working on the 
 
 Boulevard, other public- spirited citizens had been 
 at work independently and had consulted en- 
 gineers and architects, procuring as a result the 
 so-called McAuley plan. 
 
 The failure of the Federation to bring about 
 the execution of the design after reaching this 
 stage pointed the way for a new organization 
 uniting the Federation with the independent 
 workers for their common purpose. The Park- 
 way Association was the result, which, it will be 
 seen, includes among its members a number of 
 men who have been identified with the question 
 of the Park Boulevard since its first inception. 
 
 THE McAULEY PLAN 
 
 ri 
 
 22 
 
THE ALBRIGHT ART MUSEUM, BUFFALO 
 
 GREEN & WICKS, ARCHITECTS 
 
 WHAT BUFFALO IS ABLE. TO DO 
 
 Lincoln Parkway connects the city of Buffalo 
 with that portion of the Park system formerly 
 occupied by the Pan-American Exposition. At 
 a point analogous to the Fairmount reservoir in 
 Philadelphia, that is, at the junction of the Park 
 and the Parkway and to the left of the latter on 
 entering is the Albright Art Museum ; unlike 
 Philadelphia, however, the site is not sur- 
 rounded by glaring street advertisements, board 
 fences, shops, mills and manufacturing plants. 
 Here is found a refuge from which the din, dirt 
 and haste of the city are excluded. It is a place 
 
 of repose for sylvan outdoor enjoyment and the 
 undisturbed contemplation of treasures of art. 
 
 Although this site did not offer the natural 
 opportunities for monumental treatment that are 
 offered by the steeper grades on Fairmount Hill, 
 $ ioo.ooo is being spent on the approaches to the 
 museum. Seats, terraces, stairways and foun- 
 tains, and the bridge with its sculptured lions are 
 included in the general scheme. From the central 
 doorway the vista begins with long flights of 
 stairs, crosses the Parkway and leads across a long 
 surface of water to wooded banks beyond. 
 
 THE PARKWAY BRIDGE, BUFFALO 
 
 GREEN & WICKS, ARCHITECTS 
 
 23 
 
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 To Produce a Stupendous Impression on 
 
 Foreigners" 
 
 The Sieges Allee, in Berlin 
 
 In the past, the place held by Berlin in the 
 remembrance of visitors has been dominated by 
 the great avenue "Unter den Linden." This is 
 not true for the visitor to-day. The purpose of 
 the Emperor to create a new boulevard which 
 would "produce a stupendous impression on 
 foreigners" has been accomplished. The Sieges 
 Allee is as positively national — belonging to the 
 German capital and possible nowhere else — as the 
 ancient avenue of sphinxes at Luxor was Egyp- 
 tian. It is an open book of Hohenzollern history. 
 
 The linden trees of the older avenue are 
 indigenous, as are the trees that give names to 
 the Avenue des Acacias in Paris and the Avenue 
 des Palmes in Algiers; but here once more we have 
 
 a superb public monument whose crowning glory 
 is the emphasis which man has put upon nature — 
 the emphasis of all great art. 
 
 Sixteen exedras like the above, on either side 
 of a great wooded avenue, are prevented from 
 clashing with one another and giving an appear- 
 ance of monotony to the drive by being ' 'planted 
 out," so that only one can be seen at a time. 
 The avenue is divided by wooded walks, flanked 
 by lanes ; thus only an occasional glimpse of this 
 bold collection of statuary is seen from the main 
 drive, while those opposite cannot be seen from 
 the exedra benches where one may sit and study 
 the features of the three dominating personalities 
 of many epochs in Prussian history. 
 
 COVERED WALK AT HOMBURG 
 
 25 
 
THE 
 
 PASEO DE LA REFORMA 
 
 IN THE CITY OF MEXICO 
 
 MONUMENT TO THE AZTEC HEROES 
 
 If it is to the old world that we instinctively turn 
 for examples of municipal magnificence, the 
 Paseo de la Reforma, in the City of Mexico, the 
 almost realized dream of the unhappy Empress 
 Carlotta, is an avenue, which, either in concep- 
 tion or accomplishment, will bear comparison with 
 any in the world. 
 
 It is, moreover, of peculiar interest in the pres- 
 ent connection as a diagonal boulevard laid out 
 upon a city of the '' gridiron " type, very similar 
 in this respect to Philadelphia, and because its 
 termination at the heights of Chapultepec is 
 
 closely analogous to the proposed terminus of the 
 Parkway at the reservoir hill at Fairinount, the 
 proposed site for the new Art Museum. 
 
 From the central Plaza of the city, around 
 which the government buildings are grouped, 
 runs the old Calle de San Francisco. This broad- 
 ens out into the Avenida Juarez, which runs past 
 the Alameda, and its end is the starting-point of* 
 the Paseo. 
 
 From this point it stretches in a straight line 
 for three miles to the Executive Mansion on the 
 heights of Chapultepec, a broad, faultlessly paved 
 thoroughfare. At each of five places on its length 
 is laid out what in France would be called a Rond 
 Point, or in London a Circus, but which,, in his 
 vivid speech, the Mexican has called a " glo- 
 rietta," In the first of these is a statue of 
 Charles IV; in the second, one of Columbus; the 
 nex| is dedicated to the Aztec heroes, the fourth 
 commemorates the Independence of the Nation, 
 and the last awaits the hero of the future, and 
 should finally be assigned to the illustrious maker 
 of modern Mexico, President Porfirio Diaz. 
 
 Moreover, this great avenue is not a simple 
 boulevard. To one side, passing across a narrow, 
 tree-lined road-lawn, a paved footway is reached, 
 along the far side of which, facing the main 
 boulevard, are numerous monumental stone seats. 
 Back of this is another road-lawn similar to the 
 first, and then the roadway upon which the build- 
 ings face. 
 
 In one important respect the first-mentioned 
 road-lawn differs from the second. At regular 
 intervals are placed pedestals of stone, some with 
 life-size statues and some with urns. These are 
 allotted to the various States of the nation, and 
 when local pride wishes to commemorate the 
 memory of some great man, one of these urns 
 may be replaced by a bronze statue. 
 
 Our photographs show these various features 
 at different points along the route, from a point 
 near its beginning to the President's Palace at 
 Chapultepec, whence the chosen head of the 
 nation can look from the drill-ground at his feet 
 to the heart of the Capital City along the greatest 
 thoroughfare of the Western world. 
 
 26 
 
THE PASEO, SHOWING BOULEVARD PROPER, ROAD-LAWNS, FOOT-WAY AND DRIVE, 
 WITH MONUMENTAL SEATS AND PEDESTALS 
 
 THE PRESIDENTIAL MANSION, ON THE HEIGHTS OF CHAPULTEPEC, AS SEEN FROM 
 
 THE PASEO 
 
 SIMI 
 
 LAR TO FAIRMOUNT HILL, THE PROPOSED SITE FOR THE NEW ART MUSEUM 
 
 27 
 
A PHILADELPHIA 
 BOULEVARD ! 
 THE MOST DIRECT 
 APPROACH TO 
 THE PARK FROM 
 RITTENHOUSE SQUARE 
 
 The Champs EJysees 
 
 The Noblest Thoroughfare of the Art Centre of the World 
 
 As the City of Mexico has its Paseo, and as 
 Berlin has its Sieges Allee, so has Paris its great 
 commemorative avenue. It is the avenue passing 
 under the Arc de Triomphe, and it is the culmi- 
 nating feature of the entire " Ville de Luxe " of 
 Baron Haussman. Its focal point is the Place de 
 l'Etoile on the high ground at the meeting point of 
 the Champs Elysees and the Avenue de la Grande 
 Armee, both being, in fact, the parts of one great 
 avenue. Here is the great arch dedicated to 
 Napoleon and his victorious army. Here centre 
 the radiating avenues, some of which are named 
 in honor of his generals; and upou the arch are 
 inscribed the names of the victories which marked 
 the last great orgy of militarism that the world 
 has seen. 
 
 In order that even foreign nations should 
 assist at this celebration, about the circular Place 
 
 de l'Etoile palatial dwellings were built, destined 
 for the embassies of the various nations. 
 
 Here, at least, is something national; here is 
 the monument to the man, the army and the wars 
 which still hold the national worship. And it is a 
 worthy memorial, either as a military nation's 
 commemoration of its most illustrious soldier or 
 as the enduring expression of the hero-worship of 
 a great nation. 
 
 The view on the opposite page was taken from 
 the top of the arch. It shows two of the Embassy 
 Buildings, and gives some idea of the amount of 
 verdure encircling the arch and stretching out 
 into the distance along the boulevard. Behind 
 the spectator, the Avenue de la Grande Armee 
 leads far out into the country; in front, the 
 Champs Elysees leads to the Place de la 
 Concorde. 
 
 CITY HALL SQUARE 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 28 
 
2 9 
 
Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington 
 
 The finest urban thoroughfare in the United 
 States is unquestionably Pennsylvania Avenue, 
 in Washington. It is terminated by the great 
 dome of the Capitol at one end and by an angle 
 of the Treasury Building at the other. And it is 
 the finest, notwithstanding the undisciplined and 
 unkempt character of the greater portion of its 
 length. The trees are ragged and show the result 
 of private initiative (or the lack of it) in municipal 
 affairs, and the awnings, signs and sidewalk 
 obstructions are as bad as on some of our own 
 principal streets. The buildings are of all sorts 
 and all sizes, regardless of general effect. But it 
 is redeemed by its unsurpassed terminus. The 
 majestic dome of the Capitol, the dark masses of 
 
 foliage, the terraces and. gardens, the marble of 
 the fountains and stairways — these save it. And 
 near at hand, the statue at the foot of Capitol 
 Hill forms a pleasing and adequate conclusion to 
 the avenue. Consider what the result would 
 have been if the Capitol had been set down naked 
 in the midst of unrelieved stone and brick and 
 asphalt. Scarcely any building could stand that 
 test; and if our City Hall were made the terminus 
 of the Parkway, and had the benefit of a dark 
 mass of foliage near at hand, all that is best 
 iu it would be brought home to the eyes, and it 
 would become the central feature, and a worthy 
 one, of as fine a vista as any that the world can 
 boast. 
 
 30 
 
k 
 
 THE CAPITOL AND ITS SETTING, AS SEEN FROM THE FOOT OF CAPITOL HILL 
 
 Redeeming the West Side of New York 
 
 Ten years ago the line of the Riverside Drive 
 in New York ran among great malodorous 
 dumping-grounds and was neighbored by arid 
 stretches of railroad cuttings. It was unkept 
 and drear)- as the imagination can suggest, and 
 seemed to favor only the advertisers, the shanty 
 population, human beings, goats and pigs, and 
 these after a dismal fashion. The change that 
 has come is the result of an intelligent and 
 earnest effort, in which brains and money have 
 been freely used, and the result is the only im- 
 portant thoroughfare in this part of the country 
 in which the boulevard idea has been consistently 
 and continually held in view and is being mag- 
 nificently worked out. 
 
 And the whole section has been redeemed. 
 
 Grant's Tomb, the Soldiers' and Sailors' 
 Monument, the splendid roadways, the bridle 
 paths and the pavilions have all demanded the 
 lavish use of money, but it having been well 
 used, a noble and permanent result has been 
 attained. The shanties are all gone, the rail- 
 roads are planted out or hidden, magnificent new 
 buildings have risen and others are being built, 
 and New York has taken a higher rank by this 
 one step of self-respect than if she had added 
 the entire outlay to the annual profits of her com- 
 merce. 
 
 Philadelphia has a similar opportunity, a simi- 
 lar obligation rather, but it remains to be seen 
 whether the people have enough public spirit to 
 realize and fulfil it. 
 
 DRINKING .FOUNTAIN 
 RITTENHOUSE SQUARE 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 31 
 
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THE BOULEVARD DE LA MADELAINE, PARIS 
 
 THE SQUARE PEG AND THE ROUND HOLE 
 
 ' ' Sharp corners are ugly, and the Parkway 
 will make sharp corners." 
 
 So says the man who has not observed. 
 
 A square building will not fit a triangular lot 
 any more than a square peg will fit a round hole, 
 it is true, but there are people with more wit than 
 to try that. 
 
 There have been some people in Paris, in New 
 
 York, in all large cities, and there are even a few 
 in Philadelphia, who realize that a triangular lot 
 offers new opportunities as well as new problems 
 to the architect. Besides the opportunities of 
 site and exterior design, there is a great gain in 
 that the vital problems of light and ventilation 
 are practically solved beforehand. Our photo- 
 graphs tell the rest of the story. 
 
 RIDGE AVENUE AND DIAMOND STREET 
 
 THIRTY-THIRD AND RIDGE AVENUE 
 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 36 
 
Reproduced by courtesy 0/ "" The World's Work, 
 
 MEETING POINT OF FIFTH AVENUE, BROADWAY AND TWENTY-THIRD 
 
 STREET, NEW YORK 
 
 37 
 
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xz::.- 
 THE BASTILE COLUMN, PARIS 
 
 Recreation above, Commerce below 
 
 The Place de la Bastile is one of the terminals 
 of the Avenue Richard le Noir, a broad, quiet, 
 sunny, park-like thoroughfare, green with trees 
 and surrounded by apartment houses. It is the 
 breathing spot and recreation place of a residen- 
 tial quarter of the city. 
 
 Beneath and also directly under the Bastile 
 Column, invisible, unknown to many who have 
 enjoyed the beauty of the place, runs the water- 
 
 way that carries a traffic almost equal in volume 
 to that of the largest ports in France. 
 
 The plan and section on the next page show 
 the construction clearly. In the centre are seen 
 a flower-bed and fountain, the seats and the four 
 rows of trees, and, many feet below, the waters 
 of the canal, which was formerly an open, mud- 
 banked stream, not unlike our own Schuylkill in 
 character. 
 
 39 
 

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 TaJirstxass 
 
 Burgersteig 
 PLAN AND SECTION OF THE AVENUE RICHARD LE NOIR, PARIS 
 
 Minute Adopted by the Philadelphia Chapter, American 
 
 Institute of Architects 
 
 (October 27, 1902) 
 
 Whereas, The Philadelphia Chapter of the 
 American Institute of Architects approves of the 
 proposal for a direct approach to Fairmount Park 
 from the City Hall, and, 
 
 Whereas, The artistic success of the under- 
 taking depends entirely upon the skill and intel- 
 ligence applied to the solution of this difficult 
 problem, now, therefore, be it 
 
 Resolved, That this Chapter urges, that before 
 
 any steps are taken for the acquisition of proper- 
 ties or otherwise for putting the project into exe- 
 cution, that City Councils appoint a commission 
 of competent experts of national reputation and 
 unquestioned ability (such as the Commission for 
 the Improvement of Washington), charging such 
 commission to exhaustively study the problem 
 and report upon it. 
 
 HOW NOT 
 TO DO IT 
 
 DRINKING FOUNTAIN 
 R1TTENH0USE SQUARE 
 
 40 
 

 ACCEPTED DESIGN FOR THE PHILADELPHIA 
 
 ART MUSEUM 
 
 Won by Brite Cs Bacon, in Competition, 1895 
 
 IT IS NOW PROPOSED TO ERECT THIS BUILDING ON THE SITE OF THE FAIRMOUNT RESERVOIR 
 
 The T=Square Club's " Boulevard Series " of Competitions 
 
 The importance that attaches to the success of 
 the Parkway project from the standpoint of the 
 architectural advancement of the city is seen else- 
 where in the part taken by the University of 
 Pennsylvania in making the treatment of the 
 Park entrance the subject at the principal annual 
 concours. The T-Square Club has now taken a 
 similar step on a larger scale by arranging a 
 series of five Boulevard problems for its winter's 
 work. 
 
 The first calls for plans for a house on a tri- 
 angular lot ; the second, for elevations of the 
 angle ; the third, for approaches to the proposed 
 Art Museum; the fourth, for a sheltered prchestra- 
 stage for outdoor concerts, and the fifth, for 
 designs for a drinking fountain 
 
 The following extracts from the competition 
 program show the practical spirit of these prob- 
 lems and their direct regard to the needs of the 
 people : 
 
 "One of the most important elements in the 
 design of the proposed Boulevard will be its ter- 
 mination at or adjacent to the Park entrance. 
 
 " The lines upon which the ordinance before 
 councils is based permit the formation of a broad 
 plaza, from the western side of which rises the 
 hill now occupied by the Fairmount reservoir, 
 which will be abandoned upon completion of the 
 filtration system. 
 
 "A scheme has, for some time past, been un- 
 der consideration, which proposes the crowning 
 of this hill by an imposing Art Gallery, reached by 
 dignified and suitable approaches from the square 
 below. 
 
 "A portion of the facade of Messrs. Brite & 
 Bacon's accepted competitive design for this 
 'Art Museum for the City of Philadelphia' is 
 reproduced herewith, and must be used as the 
 dominant note in the composition." 
 
 And this, with reference to subordinate feat- 
 ures for the convenience and recreation of the 
 public : 
 
 " It is intended to make the Boulevard much 
 more than a mere driveway. It is to be a place 
 of popular recreation. On either side, between 
 Logan Square and the Green Street entrance of 
 the Park, the tree-lined Parkway becomes a veri- 
 table Champs Elysees. Two shaded parks, each 
 nearly one hundred feet wide, will be created, and 
 at proper intervals, monuments, fountains, band- 
 stands, restaurants, shelters and amusement 
 places will be erected, subject to wise restrictions ; 
 all being subordinated, in order not to conflict 
 with the long lines of the vista. 
 
 "Open spots for out-of-door games, children's 
 sand-courts, etc., will be provided, while one or 
 more public bandstands will be so placed as to ac- 
 commodate large audiences surrounding them." 
 
 4i 
 
^^' 
 
 THE ALEXANDRE III BRIDGE, PARIS 
 
 PERSONAL ENDORSEMENTS 
 
 In the following replies, received in answer to letters requesting an expression of opinion in 
 regard to the Parkway Project, the Editor has taken the liberty of italicizing such passages as 
 seemed to be particularly valuable and pertinent. 
 
 October 25, 1902. 
 
 My dear Sir : In reply to your letter of the 24th inst. , I would say that the proposed Boule- 
 vard seems to me an artistic and economic necessity. By Ihe vote of the citizens of Philadelphia, the 
 hub of this city has been fixed at Broad and Market Streets. Twenty million dollars spent on the City 
 Hall and at least as much more represented by railroad stations and business buildings emphasize 
 this fact. The hub being fixed, it remains to judiciously place the spokes of the wheel. There is no 
 question of the artistic need of bringing the Park down to the City Hall. Boston's recent beautiful 
 work is a crying example to us. But the economic necessity of doing it now is equally before us. 
 No one can measure the future growth of this great town. Even now, Broad Street and Market 
 Street are crowded. It can well be imagined that in fifty years they will be like the Strand and High 
 Holborn in London, unless judicious means be taken to relieve the traffic surging in and out. 
 
 And who can say that this cannot be done more cheaply and better now than under pressure 
 years hence? Yours very truly, 
 
 (Signed) CLEMENT B. NEWBOLD. 
 
 42 
 
Philadelphia, November i, 1902. 
 
 Dear Mr. Kelsey: I have received your letter of October 24th. 
 
 Philadelphia has expended many millions of dollars in the purchase of ground for its great Park 
 and for the improvement of the roads within the Park. In natural beauty that Park is superior to 
 any park in the world. It is, however, obvious that its approaches are lacking in dignity and in 
 effectiveness. This great city ought to have a wide avenue leading from its centre to the Park. The 
 cost of such an avenue would be a justifiable expenditure, and if planned, as it certainly would be 
 planned by the public-spirited and broad-minded citizens who constitute the Parkway Association, it 
 would be a municipal improvement of the greatest public benefit. 
 
 I am, with sincere regard, Faithfully yours, 
 
 (Signed) C. STUART PATTERSON. 
 
 Philadelphia, Pa., October 30, 1.902. 
 
 Dear Sir : I have always strongly favored the building of a Boulevard from the City Hall to 
 Fairmount Park. There is no public improvement that could so beautify our city. It would place 
 Philadelphia on a par with the leading cosmopolitan cities of the world. There is no municipality on 
 this continent to-day that has so great an opportunity to make such a public improvement at compar- 
 atively so small a cost. It would extend Fairmount Park to the very centre of the city. It would, 
 in a great measure, transform the city, give her an artistic appearance and forever remove her from 
 the criticism that she is "commonplace." It would be a broad magnificent avenue, with opportuni- 
 ties as great for municipal adornment as could be had in any city of the world. 
 
 It should be done at the earliest possible moment, for every year's delay will only add to the dif- 
 ficulty of its accomplishment. Very truly yours, 
 
 (Signed) CHAS. F. WARWICK, 
 
 Ex-Mayor of Philadelphia. 
 
 October 30, 1902. 
 
 My dear Sir : In response to your letter of October 28th, requesting a few lines from me with 
 reference to the proposed diagonal Boulevard from the City Hall to Fairmount Park, I cordially 
 write, and with great pleasure, my approval and endorsement of the plan, which appeals to me 
 both in its sense of beauty and art, as well as to my pride as a Philadelphian, jealous of all that 
 affects its growth and popularity. 
 
 Philadelphia alone, among cities of its class, is wanting in a suitable entrance to its Park ; and the 
 distance from the great centre which converges around the City Hall to Fairmount Park, as proposed, is 
 so short, that in my judgment the plan suggested by your confreres is the most feasible and practicable of 
 any that have been contemplated. I should be more than pleased if any words of mine would help to 
 promote the success of this most desired city improvement. 
 
 I am truly yours, 
 (Signed) EDWIN N. BENSON. 
 
 October 29, 1902. 
 
 Dear Sir : I have received your letter of October '27th regarding the desirability of a diagonal 
 Boulevard or thoroughfare from the City Hall to Fairmount Park. This project has always had my 
 enthusiastic support, and I feel perfectly sure that the expense involved would be fully repaid within 
 a comparatively short period of time by the increased valuation of property. 
 
 I have visited many cities, both in this country and in Europe, and have always been greatly 
 impressed by the interest shown on the part of the municipal authorities in matters of this character. 
 As a citizen and owner of real estate, I would be perfectly willing to assent to an additional special tax 
 on real estate for the purpose i?idicated, so well assured do I feel that the future benefit and advantage 
 accruing to the City of Philadelphia would fully compensate its citizens for any expense which they would 
 be called upon to share. Very truly yours, 
 
 (Signed) CHARLES J. COHEN. 
 
 43 
 
FIFTH AVENUE AT SIXTY-FIFTH STREET, NEW YORK 
 
 > 
 
 1801 Arch Street, Philadelphia, October 27, 1902. 
 
 Gentlemen : I cheerfully comply with your request to give my opinion on the value to Phila- 
 delphia of a Boulevard such as your Association has in view. 
 
 For many years I have held to the belief that the readiest means of bringing Philadelphia into 
 a condition of competitive rivalry with the other great cities of the world would be through a 
 destruction in part of what now exists, and a reconstruction on the ruins of the past. T should con- 
 sider the diagonal Boulevard the first step in this reconstruction. 
 
 There is nothi?tg, it seems to me, that is so inspiring, so elevating, so ennobling to a citizen as the 
 architectural and landscape effect of the city which he inhabits — nothing so dispiriting to the cultivation of 
 the higher moral and intellectual force as the absence of these qualities. With a personal knowledge of 
 the principal cities of the civilized world, I can state without fear of being contradicted, that there 
 is no city of like population that is so hopelessly deficient in attractive features, whether of roadways, 
 buildings or monuments, as is Philadelphia ; and I know of none (at least on the European side) even 
 of half its size, that does not offer inco?nparably more. 
 
 It is easy to close one's eyes, whether through patriotic motives or otherwise, to the shortcom- 
 ings of a place of residence, but facts are assertive in the dark as well as in the light. Philadelphia, 
 despite its good institutions and the personal spirit that has guided their movements, and in the face 
 of lucid moments of intellectual prosperity, has for many years been in a condition of comparative 
 retrogression— -a condition which I have always associated with an ever-ready spirit of opposition to 
 new projects, and in great part with the wholly uninteresting or non-inspiring characteristics of the 
 city. 
 
 I should be delighted to see, as the first mark of progress, this diagonal Boulevard. Its con- 
 struction would give to the city a new atmosphere, and unquestionably with it would come the founda- 
 tion for institutions which do not now exist, but which elsewhere are the main force of the mu?ii 
 cipience. I have the honor to be, Very truly yours, 
 
 (Signed) ANGELO HEILPRIN, 
 
 President Geographical Society of Philadelphia. 
 
 44 
 
New York, November 2, 1902. 
 
 Dear Sir : I have your communication of October 27th requesting an expression of opinion in 
 regard to the construction of a Boulevard from the centre of the City Hall of- Philadelphia direct to 
 Fairmount Park. 
 
 I am and always have been of the opinion that the lack of a fine driveway from the centre of the 
 city to Fairmount Park has been and is a great drawback to the city. 
 
 Fairmount is one of the most beautiful parks of the world, but perhaps the least known of all 
 parks, except perhaps its name. 
 
 I doubt if 1 per cent, of all the so - called transient visitors to this city ever see this Park. 
 Our particular business brings us in contact with the traveling public, and we 
 are therefore perhaps better able to judge of their needs and requirements than 
 many others, and I can unhesitatingly say that the utter lack of facilities for 
 driving and recreation out-of-doors deters people from prolonging their staj ; 
 in plain language, " they get away from Philadelphia as quick as they can." 
 
 Philadelphia is too near New York, where many amusements are to be found at all times, and it 
 should not rest quietly and securely under this impression, that 'what was good enough before, is 
 good enough now." 
 
 Philadelphia is much behind in many ways, and yet it has all the adva?itages of forging to the front 
 if vigorous hold is taken by its citizens in making it attractive to strangers; and when I say this I refer 
 particularly to that constantly larger growing class of travelers with leisure and money sufficient to 
 indulge in luxuries now so common all over the world. To obtain this, fine and modern hotel accom- 
 modations are necessary. 
 
 A city that has modern and up-to date hotels adds to its prosperity and attracts strangers who 
 spend money, not alone in the hotel and all its dependencies, but adds to the prosperity of the mer- 
 chant and shopkeeper generally. 
 
 I find that one of the great reasons why the "so-called social class" do not stop over in Phila- 
 delphia more than they do, is its lack of driving facilities; and if a fine Boulevard is constructed, 
 beginning somewhere from the centre of the city and leading direct to the Park, with fine residences 
 and shady walks on either side, there can be no doubt of its benefits. And I predict that whereas now the 
 great traveling public to and from the South pass Philadelphia by, a large majority will stop off and 
 enjoy our city, and especially its wonderful and beautiful Park. 
 
 Yours very truly, 
 (Signed) GEO. C. BOLDT. 
 
 Philadelphia, November 1, 1902. 
 My dear Sir : The suggestion that Philadelphia should have a diagonal Boulevard from City 
 Hall to Fairmount Park is an excellent one. Fairmount Park is, in the opinion of the most noted 
 landscape architects, the finest park in America in point of natural beauty, and this fact, little enough 
 appreciated, would become more widely known if there were a beautiful and appropriate parkway 
 which would make access to the Park from the city an easier and pleasanter matter than it is to day. 
 Such a parkway would likewise make more easily accessible, and thereby more familiar to visitors, 
 the famous Wissahickon Drive, which friends who have traveled over the world have repeatedly 
 proclaimed to me to be the most beautiful drive in America, if not in the world. 
 
 The fact is, that our Fairmount Park and Wissahickon Drive are not sufficiently well known to 
 America, and such a boulevard as the one proposed would do more than any other single clement to bring 
 about such familiarity , and thus redound immeasurably to the fame of Philadelphia. 
 
 Very sincerely yours, 
 (Signed) EDWARD BOK, 
 
 Editor ' ' The Ladies' Home Journal. ' ' 
 
 Philadelphia, November 8, 1902. 
 
 My dear Sir : In reply to your valued letter of 25th ult., I regard the proposed Boulevard 
 from the City Hall to Fairmount Park as of very great importance to Philadelphia. 
 
 There would seem to be no project which could include larger opportunity for civic and artistic 
 improvement. Very truly yours, 
 
 EDWARD H. COATES, 
 President Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. 
 
 45 
 
Philadelphia, October 29, 1902. 
 
 My dear Me. Kblsey : I am heartily in favor of the Boulevard project in its modified form, as 
 was that defined by Mr. John H. Converse toward the middle of last June. I am well convinced in 
 my own opinion that the mere undertaking of such a project would prove beneficial to this city, and 
 that the ultimate realization of the plan would confer great and varied advantages upon us. 
 
 The project would unite for an unselfish end a large number of citizens whose views on other matters 
 and whose occupations are so dissimilar and divergent that they rarely, if ever, come together. Such a 
 plan as this would at once help us to realize the unity of our civic life — above all things Philadelphians 
 need such a realization and the inspiring influences that spring from it at the present time. 
 
 I think the reasoning is fallacious which would urge us to forego this enterprise till all other 
 needs have been met. Those other needs will not best be met by shrinking from so big and costly 
 a project as this. Our whole civic life will beat with a stronger and more healthful 
 pulse if we boldly dare to put this burden on our municipal shoulders. The 
 beauty and the convenience which will result from the project when attained 
 will be blessings to Philadelphia in perpetuity which will far counterbalance the 
 seemingly heavy outlay. 
 
 To secure a municipal art gallery, which I understand this plan carries in its train, and to enjoy 
 the invaluable works of art which certain influential and public-spirited citizens propose giving to 
 such a gallery, this alone adds a strong inducement to enter upon the project. The benefits from 
 the main plan as well as from the minor one are benefits which every citizen of Philadelphia will 
 profit by. I hope the plan may be adopted and in due time will reach full fruition. 
 
 Very faithfully yours, 
 (Signed) HERBERT WELSH, 
 
 Editor of ' ' City and State. ' ' 
 
 Philadelphia, October 31, 1902. 
 
 Esteemed Sir : I most heartily endorse your advocacy of a diagonal Boulevard from City Hall 
 to Fairmount Park. A city rightly administered has interests beside those of commerce and industry. 
 Man' ' s msthetic needs have claims that are as vital to the highest civic development as are the material 
 advantages or even those of church and school. The moral philosophers of all ages have posited the 
 love of the beautiful together with the love of the true and of the good as the goal of human per- 
 fection. The evils of modern society have, to a considerable extent, their root in the undue growth of 
 cities and in the estrangement to rural environments. One of the remedies may be found in bringing 
 the handiwork of God nearer to man-built piles of brick and stone, and in making country and city closer 
 neighbors to each other. 
 
 Philadelphia is blessed with one of the most beautiful parks of the new world, if not of all the 
 world. It is a duty we owe to ourselves as well as to the stranger within our gates to make approach 
 to it easy and speedy. 
 
 Entrusted to a committee of such honored citizens as compose the Parkway Association, the 
 work is sure to be done with the smallest expense and with the largest possible results. Our children 
 will not only meet their share of the financial obligation, which the cost of this enterprise will 
 devolve upon them, but will also honor their fathers for having so wisely considered their best 
 interests. Very respectfully yours, 
 
 (Signed) JOS. KRAUSKOPF, 
 
 Rabbi of the Keneseth Israel Temple. 
 
 November 8, 1902. 
 Dear Sir : In response to your recent letter in reference to the proposed Boulevard from Broad 
 and Filbert Streets to Fairmount Park, / would say that I am heartily in favor of it, and believe the 
 city is fully justified in making the improvement. While there is merit in the rectangular arrange- 
 ment of our streets, in the main, it would be unquestionably advantageous to have an additional street 
 running in a diagonal direction which could be beautified in such maimer as to appear to be a continua- 
 tion of our magnificent Park. 
 
 Sincerely yours, 
 (Signed) JACOB S. DISSTON. 
 
 46 
 
ENTRANCE TO OCEAN PARKWAY, BROOKLYN, N. Y. 
 
 Dear Sir : In nothing perhaps does the old world so far excel the new as in the successful govern- 
 ment of municipalities. I do not so much allude to the fact that European towns are better as well 
 as more cheaply governed than American cities than as to the wide recognitio7i of the principle in 
 Europe that (esthetic conditions play an important part in the development and prosperity of cities. 
 
 Within the last forty years, four of the greatest cities in Europe have been to a large extent 
 reconstructed and rebuilt. London, Paris, Vienna and Berlin are at the present time very different 
 and far more-beautiful-than. theyjwere half a ce ntury ago, and largely because these new ideas have 
 
 "been carried out on such an extensive scale. 
 
 Vastly important as is the purely practical side of a city's life, it is not all; the aesthetic side 
 appeals strongly to the higher sentiments of the citizens of the community, and it is only when this 
 side is fully met and developed that the life of any metropolis becomes full and complete. Great 
 commercial centres, when they are at the same time places of historic interest, draw to themselves con- 
 tinuous streams of visitors, both on business and pleasure , but when esthetic features are added, and the 
 lighter sides of existence have received their due share of attention, the general prosperity and growth are 
 immensely added to. 
 
 In American cities, and, unfortunately, in Philadelphia in particular, such considerations are but 
 little understood or appreciated. It is generally supposed here that considerable expenditures of 
 money for ornamental and artistic purposes are either entirely wasted or go for a class of improve- 
 ments which are simply to be considered as luxuries ; but careful calculations have shown that money 
 judiciously expended for such purposes is actually a paying investment. It seems to me the true 
 way to look at this question is to survey the whole field ; when I think it will appear that by spend- 
 ing money on making the city more beautiful, thus adding to the general prosperity and wealth, it 
 will be in a short time easier to get money for the fundamental necessities on which the very life of 
 the community depends. A great and splendid Boulevard from the City Hall to the Park would be 
 at the same time both a much-needed convenience and a means of beautifying a large and important 
 section of Philadelphia. On glancing over the world's capitals, such a great avenue is almost inevi- 
 tably found to be one of their most striking and beautiful features. With so many elements of a 
 metropolis, Philadelphia stands almost alone without any such distinctive boulevard. All considerations 
 continue to make such an improvement imperatively necessary. Would it not be wise by taking a single 
 stefl to stamp Philadelphia with a hall-mark of a metropolis '? 
 
 (Signed) CHANCELLOR C. ENGLISH. 
 
 47 
 
STRAND IMPROVEMENTS NOW BEING EXECUTED IN LONDON 
 
 October 27, 1902. 
 Dear Sir : The only reason why we have not had a fine wide Boulevard from City Hall to Fair- 
 mount Park before, is simply that the people of the city have not understood what it means to the pros- 
 perity of the city, and to the comfort and happiness of the people. If any means can be adopted which 
 will make the people think about the subject, the Boulevard will be built with the almost unanimous 
 approval of the people. I am heartily in favor of the effort of your Association to let the people 
 know what will be the advantages of such a highway. 
 
 Yours fraternally, 
 (Signed) RUSSELL H. CONWELL. 
 
 Pastor of the Baptist Temple, Broad and Berks Streets, Philadelphia. 
 
 October 30, 1002. 
 My dear Sir : 
 
 I think there is nothing so much needed in this city as a broad airy thoroughfare, traversing it 
 transversely as the Parkway would do. I am under the impression (which may or may not be true) 
 that William Penn intended such avenues when he laid out the city ; at all events their great con- 
 venience is shown by the practical value of Passyunk Road and Ridge Avenue. If we could have a 
 Parkway broad enough to admit of good driveways, and not entirely given over to trollies, I should 
 be most pleased. Yours truly, 
 
 (Signed) WEIR MITCHELL. 
 
 Philadelphia, November 3, 1902. 
 
 Dear Sir : It is my firm conviction that no public improvement can be made in a great city in 
 the way of beautifying its streets, improving its architecture, or increasing its facilities without bene- 
 fiting the entire community and developing civic pride which will be shared by posterity. 
 
 Whether the Boulevard as recommended by the Parkway Association is the very best in all its 
 details that can be devised, I am not prepared to say, as I have not given the matter sufficient study- 
 but that a magnificent Boulevard from City Hall to Fairmount Park would raise the city of Philadelphia 
 to a higher standard in the estimation of most of its citizens and visitors, I think there is ?wt the slight- 
 est doubt ; and I trust that such a plan will be consummated just as soon as it can be done without cur- 
 tailing the actual necessities of our municipality. Yours very trulv 
 
 Signed) FINLEY ACKER. 
 
 48 
 
49 
 
OCTOBKR 31, 1902. 
 
 Sir : I have always wondered year after year when I have visited your city why no effort was 
 made to provide a better and more worthy approach to your Park than now exists. 
 
 To a stranger who is driven by any of the only circuitous routes, always through the manufac- 
 turing quarters to the Park, the question arises, when at last the beautiful vista opens out, "Why is 
 such apathy shewn f Why are no proper means provided of reaching so magnificent a location with its 
 natural and artificial beauties such as no other city, on the American or in fact any other continent, pos- 
 sesses ■?" It seems a great reproach that you have not a boulevard that would vie with Chicago's 
 Lincoln Park or the Riverside Drive in New York. With barely an effort, Nature has provided you 
 a park that deserves a Boulevard that would eclipse the Champs Elysees in Paris or the Unter den 
 Linden in Berlin. ■ — ~~ 
 
 I once heard an interesting little lecture given by your eloquent townsman, Dr. Conwell, 
 entitled, " Acres of Diamonds," shewing the riches we possess at our doors that need only develop- 
 ment. Here is one I wish he would lift up his voice in favor of, as I feel sure the work would prove 
 as profitable as it would be elevating to the whole of the citizens of your city. 
 
 As a business proposition I cannot conceive anything more profitable than in emulating Paris in 
 thus Hausmannizing Philadelphia. No betteT~ETfne~thati the pieseul could be taken to acquire the 
 necessary land for the Boulevard and residential sites on each side. By the sale or lease of these 
 latter under strict building agreements the city would recoup itself the cost; in a few years you ivould 
 have an incomparable approach to the Park lined on each side by splendid residences. The whole work 
 would be the glory and delight of present and future generations of Philadelphians and a lasting monu- 
 ment to those who planned and carried out the work. 
 
 As I said before, Why have so magnificent a Park and no approach? Suiely, an effort 
 ought at once to be made to remove the reproach that Philadelphia is behind either 
 Chicago or New York, or in fact half a dozen other Western cities, in properly 
 framing the picture they possess. 
 
 I should rejoice to see this grand improvement accomplished, and it would add immensely to the 
 pleasure I always have in visiting your beautiful city if I could drive comfortably to the Park. 
 
 Yours very truly, ROBERT STARK, 
 
 of London, England. 
 
 Sir : When living in Paris, in my childhood, I heard sage remarks as to Baron Hausmann's 
 extravagance, and saw conservative French heads shake ominously at his recklessness in tearing 
 down good houses to cut new boulevards and to widen old streets — regardless of cost. 
 
 Yet who can exaggerate the value of the stream of foreign gold which was thus turned into the 
 remodeled metropolis by the wise prefect of the Seine ? Not only did rich Parisians contentedly 
 remain in their gay, up-to-date city, but the latter, by this wise liberality, became a Mecca for the 
 pleasure-loving world. From the shores of the Caspian Sea to those of the Pacific Ocean, foreigners 
 came to pay the voluntary trade-tax levied by Paris upon Cosmopolis. French commerce benefited 
 accordingly, and compound interest was collected on the original outlay. 
 
 A city is, after all, but a business firm in which thousands of partners are 
 interested. It is a department store conducted upon a large scale, and the liberal 
 policy adopted by the advanced business men of the country who, in a genera- 
 tion, have become its merchant princes, seems a policy for our municipalities to 
 follow. 
 
 This is why, without owning a horse, I have for many years participated, often actively, in the 
 movement which looks toward the cutting of a fine thoroughfare leading from the heart of the city 
 to the Park. 
 
 // is neither an artistic nor an aristocratic whim — it is a simple business proposition, the value of 
 which I have seen tested. It is an effort in the direction of retaining Philadelphia capital in Philadel- 
 phia and of attracting here the wealth of neighboring States, who pass through our city without stopping 
 and go to lavish their surplus means elsewhere. 
 
 Philadelphia should be made healthful, beautiful and attractive, if it would survive in the 
 struggle for existence. This projected avenue should be but a part of a general municipal scheme for 
 the development of which the very best talent should be secured, and I believe that every dollar thus spent 
 will in time be returned tenfold in the advanced value of property and in the increased prosperity of the 
 community. (Signed) SARA Y. STEVENSON. 
 
 50 
 
5i 
 
Dbar Sir : I am in favor of the straightest, shortest and broadest Boulevard that can be built 
 from the City Hall to the Park. 
 
 Long before our Park Boulevard was ever thought of, a man named Pericles, being imbued with 
 noble thoughts, appropriated a few millions out of the War Fund, and in several busy years made 
 Athens the most beautiful city of the ancient world. 
 
 Then another, named Peter the Great, made a blue spot with a pencil one day on Russia's map, 
 and said, " There ! " and located St. Petersburg. 
 
 A man named Hausmann took a pencil and yardstick and drew straight lines across the city's 
 map to connect the strategic parts of Paris and make it beautiful and healthful as well. And they 
 did it ! These men had nerve. They spent the people's money freely and nursed the job for years. 
 
 We are not far behind them in many things; but the difference is, their jobs show for more, and 
 posterity derived a lasting heritage. Our jobs also show up well when you have time to appreciate 
 them. Who can but admire our wonderful Public Buildings, particularly a downward view from the 
 tops of our sky-scrapers ! 
 
 Everybody makes mistakes The man who does not, never makes anything. The desire of a seri- 
 ous man is to keep his general average good ; so let us now make good by completing our Boulevard. 
 
 Of course, there will be kickers. Lots of them ! What earthly good is a Boulevard to some 
 who probably never saw the Park itself; or to some worthy up around Gunner's Run, whose annual 
 diversion is the bursting of the Cohocksink sewer ? 
 
 Then, too, there are many who look upon Paris as wicked; upon Athens as long dead, and 
 upon Philadelphia as the " real thing," and who always go to the Park via Cal- 
 lowhill Street ! 
 
 Yes ! I am sure we will have have a Boulevard. If not just now, then, later on, when it will cost 
 more. (Signed) JOSEPH ALLISON STEINMETZ. 
 
 A visitor to the exhumed ruins of Pompeii sees many differences between the ancient and the 
 modern concept of the city, but perhaps the most striking departure is the treatment of the street and 
 its relation to the houses bordering upon it. 
 
 In the old city the streets were mere alleys, and the dwellers, even the wealthiest, deliberately 
 turned their backs upon it, making the street-wall plain and uninviting, and lavishing all their care 
 and means upon the interior court. 
 
 In the modern city, on the contrary, the tendency is ever toward wider and more spacious road- 
 ways ; and even the citizen of moderate means feels impelled to make that portion of his dwelling 
 that belongs to the public, the outside, neat and attractive, while the wealthy expend upon the ex- 
 terior of their mansions a large proportion of the appropriation. Often, doubtless, this is done in the 
 mere spirit of ostentation ; but whatever the motive, the gain is the public's.- 
 
 This trend towards beautiful and spacious streets and parkways is an evidence of the growing 
 social spirit, and as such should be encouraged. Public expenditure (provided always that essential 
 needs are not neglected) on such improvements as the proposed Boulevard, is therefore wise, since 
 it enables private citizens to do their part toward that increase in the beauty of the city which is 
 the inheritance of all. There would be no lack of funds for such improvements in Philadelphia if its 
 citizens would really take the management of their affairs in their own hands. 
 
 (Signed) GEO. BURNHAM, Jr. 
 
 Philadelphia, November 18, 1902. 
 
 Sir : A spacious and beautiful parkway to connect Fairmont Park with the City Hall would do 
 more to make the city attractive and, therefore, to stimulate that public spirit which has its founda- 
 tion in civic pride, than any single improvement that has been proposed in our day. 
 
 To secure the fullest effect, it seems to me essential that the Parkway should 
 cut the existing streets diagonally, not only for the sake of the direct communi- 
 cation and uninterrupted vistas which would thus be established, but because 
 the junctions with intersecting streets would be vastly more interesting and 
 admit of nmch more attractive treatment lhan the monotonous rectangles 
 which constitute the most depressing feature of the present City Plan. 
 
 I trust that the efforts of the Association will command the cordial support of all who believe, as 
 I certainly do, that the connection between the dignity and beauty of a city and the loyalty and devotion 
 of its inhabitants is intimate and vital . (Signed) LESLIE W. MILLER. 
 
 Principal School of Industrial Art. 
 
 52 
 
ALEXANDRE Hi BRIDGE, PARIS 
 
 53 
 
HOW NOT 
 TO DO IT 
 
 ■ 
 
 
 
 
 ■ 
 
 f 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 
 1 — ■- : . =_, . , : ; 
 
 AS SEEN ON 
 CALLOWHILL STREET 
 
 EDITORIAL COMMENT 
 
 Philadelphia Inquirer, June 25, 1902. 
 
 On Arguments against the Boulevard 
 
 Just as old fogies argued against the introduc- 
 tion of gas and afterwards electricity; against 
 asphalt paving and clean smooth streets; against 
 every enterprise of public merit, so they are to- 
 day antagonizing the proposed Boulevard from 
 the City Hall to Fairmount Park. 
 
 listen to them and smile while they are say- 
 ing that we cannot stand the expense; that any- 
 where from eight to twenty millions will have to 
 be shouldered by the tax-payers indiscriminately, 
 while direct benefit will accrue only to a very 
 small number ; that there will be a loss of income 
 from the property destroyed ; that even after the 
 Boulevard is constructed, we cannot afford to 
 keep it in condition ; that, first of all, we want 
 good water and streets. One particular old fogy 
 even declares that we need a ship-canal across 
 New Jersey and a deep-water channel to the sea, 
 therefore we cannot think of a Boulevard. 
 
 As a matter of fact, we have the best-paved 
 streets in the United States to-day. Pure water 
 already has been provided for, and is shortly to 
 be turned on. The city of Philadelphia is not 
 expected to construct a ship-canal. That is for 
 private enterprise or for the Government to do. 
 The deep water channel has been ordered by 
 Congress. So all these reasons why we should 
 not have the Boulevard may be thrown out. 
 
 As to progress, when has there been a time in 
 the history of the city when obstructionists have 
 not sought to block enterprise? Gas was op- 
 
 posed, but it came. Electricity was fought, but 
 we would not do without it. The old cobble- 
 stones were good enough for the old fogies, and 
 asphalt was a Satanic invention to kill off horses 
 on the slippery surface; but who would go back 
 to cobbles now ? 
 
 The curse of Philadelphia has always been 
 the objection to anything new by the Don't- 
 Know class. When you hear a man declaring 
 that the Boulevard would destroy property and 
 would not benefit any considerable number, you 
 may invariably put him down as a know-nothing; 
 a man whose information upon affairs is bounded 
 by the narrow limits of his back-yard; a man un- 
 traveled and thoroughly ignorant of what has 
 been done elsewhere. 
 
 The Boulevard' would not only beautify the 
 city, but would attract visitors. It would bring 
 jthe Park to the centre of the city, where there is 
 ]not a breathing spot now. It would benefit the 
 poor and the rich alike, for the former would find 
 easy access at cheap rates to the Park itself. It 
 would add to the value of property; and those 
 who should purchase land along its line and 
 build fine houses would really pay the expenses. 
 Not a single additional cent would be put on the 
 tax-rate, while there would be an increase of the 
 city's income from the very start. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the Boulevard would be a 
 business investment in which the city would en- 
 gage at a continuous profit to itself. 
 
 54 
 
Evening Bulletin, Friday, June 13, 1902. 
 A Great and Needed Improvement 
 
 The proposition to create a Boulevard from the 
 City Hall to Fairmount Park has been too long 
 before the people of Philadelphia to need explana- 
 tion at this late day. It embodies a plan which 
 is needed for the improvement of the appearance 
 of Philadelphia, for facilitating access from the 
 centre of the city to Fairmount Park, and for 
 providing an outlet for the congested conditions 
 which are likely, before many years, to prevail in 
 the vicinity of City Hall, unless some such means 
 is taken to make a new avenue. 
 
 It is certain that it will be only a matter 
 of time when considerations of practical utility, 
 attendant upon the growth of business and the 
 growth of population, will enforce upon all Phila- 
 
 delphians the necessity of such an improvement. 
 The idea that it rests simply on esthetic notions 
 of adornment is a mistaken one. 
 
 A splendid embellishment of the city would, 
 of course, result from it; but far more important, 
 looking to the future— and the not very distant 
 future, either — would be the great facility it would 
 bring in getting about the central part of 
 Philadelphia, in providing the space which is 
 sure to be needed for the purpose of the whole 
 public. 
 
 The Boulevard is one of those things of which 
 it may be said, that when it does come the people 
 will only wonder why it did not occur long before 
 it did. 
 
 Philadelphia Inquirer, June 30, 1902. 
 
 It is Positive Action that is Needed Now 
 
 There is no good reason why there should be 
 any delay whatever in placing the route of the 
 proposed Boulevard on the City Plan. 
 
 The Mayor has sent in an ordinance which 
 has been referred to the Survey Committee of 
 Councils. Unless this Committee is urged to 
 action the whole matter will go over to October, 
 and then, we presume, there would be hearings. 
 
 If the Boulevard is worth having — and it 
 unquestionably is— then it is worth having at the 
 earliest possible moment. 
 
 Why, then, should this great enterprise be 
 permitted to drag along until fall? 
 
 Why should there be any public hearings at 
 
 all? 
 
 The people of Philadelphia are entirely famil- 
 iar with all the arguments. None but a few dis- 
 gruntled persons— persons who are always in an 
 unhappy frame of mind when public improve- 
 
 ments of any kind are suggested — are opposed 
 to it. 
 
 The time for talk has gone by. IT IS POSI- 
 TIVE ACTION THAT IS NEEDED NOW. 
 
 Special sessions of Councils are easily called . 
 There was no difficulty in securing them when 
 the underground franchises were put through. 
 
 The Inquirer suggests SPECIAL SESSIONS 
 for the sole purpose oi PLACING THE BOULE- 
 VARD ON THE CITY PLAN. 
 
 For years the proposition of connecting Fair- 
 mount Park with the City Hall has been dis- 
 cussed off and on. During .Mayor Stuart's term 
 Councils actually passed an ordinance, but it 
 failed, most unfortunately, to secure the sanction 
 of the Mayor. Had the grand avenue been built 
 then the city would to-day be in receipt of a 
 handsome revenue from the increased valuation 
 of the property. 
 
 55 
 
Not a single new argument against the plan 
 has been brought forth since that time. 
 
 Councils might dillydally for a year, and after 
 twelve months of talk we should be no nearer 
 beginning the enterprise than we are now. 
 
 LET US HAVE DONE WITH TALK AND 
 WITH COMMITTEE HEARINGS. 
 
 Let Councils place the Boulevard on the city 
 plan AT ONCE. 
 
 Now is the time to do it when public senti- 
 ment is ready for it and is urging it through 
 organized associations and public-spirited gentle- 
 men. 
 
 Besides, it is due to the property owners along 
 the route that they should positively know what 
 is to be done. Once on the City Plan, there could 
 be no improvements except at the risk of the 
 owners. 
 
 Back of this Boulevard public opinion already 
 stands. 
 
 Councils need not wait for more of it. They 
 have all that it is necessary to have right now. 
 
 This splendid enterprise, which would benefit 
 the whole city; which will connect the city's very 
 centre with the people's great pleasure-ground; 
 which will preserve the City Hall to the view and 
 which will add largely to the revenue of the 
 municipality has been neglected altogether too 
 long. 
 
 The ordinance calls for the half block of land 
 extending from Broad to Fifteenth and from Fil- 
 bert to Cuthbert, and with this block as a park 
 or a plaza the avenue will stretch straight to 
 Fairmount: 
 
 Mayor Ashbridge can do the citizens of Phila- 
 delphia no better turn than by not only urging 
 but INSISTING ON PROMPT ACTION. 
 
 And the Councilmen should be willing to 
 meet in special session and order the Boulevard 
 placed on the City Plan. 
 
 NEAR FORTY-NINTH 
 STREET STATION 
 
 City and State, June /<>, jgo2. 
 
 As nearly as public sentiment can be gaged, it 
 favors the Boulevard. The public mind has in 
 recent years become accustomed to the expendi- 
 ture of vast sums, and the $5,000,000 or $7,000,- 
 000, which is the estimated cost of the Boulevard, 
 
 does not look so large. * * * The Committee 
 proposes to inaugurate a popular movement and 
 feels confident of sooner or later securing the pas- 
 sage of necessary legislation. The plan of the 
 Boulevard is most attractive. 
 
 56 
 
Philadelphia Inquirer, July i, 1902. 
 
 " Give Us the Boulevard Now " 
 
 This Boulevard question has been discussed 
 for years. 
 
 All the talk in the world will not add to the 
 information already possessed. Everybody who 
 knows anything outside of his own backyard 
 knows how very desirable this avenue is. 
 
 Just as the Bois de Boulogn e, the main park of 
 Parls^Js ^rtnigtrtToT hTcenfare^of the city~by the 
 ~^> * avenue ofjhe Bois_de BpuTogfle_a nd the avenue of 
 ^ffi££Eamps-4$ly^ees T at_is_j5roposed to bring the 
 magnificent pleasur e-ground~~5T~Pfa il3dElptHa: to 
 
 the City HaTT: 
 
 ""TralalgarlSquare may be called the centre of 
 London. Within a minute's walk of the Nelson 
 Monument the Mall is reached — the Mall which 
 stretches along St. James' Park to Buckingham 
 Palace, where it joins Constitution Hill, which 
 in turn runs to Hyde Park Corner, skirting Green 
 Park on the right, a park which faces on Picca- 
 dilly. From London's centre one may walk, 
 therefore, to Hyde Park and Kensington Gar- 
 dens through continuous boulevards. 
 
 These things are done on the other side of the 
 water, and they are the never-ending sources of 
 delight to all of the people— to ALL OF THFM 
 we said. 
 
 But when it comes to doing something for all 
 of the people in Philadelphia there arise the 
 pull-backs and the everlasting growlers and the 
 old fogies, and they declare that a diagonal street 
 will have ugly angles and that, after all, we can- 
 not afford it. 
 
 Cannot afford it! Nonsense! The city will 
 invest five or six millions — that is all— and will 
 jreap a grand income from the investment. As to 
 the angles, it is not necessary to the Know-it-alls 
 1:6 go to Paris or London to discover the depths 
 of their ignorance. Let them purchase an excur- 
 sion ticket and go to Washington some time. 
 / The making of Washington is in the diagonal 
 avenues. 
 
 No city can be beautiful when it is laid out 
 wholly on the right-angle principle. Sharp 
 corners are ugly. 
 
 The Boulevard is not only a thing of beauty, 
 but it is a public necessity. 
 
 I That is why we say that it should be con- 
 structed at the earliest possible moment. 
 
 Why wait until fall? Why not put it through 
 NOW? 
 
 ARCH STREET 
 AT EIGHTH 
 
 Philadelphia Sunday Times, June 16, /902. 
 For Posterity 
 
 As was expected, the boulevard plan is met 
 by the old objections. It would cost too much; 
 the city has not the money, or needs its money 
 for other things. The evident disinterestedness 
 ot the men who have renewed the advocacy ot 
 this project precludes the usual suggestion of a 
 job, and there is no expressed dissent from the 
 desirability of the improvement. It is only a 
 question of money. 
 
 If the work were to be done all at once, this 
 would be a valid objection. The fine pictures 
 that have been drawn by imaginative architects are 
 only dreams of the far-distant future. But there 
 is no prohibitory cost in the way of marking out 
 now such a broad avenue as has been carefully 
 surveyed. There may be such a prohibition in a 
 very short time; but all the needed land could be 
 condemned at present at a price that will be 
 
 57 
 
regarded as cheap a few years hence, when im- 
 provement has been turned in this direction. 
 
 It is not extravagance that burdens Phila- 
 delphia, but inefficiency. The big things that 
 the city has done have been the most profitable 
 things — Fairmount Park, the Reading Subway, 
 the filtration system, assuming that this last is 
 some day to be carried to perfection. Posterity 
 will not complain when it comes to pay the loan 
 created for improving the water supply if the 
 results are satisfactory. It will only complain of 
 the debt for which there is nothing to show. 
 
 The leading men of a generation ago met the 
 same cry of extravagance when they insisted 
 upon the extension of the Park, and we now 
 bless their memory for their large ideas and 
 courageous foresight. They did it for us. In 
 this addition to their work, bringing the Park 
 into connection with the heart of the city, there 
 is an opportunity to do for posterity what pos- 
 terity will not be able to do for itself, except at a 
 cost compared with which the present cost is 
 trifling. 
 
 HOW NOT 
 TO DO IT 
 
 DRINKING FOUNTAIN 
 RITTENHOUSE SQUARE 
 
 Evening Telegraph, June ij, 1902. 
 
 " The City Beautiful " 
 
 At the Art Club meeting of citizens yesterday 
 a permanent organization was effected for the pro- 
 motion of a project to construct the contemplated 
 Boulevard extending from the Public Buildings 
 to Fairmount Park. This is a step in the right 
 direction, though it is to be noted that the pro- 
 posed Boulevard will constitute but one feature of 
 the general suggestions embodied under the some- 
 what indefinite title, "The City Beautiful." It 
 is well to take in hand but one thing at a time, 
 and yet the fact should be remembered that in 
 planning and constructing improvements to 
 render the whole city more artistically attractive 
 it is of first importance that a unitary design 
 applicable to the entire territory should be intel- 
 ligently formulated, and then that this design 
 should be carried out by competent administra- 
 tors. 
 
 So far as the present project is concerned, it 
 may be presumed on fairly reasonable grounds 
 that a fine avenue reaching from the Public Build- 
 ings at the centre of the city to the entrance of 
 Fairmount Park will prove acceptable to the intel- 
 ligent thinking people of this municipality. In 
 whatever else is done in other parts of the city to 
 
 create and maintain attractive and desirable en- 
 vironments, this grand approach to the city's 
 pleasure-ground will undoubtedly be the most dis- 
 tinctive feature of the improvements hereafter to 
 be effected. 
 
 It was remarked at yesterday's meeting that 
 the cost of the undertaking, estimated at $20,- 
 000,000, would stagger the tax -payers of the city 
 and would tend to prevent its popular adoption ; 
 but, as clearly explained at the time, not more 
 than $6, 000, 000 would be required for the com- 
 pletion of the Boulevard proper, while the remain- 
 ing sum was intended to cover the acquisition of 
 abutting real estate which need not constitute an 
 essential factor of the project. How decidedly 
 the people of the city are really interested in this 
 proposition is indicated by the circumstance that 
 it is already commanding approving attention in 
 political circles. Governor William M. Bunn, a 
 candidate for the Mayoralty in the coming munic- 
 ipal contest, makes a point of favoring the Boule- 
 vard, and there need be no question that, if the 
 people in general decide on its construction, the 
 City Fathers will be prompt enough to sanction 
 the enterprise. 
 
 58 
 
Philadelphia Times, June 14, 1902. 
 
 " The Boulevard a Necessity " 
 
 Mr. Beck touched the heart of the matter when 
 he spoke of the new Boulevard as not a luxury, 
 but a necessi ty . "If there is one thing necessary 
 for a great city, it is beauty." This has always 
 been so. The great cities of history have been 
 beautiful cities. And in the increasing competi- 
 tion among the cities of this Continent, those 
 whose prosperity will endure and whose influence 
 will extend will be those that take most thought 
 for their wise adornment. The early Philadelphia, 
 with its discreet architecture, its shaded streets 
 and open spaces, and with its unspoiled rural sur- 
 roundings, was really a beautiful city. Ignorance 
 and carelessness and tasteless stupidity allowed 
 its beauty to be lost, and with it the city lost its 
 attractiveness and its dominating influence. It 
 was neglected by the country because it neglected 
 itself. 
 
 It is customary to ascribe the relative decline 
 of Philadelphia, as compared with New York, to 
 the latter' s advantages in commerce. This is 
 true enough; but New York much earlier learned 
 the necessity of municipal adornment, and it is 
 to-day, or is rapidly becoming, one of the most 
 beautiful cities in the world. It is the attractive- 
 ness of the city itself that draws the crowds who 
 go there to transact business which might more 
 easily be done here. With the immense indus- 
 trial productiveness of Philadelphia and its 
 abounding material prosperity and domestic com- 
 fort, it need not take this subordinate place if the 
 industrial and corporate enterprise that makes the 
 wealth of Philadelphia were manifested equally 
 in its municipal extension and adornment. Then 
 travelers and business men could not afford to 
 pass it by as a way-station, but would stop here 
 to see and to enjoy. 
 
 One objection raised to the Boulevard project 
 at the meeting on Friday was, that it is artificial — 
 not a spontaneous development. The answer to 
 this is that the conditions it would change are 
 
 artificial. The rectangular arrangement of streets 
 is artificial . The attempt to spread the city evenly 
 over a checkerboard is artificial, and in the section 
 concerned has produced decay. The only cure is 
 by heroic action, and reason and experience alike 
 suggest that to open a broad avenue into and 
 through this quarter would turn a current of 
 natural development in that direction, with results 
 that would abundantly repay the cost. 
 
 The unfitness of the present plan of streets to 
 the growth of a modern city is impressively shown 
 in the rapid increase of tall structures around the 
 City Hall, nearly concealing that costly building 
 and reducing the streets themselves to dark 
 canons. This recent development has created a 
 new centre of activity from which improvement 
 must radiate, and there is thus supplied an 
 additional reason for opening a new avenue to 
 the northwest that was not recognized ten years 
 ago. 
 
 Timid conservatives will still shiver at the 
 cost, but if the improvement is as important and 
 valuable as nearly all agree, no better investment 
 could be made. The most desirable plan, un- 
 doubtedly, is that followed by Boston in opening 
 the new avenues through the reclaimed Back 
 Bay, where the city took all the land, did the 
 work and then sold the building lots at a profit. 
 This is not practicable under our laws, and the 
 present project is simply to open an avenue 160 
 feet wide from the City Hall Plaza to Logan 
 Square, and a wider avenue or parkway thence to 
 Fairmount, where the possibilities of artistic 
 adornment are boundless. Many years must be 
 required to realize the whole of this great plan, 
 which is for the future rather than for the pres- 
 ent. The proportion of cost that would fall on 
 this generation would be slight, and coming gen- 
 erations will deem the price well paid. It may 
 appear a luxury to some of us, but to the future 
 it is a necessity. 
 
 ARCH STREET 
 AT TENTH 
 
 59 
 
Quaker Quality, June /, igo2. 
 
 •• Things that Matter " 
 
 ' ' Whenever any one tries to do something for 
 Philadelphia somebody vetoes it," is as true to- 
 day as when, with righteous indignation, it was 
 uttered ten years ago by Justus Strawbridge. It 
 was provoked by the action of the then mayor in 
 vetoing a bill providing for the construction of a 
 Boulevard from City Hall to I,ogan Square and 
 then to Fair mount Park. The same project is 
 under consideration at this time, and there is a 
 fear that it may meet its second Waterloo. It is 
 quite true, as Mr. Strawbridge says, that every 
 movement looking toward the advancement of 
 the city, or its beautification, at once inspires 
 most vigorous protest. The opponents of the 
 Boulevard raise the cry that there is no money to 
 pay for the work, an objection that would seem 
 very convincing had it not been shown how the 
 money could be raised without imposing an extra 
 burden upon the tax-payers. Nobody doubts 
 that a Boulevard, practically bringing Fairmount 
 Park into the heart of the city, would materially 
 add to the beauty of Philadelphia and prove an 
 investment that would warrant the outlay. In 
 fact, it is argued that such an improvement would 
 pay for itself many times over, and that $20,000,- 
 
 000 could not be expended to a better advantage. 
 
 1 believe all of this is conceded as fact, but that 
 does not chill the enthusiasm of the opponents of 
 the improvement, and I doubt if anything will. 
 There has always been some obstacle in the path 
 of our municipal progress, and, as a result, Phila- 
 
 delphia is the worst laggard in the onward 
 march of the big cities of this country. True, 
 it has had some unfortunate experiences in the 
 line of municipal improvement — costly ones, in 
 many cases — but she should not be deterred by 
 those — rather turn them to profit for the future. 
 Philadelphia, I think, is in need of a "Boss" 
 Sheppard, who, despite the protests of the citizens, 
 and even threats of the gaol, made Washington 
 the finest city in the country, transforming her 
 impassable streets into smooth asphalt floors. 
 This fearlessness in defying public clamor fairly 
 drove him as an exile from the Capital, but in 
 years after he was welcomed back with all the 
 honors that the city could bestow, and hailed as 
 the creator of the most beautiful American city. 
 It will probably take some one armed with such 
 autocratic power to lift Philadelphia out of her 
 rut of conservatism — one could almost say dry rot 
 — and breathe the breath of progress into her 
 nostrils. If we are ever to have the long talked 
 of Boulevard, it must be at this time. The sec- 
 tion it traverses will doubtless be rebuilt within a 
 very few years and the values for the right of way 
 will make the project impossible. It is now or 
 never. If we are compelled to wait until the 
 money is actually in hand to pay for this great 
 work it will never materialize, but be buried in 
 the cemetery of conservatism where so many 
 blasted hopes of the progressive element of our 
 people lie. 
 
 Philadelphia Item, July /, jgo2. 
 
 The Boulevard as a Source of Revenue 
 
 The City Parks Association, which has done 
 much good work in helping the move to provide 
 breathing spots, and to beautify these resorts, 
 comes out and strongly presents the benefits of 
 the proposed Boulevard from City Hall to Fair- 
 mount Park. 
 
 The managers of the Association present in 
 excellent style the arguments which have fre- 
 
 CITY HALL SQUARE. 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 quently appeared in the Item in favor of this great 
 improvement. 
 
 After stating that the Boulevard would cut 
 through a district of poor and undesirable develop- 
 ment, thus starting the march of improvement 
 upon a section where it is badly needed, report 
 says: "Twenty-four streets will intersect the 
 Boulevard between the City Hall and the entrance 
 
 60 
 
to Fairmount Park, Estimating for an improve- 
 ment to the distance of only 300 feet from each 
 intersection, there will be 1,200 feet, including 
 both sides of each street, to be benefited. Twenty- 
 lour intersections will, therefore, involve 28,800 
 feet of frontage. An increase of $10 a foot upon 
 this frontage, capitalized at 5 per cent., would 
 create an increased value of about $6,000,000. This 
 increase is entirely exclusive of the property front- 
 ing on the Boulevard itself. The value of the 
 street frontage upon it could not be less than $50 
 a foot, which is probably only one-half of what it 
 will soon bring. At this figure, however, of $50 
 a foot, capitalized at 5 per cent., the value will be 
 over $8,000,000, which, with the $6,000,000 on 
 intersecting streets, would make over $14,000,- 
 000 of new values. 
 
 "Upon this value at the present rate of tax, 
 $1-85, $259,000 would be produced. This is the 
 interest upon over $8,000,000 of city loan at 3 per 
 cent. This sum is in excess of any estimate of 
 damages to be assessed, and a net revenue would 
 therefore accrue to the city at once. No allowance 
 has been made for the increase in values at points 
 distant more than 300 feet from the intersections 
 of the streets, special values of corners, etc." 
 
 These figures are not wild and irrational. They 
 are made carefully, and come from men well 
 acquainted with real estate and the value of 
 improvements. They substantiate the claims 
 which the Item has made that the Boulevard will 
 be a source of revenue as well as of beauty to 
 Philadelphia. 
 
 DRINKING FOUNTAIN, 
 RITTENHOUSE SQUARE 
 
 The Philadelphia Inquirer, July 4, igo2. 
 
 " The Boulevard Proposition is Gaining Strength from the Character of the Opposition to it " 
 
 The Boulevard proposition is gaining strength 
 daily from the character of the opposition to it. 
 There is no doubt that some persons honestly 
 fear that it is unwise to take up the matter at this 
 time, and such are entitled to respect for their 
 views. But those who rush into print to argue 
 against it make themselves ridiculous and their 
 arguments prove boomerangs. We had hardly 
 expected to see Mr. George H. Earle, late con- 
 ductor of the Record, indulge in such expres- 
 sions as that the Boulevard "will be a rich man's 
 driveway for which the poor will pay and which 
 they will never enjoy," and it will be "a Boule- 
 vard fringed with back-fences and patent-medi- 
 cine signs — an ugly gash across one of the fairest 
 parts of the city;" and, further, to quote an 
 anonymous Councilman, whom he evidently be- 
 lieves, as saying that the cost will be fifty mil- 
 lions of dollars. ^ 
 
 In our opinion, not one of these statements is 
 true or anything like true. If they were, neither 
 the Inquirer nor any of the men on the commis- 
 sion would be supporting the Boulevard. It is 
 
 an indictment which is so gross that it reacts in 
 favor of the plan it is intended to destroy. Any 
 man of sense knows that the money to pay for 
 this Boulevard, which will not cost more than 
 one-fifth of fifty millions at the very outside, must 
 be advanced by rich men who have accumulated 
 money to invest. If there were no revenue- 
 producing element whatever in the measure, it 
 would eventually be the rich who would pay the 
 bulk of the taxes to redeem the bonds. The fact 
 has been explained so often that this is really an 
 investment, that it seems idle to repeat it once 
 more, especially for the benefit of such an emi- 
 nent financier as Mr. Earle. 
 
 A modest estimate of the increase of valua- 
 tion of property indicates an increased revenue 
 more than sufficient for the purpose of enventu- 
 ally paying its cost. This has been the experi- 
 ence of all cities in this country and Europe. 
 Secondarily, it will beautify the city and induce 
 many wealthy persons to settle here who mig^t 
 go elsewhere, and will certainly draw strangers to 
 see it. But, quite as important as any, it will 
 
 61 
 
be an element of beauty in the city which will be 
 gratifying to every citizen, and more so to the 
 poor, who cannot leave the city in summer, than 
 to the rich, who always do. 
 
 Mr. Earle lives the year round in the country, 
 where he has a beautiful estate, one of the finest, 
 we believe, in this region. He has spent many 
 thousands of dollars in building beautiful road- 
 ways over his property. He has liberally aided 
 Delaware County in improving the highways in 
 his neighborhood. On most any fine evening he 
 can be seen in his automobile or behind his fast 
 horses, speeding through the country, drinking 
 in the beauties of Nature's boulevards which have 
 been aided by man. Mr. Earle is a connoisseur in 
 pictures, and is a lover of the beautiful in many 
 ways — a trait which we think highly commend- 
 able. It is because we think the original builders 
 of the city were too eminently practical; that 
 they lacked appreciation of the beautiful and 
 were willing to make Philadelphia a mere collec- 
 tion of brick houses in rectangular squares where 
 most of the population live all the days of their 
 lives and often in distress — it is because of these 
 obvious mistakes that the Inquirer believes that 
 the city should now begin to remedy them and 
 give the poor people some of the blessings of 
 beauty which now are enjoyed by the rich. 
 
 On next Monday it will be commonly said 
 that the city is deserted. "Everybody is out of 
 town for the summer." The fact is, at the most 
 liberal estimate, not 5 per cent, will be away; the 
 
 95 per cent, must stay here through all the heat 
 and labor for a living. If there were the stately 
 Boulevard that is proposed already in existence, 
 it would nightly be crowded with thousands of 
 persons who could at least feel that if they did 
 not own country estates and run automobiles 
 they could walk amid scenes of natural beauty 
 or ride for 5 cents and have more enjoyment than 
 many persons get out of a trip to the mountains 
 or the fashionable seashore resorts. 
 
 Practically, this Boulevard will not cost a 
 cent; it will not be " a rich man's driveway paid 
 for by the poor;" itwill not be "lined with back- 
 yards and patent-medicine signs." It will be the 
 most beautiful street in America, and will be 
 lined with the palaces of the rich, who will be 
 glad to pay very highly for the privilege in the 
 way of taxes. The men who are most earnest in 
 aiding the construction of this Boulevard are 
 those who can personally expect the least enjoy- 
 ment from it, outside the satisfaction of having 
 performed a civic duty. The few who object are 
 the crabs, the old fogies, the unprogressive citi- 
 zens, the residents in the country, the men who 
 have wealth invested in personal property, which 
 notoriously does not pay its share of the burdens 
 of taxation, and those who are honest but ignorant. 
 
 So far, not one valid argument has been 
 offered against the greatest public improvement 
 the city has undertaken since the purchase of 
 Fairmount Park, which was even more viciously 
 assailed than is now the Boulevard project. 
 
 INDEPENDENCE 
 
 SQUARE 
 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 Philadelphia Press, June 14, 1902. 
 The First Great Improvement 
 
 The Park Boulevard project has an enduring 
 vitality. In spite of delays and discouragements, 
 vetoes and repealing ordinances, it will not die. 
 Fairmount Park should be connected by a direct 
 and suitable approach to the heart of the city. 
 
 The truth and force of this statement are so self- 
 evident that it makes its own argument. The 
 proposed diagonal Boulevard will accomplish this 
 much deserved and almost necessary object. For 
 this reason the Boulevard idea lives and will con- 
 
 62 
 
tinue to live and be an issue until it is carried 
 into effect. 
 
 When that is done the wonder will grow how 
 the city ever did without a Boulevard, and why 
 it delayed so long making a direct approach to 
 Fairmount Park. The absurdity of our gridiron 
 system of streets without diagonal avenues to 
 shorten distances is seen in the completeness with 
 which Fairmount Park is fenced off from direct 
 s and easy approach. The population of the greater 
 part of the city can reach the Park only by going 
 over two sides of a triangle. The hypothenuse, 
 qr short cut, is for most localities non-existent. 
 
 Ridge Avenue is one of the most useful streets 
 
 of the city, and would be much more useful and 
 
 [ satisfactory if it were three times as wide. The 
 
 Boulevard will parallel Ridge Avenue, but it will 
 
 be a real avenue, broad and tree-lined and with 
 
 , suitable sites for stately residences. It will bring 
 
 ! the Park to the City Hall, add to the city's 
 
 ( attractiveness and convert a very dead and repel- 
 
 \ 
 
 lant portion of Philadelphia into a region of life 
 and beauty. 
 
 The character of the men who have revived 
 the Boulevard project is a guarantee that some- 
 thing will be done. They are men of force and 
 influence who usually push to success whatever 
 they undertake. The City Parks Association has 
 an elaborate scheme for the enrichment and 
 adornment of the city by small parks and diago- 
 nal avenues. This boulevard movement is not in 
 conflict with that plan, but supplementary and 
 in entire harmony with it. 
 
 We want diagonal avenues. The Washing- 
 ton plan is the true one for cities. We will get 
 this in time. But the Park Boulevard project is 
 the one to begin with. Those who are interested 
 in making Philadelphia convenient and attractive 
 for its people should concentrate their strength 
 and unite their efforts in securing a broad and 
 beautiful boulevard from City Hall Square to 
 Fairmount Park. 
 
 CITY HALL SQUARE 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 63 
 
ARGUMENT BY HON. JAMES M. BE.CK 
 
 ON 
 
 The Necessity of a City Hall Plaza 
 
 RE.PRINTE.D FROM THE ORIGINAL PAMPHLET 
 
 [This argument in favor of the Plaza is still so pertinent and bears so directly upon the present movement that 
 
 we herewith present it entire. — Ed.] 
 
 ~r-A 
 
 An ordinance is now under consideration by 
 the City Councils to create at the northwest side 
 of the City Hall a public park or plaza that will 
 be a perpetual source of pleasure and comfort to 
 all future generations of Philadelphians. This 
 specific proposition has been before the public 
 for about three months. The general idea, how- 
 ever, that fhe City Hall should have about it a 
 greater open space has bee'n in the public mind 
 ever since the site of the building was determined. 
 Time and again this need has been called to pub- 
 lic attention. 
 
 The architect who designed this municipal pal- 
 ace, and whose monument it will ever be, again 
 and again complained that his building could 
 never be adequately judged until it could be seen 
 in its due perspective. Citizens of prominence, 
 and the newspaper press, the latter almost with- 
 out exception, have called to the Councils' atten- 
 tion this crying need. I do not therefore claim 
 the slightest originality for the general sugges- 
 tion. But the particular proposition, with which 
 my name has been modestly connected within the 
 last few months, is a practical application of the 
 idea, and contemplates the creation of a plaza on 
 the true front of the building, and in the midst 
 of lofty structures that would make it without 
 further embellishment or ornament one of the 
 greatest plazas of the world. This specific prop- 
 osition has, I say, been under public considera- 
 tion for about three months, and has met with 
 almost universal approval . Every newspaper that 
 has commented upon it has heartily indorsed it; 
 public citizens ot prominence and influence have 
 commended it with warmest approbation. The 
 chief magistrate of the city in his recent message 
 has not merely indorsed it with a vigor of expres- 
 sion that is characteristic of Mr. Warwick, but 
 emphasized the fact that this work must be done 
 now, if done at all. He says: "It would be of 
 immense importance to open, if possible, on one 
 of its (the City Hall) sides for the making of a 
 park or plaza. In so far as the question of expense 
 is concerned, now is the time to accomplish that re- 
 sult, for delay will only add to the value of adjoin- 
 
 ing property, and in a generation the increase in 
 valuation will be so great that it may be next to 
 impossible to secure the ground necessary for the 
 purpose. ' ' This project cannot safely wait another 
 generation, nor even another year. Within six 
 months a great office building may be con- 
 structed, whose cost will be such as to make the 
 project impracticable It can therefore be said in 
 very truth that now is the accepted time, and that 
 unless action be immediately taken the colossal 
 mistake of this generation will have been made, 
 which will make it the ridicule and wonder of 
 future generations. 
 
 Let us dismiss the thought that this is a 
 luxury which the city cannot afford at the pres- 
 ent time. It is not a luxury; it is an absolute 
 necessity. It is no more a luxury than was 
 the original construction of the building. Phila- 
 delphia could have erected a plain, large, brick 
 building like a factory for its town hall, and this 
 would have served every useful purpose of such 
 a building. But Philadelphia, as the eighth city 
 of the world, and the true second city of the 
 American continent, could not afford to have as 
 its town hall a factory building. It wisely decided 
 to construct one that should be worthy of its dig- 
 nity and renown. The building was no more of 
 a necessity than was its beauty. The honor and 
 the reputation of the city demanded both. It 
 necessarily follows that a sufficient open space is 
 a necessity equal with the building itself. To 
 construct a veritable palace at the expense of six- 
 teen millions of dollars, and then deny it a suffi- 
 cient open space to properly see it, is a folly that 
 is absolutely monumental. 
 
 Apart from this fact, on general principles, 
 beauty is not a luxury. A city from a commercial 
 standpoint is nothing but an aggregation of shops. 
 It is true of the whole as it is true of each of its 
 cotnponentparts, thatit must be tastefully arranged 
 and adorned. The comforts and the attractive 
 features of our large stores are not luxuries; 
 they are necessities. The taste of our people 
 demands them, and without them commercial 
 success would be impossible. Similarly a city, 
 
 64 
 
4V- 
 
 THE ALEXANDRE III BRIDGE IN PARIS 
 
 COMPRISING PART OF THE SHORT, NEW AVENUE NICHOLAS II, SYMBOL OF THE FRANCO-RUSSIAN ALLIANCE 
 
 which is subjected under modern conditions to 
 keenest competition with other cities, must be 
 beautiful in order to gain business and attract the 
 stranger within its gates. It is with a city as 
 with a man-certain articles of adornment are 
 necessities in the most literal sense of the word. 
 
 Collars and cuffs add nothing to the comfort or 
 physical well-being of a man, and yet without 
 them no one could satisfactorily walk among his 
 fellow men. A city must therefore make itself 
 attractive at the peril of falling behind in. the 
 competition of modern life. 
 
 65 
 
Every city which is to-day abreast with the 
 times recognizes this important truth. Athens 
 recognized it over two thousand years ago; Ven- 
 ice and Florence taught the same truth in the 
 twilight of the Middle Ages. In our time Paris 
 pre-eminently has illustrated the utility and econ- 
 omy of beauty. Thirty years ago she decided at 
 considerable expense to widen her streets, create 
 open places, rebuild her palaces, and construct 
 noble boulevards. The result has been that she 
 has become not merely the most beautiful, but 
 relatively to her population, the most opulent city 
 of the world. The cost of her improvements has 
 been repaid to her people a hundred times by the 
 millions upon millions of strangers that have 
 sojourned and spent their money within her 
 gates. 
 
 The American city which first realizes this 
 fact will hold the ultimate primacy on this conti- 
 nent. I am one of those who believe that the 
 race for municipal importance in this country has 
 only begun. It will not be determined by popu- 
 lation alone, nor even necessarily by commercial 
 importance;' nor is the possession of an harbor 
 close to the sea a vital matter. London, which is 
 quite as far inland as Philadelphia, has had no 
 difficulty in leaving Liverpool, which is blessed, 
 like New York, with an unequaled harbor, in the 
 rear. Paris, which has not one-half the popula- 
 tion of London, and is equally inland from the 
 sea, has made its city a greater centre of attrac- 
 tion than the metropolis of England. Similarly 
 it will be possible for Philadelphia in the next 
 century to make itself the most renowned city of 
 the western continent, even if it have not the 
 commercial importance or population of New 
 York, provided that it shall make itself more 
 beautiful and the centre of a higher culture. As 
 I have had occasion to say elsewhere, its very 
 name is an inspiration, because it suggests the 
 Greek's passionate love of the beautiful. It is 
 the only American city with a Grecian name. 
 Boston and New York are English; Cincinnati, 
 Roman; San Francisco, Spanish; Brooklyn, 
 Dutch; St. Louis and New Orleans, French; 
 Chicago, Indian; but the very name of Phila- 
 delphia suggests that ' ' City of the Violet Crown, ' ' 
 which though small in population became and 
 remained the wonder and admiration of man- 
 kind, because she gave Phidias to the world and 
 crowned her Acropolis with a Parthenon. 
 
 Apart from this consideration and from the 
 standpoint of comfort only, there is real need of 
 the City Hall Plaza. We must build for the 
 future. We have wondered at the changes that 
 twenty-five years have wrought in Penn Square, 
 and from them we can faintly imagine the 
 changes which the next twenty-five years will 
 
 bring. A quarter of a century hence our popu- 
 lation will number one million five hundred 
 thousand people. The City Hall Square will be 
 the true hub of the city about which the varied 
 spokes of its activity will revolve. No fact can 
 be more certain than that about Penn Square 
 will cluster the great hotels, theatres, business 
 houses, museums, art galleries, and other public 
 edifices. Around this great building will surge, 
 for generations to come, an endless tide of hu- 
 manity. This locality is destined to witness as 
 certain a congestion of life as the City Hall 
 Square in New York, for from every point of the 
 compass the tide of travel will converge to this 
 common centre. Even with its open space we 
 know what discomfort and obstructions to travel 
 exist in the New York City Hall Square. What 
 it will be in Philadelphia without any open space 
 can hardly be imagined. It is therefore of im- 
 portance that a breathing spot should be con- 
 structed in the centre of the city for utilitarian 
 reasons, if for no other. A century hence all that 
 now live will be no more. Philadelphia will then 
 be a city of at least two millions of people. What 
 will not be their amazement and indignation at 
 the folly of this generation if it miss the oppor- 
 tunity of relieving travel and promoting the 
 beauty of the city's centre by the construction of 
 this plaza. Penn was more far-sighted than this. 
 When the city was but a virgin forest, and had 
 little existence save in his own noble and pro- 
 phetic imagination, he planned an open place 
 midway between its two rivers, and at the inter- 
 section of its two broadest avenues, and gave 
 instruction to his surveyor to make provision for 
 it. The plan of the city, as published in London 
 in 1 701, shows a central plot of ten acres. Thus 
 was created Penn Square. It was a source of 
 delight and pleasure for generations of Phila- 
 delphians, until, in 1873, it was selected to be 
 the site of the new municipal building. It is 
 now too late to argue whether the obliteration of 
 this square was not a mistake. Had the city had 
 the means to have purchased a sufficient site at 
 the time it can hardly be questioned that the 
 obstruction of its two principal avenues was a 
 blunder. Considerations of economy may have 
 required what was done, but the regret can be 
 none the less universal at the destruction of 
 Penn's open square. The fault can be in part 
 remedied by the creation of the proposed plaza, 
 which, with an avenue of two hundred feet already 
 secured, will make an open space from the line 
 of the City Hall to the north side of Arch Street 
 of at least six hundred feet. Thus an open space 
 can be secured which can be called Penn Square. 
 If suitably ornamented no city will have a plaza 
 of greater magnificence, because none will be 
 
 66 
 
MAY AVENUE, BUENOS AYRES 
 
 Courtesy of " The World's Work " 
 
 The Government House as an objective point in the distance, orderly tree-planting, aisles of safety and roadway lighting, prove 
 
 this South American city to be abreast of the times 
 
 flanked with buildings oi such stupendous size 
 and importance. The stranger who arrives at 
 Broad Street Station will behold a scene that will 
 make an indelible impression upon his mind of 
 the beauty of Philadelphia. An open space will 
 confront his view, flanked on one side by the 
 magnificent Masonic Temple, to the southeast by 
 the City Hall, one of the noblest buildings in the 
 world ; to the southwest by the Pennsylvania 
 Railroad Depot, and to the north, great buildings 
 will doubtless arise, because of the favored char- 
 acter of the site, which would complete the beauty 
 of the surroundings. Neither Princess Street in 
 Edinburgh, Trafalgar Square in London, the 
 Place de la Concorde in Paris, the Maximilien 
 Platz in Vienna, or the Cathedral Square in 
 Milan, present a view of more impressive mag- 
 nificence than could this square be made to pre- 
 sent. Strangers who once saw it would leave 
 Philadelphia with a lasting impression of its 
 magnificence and would carry its fame far and 
 wide. To what wiser use or with what more last- 
 ing benefit could the money be expended ? It is 
 doubtless true that the largest portion of the 
 city's money must be expended for direct and 
 
 necessary uses. While not gainsaying the value 
 of these, it should be remembered that the sewers 
 that you construct will corrode, the gas works 
 fall into decay or become obsolete, school houses 
 must be built and rebuilt, water works require 
 constant renovation and attention, the life of 
 asphalt is short, and contracts for paving on a 
 five-years' guarantee are resisted. The money 
 expended, however, in a park never loses its 
 advantages. A park remains from generation to 
 generation, and does not share that common fate 
 of gradual destruction which seems to visit other 
 things. It carries with it a stream of richest 
 benefaction as some unfailing river. ' 'Labitur et 
 labetur in omne volubilis aevum." 
 
 Could we but see ourselves in this respect "as 
 others see us ! " Every stranger who views the 
 City Hall marvels at our apparent neglect in con- 
 structing a building at so great an expense and 
 leaving it without any adequate site. The error 
 is not unlike that which the keen satire of Wie- 
 land pictures as having been committed by the 
 people of Abdera many centuries ago. The Ab- 
 derites decided to erect a magnificent public foun- 
 tain, and for once advanced beyond their pro- 
 
 6 7 
 
vincial prejudices by selecting Phidias to design 
 it. It represented Neptune arising from the sea. 
 On the day of the dedication of the monument it 
 was discovered that it had been constructed with- 
 out any reference to the water supply, so that 
 instead of jets of water springing from the nos- 
 trils of the horses and the dolphins, only a few 
 drops trickled down, as though they had the in- 
 fluenza. 
 
 Philadelphia's folly seems hardly less ridicu- 
 lous and much more serious. With great liberal- 
 ity (that has bordered on prodigality) it has for 
 the last quarter of a century been constructing 
 the most costly, elaborate, and ambitious struc- 
 ture for municipal purposes in this or any other 
 country. Few buildings of a similar magnitude 
 are now in process of construction in any part of 
 the world. If the aim at lasting greatness be not 
 wholly true, it is nevertheless high, and the con- 
 ception of this magnificent building is worthy of 
 a city of metropolitan rank. If it were a folly, 
 it is of that class of follies that makes a city or 
 an individual great. It is interesting to note that 
 while the building has found its severest critics in 
 our own city, it has won the admiration of almost 
 every distinguished traveler from other lands. 
 While the critics of Boston and New York, who 
 believe that "nothing good can come out of 
 Nazareth," have sneered at this building as inde- 
 fensibly rococo, and while many of our own citi- 
 zens ceaselessly lament what they regard as a 
 wasted opportunity, yet distinguished men from 
 the lands of great and classic structures, whose 
 judgments are entitled to the greatest respect, 
 have almost uniformly praised the building as 
 admirable from either an aesthetic or utilitarian 
 standpoint. History has thus again repeated 
 itself, and poor John McArthur, who died before 
 the completion of his great building, has not been 
 without honor "save in his own country." 
 
 Thus Sir Edwin Arnold, in his recent book of 
 travels, says of our City Hall that no city in Eu- 
 rope has a municipal building that is comparable 
 to it in beauty. Bartholdi and, I think, Edmund 
 Gosse, spoke of it in similar terms, while Dr. 
 Lutaud speaks of it as recalling "the most beau- 
 tiful edifices of the French renaissance. The 
 architectural motifs of the pavilions reproduce 
 the motifs of certain pavilions of the Louvre." 
 He further calls it "the most graceful edifice" in 
 the Union, which statement can be commended 
 to the snobbish critics of our own and other cities, 
 who admire in the pavilions of the Louvre the 
 identical architectural motif which they decry in 
 our noble example of renaissance architecture. 
 Mr. John Sartain has said that when he had 
 charge of the Art Exhibit at the American Ex- 
 position, which was held in London some years 
 
 ago, the model of our City Hall attracted con- 
 siderable attention from distinguished men in 
 London, and that the comments were, as a rule, 
 favorable. 
 
 Almost every one of our foreign critics have, 
 however, commented upon the folly of construct- 
 ing so great a building at so great an expense 
 and then leaving it without any adequate space 
 about it to see it in its true perspective. Dr. 
 Lutaud (a French academician, and the author 
 of Aux Etats Unis) is especially emphatic upon 
 this point, and his words may be profitably 
 quoted in order to show us how ' ' others see us. ' ' 
 
 He says: "In fact, there is a rich German 
 brewer, I was told, who has built at the ex- 
 tremity of Market Street, and just facing the 
 City Hall, one of these grotesque buildings whose 
 colossal height completely conceals the monu- 
 ment which, if it is not the most remarkable in 
 the United States, is certainly the only edifice of 
 the renaissance style to be found in America. 
 How could the Philadelphia municipality let a 
 monument which cost it nearly a hundred mil- 
 lions of francs be ruined in this way? How 
 could it permit any one to efface by a barracks of 
 twenty stories the most graceful edifice in the 
 Union ? Some day it will certainly be necessary 
 to demolish the German brewer's building, and it 
 is quite time to prohibit in Philadelphia, as has 
 been done in Chicago, the construction of indi- 
 vidual buildings exceeding thirty to forty metres 
 in height, especially on streets comparatively 
 narrow and in the neighborhood of public build- 
 ings. In a word, there is needed in Phila- 
 delphia, as in many other cities of the States, a 
 good inspection and laws regulating private 
 structures in conformity with hygiene and aes- 
 thetics." 
 
 Making allowance for Dr. Lutaud's unneces- 
 sary and undeserved warmth of comment at the 
 expense of Mr. Betz, yet future generations will 
 certainly regard with amazement the fact that 
 this generation should spend over sixteen million 
 dollars in erecting a building and then permit its 
 virtual destruction from an sesthetic standpoint 
 by hemming it in by lofty and incongruous build- 
 ings. A building should presumably have about 
 it an open space at least three times its height, 
 and when Penn Square was selected sufficient 
 property should have been condemned on all 
 sides of the City Hall to make a suitable open 
 plaza, like that which makes the Capitol at 
 Washington so wonderfully beautiful. 
 
 In some respects the mistake is irreparable ; in 
 others it is still possible to do something. No 
 extension of space can be expected on the north- 
 east, as the costly and beautiful Masonic Hall 
 forbids it. To the east it is hardly desirable, as 
 
 68 
 
THE KARHTNERRING, ONE OF THE ENGIRDLING BOULEVARDS OF VIENNA 
 
 Side-streets for waiting carriages, which thus do not interrupt circulation ; trees far enough away from building to 
 
 avoid obstructing light and air. 
 
 the true front of the building is north. To the 
 south costly office buildings and the great value 
 of real estate make impracticable any future ex- 
 tension of space, and the western side is for like 
 ■reasons unavailable. One outlet still remains, 
 upon which no costly structure is at present 
 erected, and which affords an opportunity for a 
 plaza of exceptional beauty and value. If the 
 city should condemn for park purposes the block 
 of ground between Broad and Fifteenth and Fil- 
 bert and Cuthbert it will afford sufficient space to 
 properly see the City Hall, and at the same time 
 relieve the great congestion of life and business 
 that is inevitable in this locality before another 
 generation. This would have three advantages 
 already suggested : 
 
 First, that it would be on the true front of the 
 building, which faces noi th ; 
 
 Second, that it could be opened at compara- 
 tively little expense as compared with the other 
 sides of the building ; and, 
 
 Third, because it would afford not merely a 
 fine perspective view of the City Hall, but would 
 likewise enhance that of the Masonic Temple and 
 the Pennsylvania Railroad Building. Flanked 
 
 with .these three buildings, and suitably im- 
 proved, the plaza thus constructed would be one 
 of the most beautiful in the world. It would have 
 a width from the building to Cuthbert Street, 
 which at this point could be vacated, of over four 
 hundred feet. 
 
 I do not believe that the comparatively small 
 expense of such a public work is entirely appre- 
 ciated. The entire assessed values of the whole 
 block aggregate $868,000. If property were only 
 condemned as far as the line of the Pennsylvania 
 Railroad Building — that is, to the Hotel Scott 
 property — this amount would be reduced by 
 $350,000, making the net assessed vaiue a little 
 over $500,000. The properties are practically in 
 the same condition as they were twenty-five years 
 ago, and as the great retail and wholesale busi- 
 ness centres have not as yet reached this side of 
 the City Hall, the properties are not as yet valued 
 at much above the assessed valuations. Thus, 
 one of the properties mentioned, which is assessed 
 at $50,000, sold about a year ago for about $52.- 
 000. Allowing a liberal advance above assessed 
 values, the entire condemnation proceedings 
 should not cost the city more than $1,000,000, 
 
 69 
 
if the plaza were only constructed to the 
 Hotel Scott, and not more than $i , 200,000 
 if it were constructed to Fifteenth Street. 
 
 If it were decided, as seems preferable, 
 to go to Arch on the north and to the 
 line of the Pennsylvania Railroad on the 
 west, the assessed valuations are $1,016,- 
 500, and the cost of condemnation should 
 not exceed $1,500,000. 
 
 In addition to this, the work of paying 
 for this important public improvement is 
 facilitated by our procedure in condemna- 
 tion cases. No appropriation would have 
 to be made except for the physical act of 
 removing the buildings and turning it 
 into a park. Juries would be appointed 
 to assess value, and it is wholly probable 
 that in nearly every case the property 
 owners would appeal to a common-law 
 jury of twelve. Thus the trials would 
 run over a length of time approximating 
 three or four years, and the verdicts 
 would be rendered and payable by man- 
 damus separately. For at least a year or 
 two nothing would have to be paid, and 
 the ultimate expense would probably not 
 require from the city in any one year 
 more than $300,000, as the thirty or forty 
 odd cases could not be tried within one 
 year. But whether the money is paid 
 separately or in a bulk, it would be prac- 
 tical to pay it in two annual payments 
 of, say, $500,000, by paying the more 
 moderate awards and appealing the 
 higher, and this is certainly within the 
 financial means Of the city. The enhance- 
 ment of values by this public work would 
 in a short time pay for the outlay. It 
 should be remembered also that in this 
 way Penn Square, as planned by Penn 
 and so dear to our forefathers, could be 
 practically restored. 
 
 It may be asked, what would be done 
 with the City Hall plaza if the city 
 decided upon its construction ? If it 
 should be constructed — ' ' a consumma- 
 tion most devoutly to be wished" — it 
 could be treated either as an urban park, 
 with trees, grass-plots, and flower-beds, 
 or as an open plaza with statuary and 
 fountains. The wisdom and experience 
 of older and greater cities would seem to 
 suggest the second method for any park 
 that is in the very heart of a city. While 
 London has in the vicinity of its courts 
 of justice a large square of trees and 
 grass known as Lincoln's Inn Fields, yet 
 this spot of green seems an incongruity 
 
 One of a series of columns adding scale 
 and dignity to the Paris Opera House and 
 utilized for street lighting and advertising. 
 
 70 
 
amongst the smoke - begrimed inns of 
 court, and justifies its description by 
 Dickens as that ' ' perplexed and troublous 
 valley of the shadow of the law. ' ' Tra- 
 falgar Square seems to me to be far pref- 
 erable as a model of what our City Hall 
 plaza should be. It and the Place de la 
 Concorde in Paris are probably the most 
 beautiful and magnificent plazas in the 
 world. In the centre of the former, Nel- 
 son's Monument rises to a stately height; 
 at its feet are the four majestic lions 
 which Landseer designed. On two sides 
 of the monument are fountains, whose 
 splashing waters add a music to the dull 
 roar of the great streets that empty their 
 endless tide of humanity into the square. 
 At the four corners of the square stand 
 appropriate statues to some of England's 
 mighty dead — General Gordon, Sir C. J. 
 Napier, Sir Henry Havelock, and George 
 IV. The greatness of London, with its 
 six million people and its thousand years 
 of glorious history, seems to be focused 
 in this square. Here is that "full tide 
 of existence" of which Dr. Johnson 
 spoke and which he located at Charing 
 Cross. 
 
 Even more beautiful is the Place de 
 la Concorde. In its centre rises the 
 obelisk of Luxor, a monolith of red 
 granite, which connects the great city of 
 antiquity, " hundred gated Thebes," 
 with, in some respects, the greatest of 
 modern times, incomparable Paris. On 
 either side are magnificent fountains, 
 while in an august circle about the square 
 stand in marble efiBgy the eight cities of 
 France— Lille, Bordeaux, Nantes, Rouen, 
 Marseilles, Lyons and Strasburg. In the 
 lap of the last-named statue are ever to 
 be seen those mourning wreaths, which 
 suggest the unquenchable patriotism of 
 France. 
 
 Such a plaza as these ours should be. 
 In its centre should stand some magnifi- 
 cent monument. Had it been constructed 
 a year ago it would have been chosen as 
 the site of the Washington Monument of 
 the Cincinnati Society. No more appro- 
 priate site could have been selected. 
 Indeed, it is possible that if the City 
 Councils act promptly in the matter of 
 this plaza that the Washington Monu- 
 ment, whose construction has not yet 
 been commenced, could be obtained as 
 its central feature. Fountains should 
 add the gladdening melody of their fall- 
 
 mmtmm- 
 
 7i 
 
 A column with six globes and six lamps 
 alternated, forming a part of a monumental 
 approach to entrance, and which helps to 
 show off building, 
 
-MVNTC.1PAI -ART -SOCIETY 
 -LVX- 
 
 tin. 
 
 XMPSriTION- 
 
 f .■S<'y-n.~f<Zi.. 
 
 ■ ,4TreA.'.Sl 'e/c Z 
 
 DESIGN FOR ELECTROLIER AND 
 OF SAFETY 
 
 BY WILKINSON & MAGONIGLE 
 
 ISLE 
 
 ing waters, while on the outer circle worthy 
 btatues of the founders of the Republic should 
 be placed from time to time. Trees, grass and 
 flowers could be added, but they should be sub- 
 ordinated to the general treatment of the plaza. 
 I have ventured to include in this pamphlet pic- 
 tures of these two plazas and some other similar 
 open spaces in the world's great cities. 
 
 All this is feasible. Let once the plaza be 
 created and this intelligent and opulent city will 
 not let its great central square lack appropriate 
 treatment. A recent testator has given $500,000 
 for a monument for Fairmount Park. Another 
 has devoted a fortune, aggregating $200,000, to 
 the construction of eight statues for Independence 
 Square. Another has given pictures and an en- 
 dowment for an art gallery in our noble park of the 
 value of $700,000, and our Academy of the Fine 
 Arts will soon be enriched by the gift of a collec- 
 tion of pictures which is easily worth $200,000. 
 The Society of the Cincinnati is now ready to 
 present the city a monument which will cost 
 $250,000. No city is receiving more munificent 
 gifts of this character than Philadelphia, and it 
 cannot be doubted that if this plaza were con- 
 structed, the opportunity would be welcomed by 
 public men to make it the site of an appropriate 
 monument. Let the plaza be constructed, and 
 then we can 
 
 "satisfy our eyes 
 
 With the memorials, and the things of fame, 
 
 That do renown this city. ' ' 
 
 The chief argument that will be addressed to 
 public consideration against this project is that it 
 is too magnificent and expensive for adoption by 
 this city. It is diflicult to patiently treat this ob- 
 jection, and yet this feeling of civic self- deprecia- 
 tion, often unconscious and unexpressed, is the 
 most serious obstacle to this or any plan for the 
 advancement of our city. Civic pride has made 
 Chicago what she is ; the lack of it has prevented 
 Philadelphia from remaining in the beginning of 
 the second century of our republic as she was at 
 the commencement of the first— the metropolis of 
 the western hemisphere. Philadelphia always 
 reminds me of a sleeping giant, unconscious of 
 its strength and capability, or, rather, it is a Gul- 
 liver, bound hand and foot by men of Lilliputian 
 ideas, who ever let " 'I dare not' wait upon ' I 
 would. ' ' ' This class of pull-backs, who destroy, 
 but never create, who tear down, but never build 
 up, greet every new idea with the hoarse croak- 
 ing of the ravens that welcomed Duncan beneath 
 the battlements of Macbeth. 
 
 Let us never forget that Philadelphia is the 
 eighth city of the world and the true second city 
 of America (for only by a stretch of the imagina- 
 tion can Chicago claim one hundred and fifty 
 
 72 
 
square miles of adjacent prairies as within her ur- 
 ban limits). With a million and a quarter of peo- 
 ple, with a latent wealth that is incalculable, with 
 a proud and glorious history, whose every page is 
 the glory of the republic, nothing is too good for 
 Philadelphia or beyond her capacity of achieve- 
 ment. She must have, as every great city, a cen- 
 tral plaza, and truly 
 
 "If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well 
 It were done quickly." 
 
 London has its Trafalgar Square; Paris, its 
 Place de la Concorde; Edinburgh, its Princess 
 Street; Vienna, its Volksgarten; Venice, its Pi- 
 azza of St. Mark ; Madrid, its Puerta del Sol ; 
 Florence, its Square of the Senate ; Brussels, its 
 Royal Palace Esplanade; Milan, its Cathedral 
 Square, and Philadelphia must have a plaza, 
 whose surroundings will reflect her historic re- 
 nown, her present and future importance. 
 
 Let the Councils of our city in this and every 
 matter pertaining to the common weal plan in the 
 spirit of those councilors of Florence, who, desir- 
 ing six centuries ago to rebuild their Cathedral, 
 made this noble decree : 
 
 ' ' Since the highest mark of human prudence 
 in a people of noble origin is to proceed in the 
 management of their affairs so that their mag- 
 nanimity and wisdom may be evinced in their 
 outward acts, we order Arnolfo, head master of 
 our commune, to make a design for the renova- 
 tion of Sta. Reparata in a style of magnificence 
 which neither the industry nor power of man can 
 surpass, that it may harmonize with the opinion 
 of many wise persons in this city and state, who 
 think that this commune should not engage in 
 any enterprise unless its intention be to make the 
 result correspond with that noblest sort of heart 
 which is composed of the united will of many 
 citizens." James M. Beck. 
 
 CITY HALL SQUARE 
 PHILADELPHIA 
 
 73 
 
BRIEFLY: 
 
 Philadelphia has undertaken to construct a speedway at a 
 cost of $200,000. 
 
 This is for the sole good of an exclusive class owning fast 
 horses and already well provided with luxuries. 
 
 It has given the city no new property, yet there has been no 
 protest against spending $300,000 for a mere improvement, and 
 one which is no improvement so far as the general public is con- 
 cerned. It is too far out of reach for most people and there is 
 nothing to call them there anyhow. 
 
 The construction of the Parkway would mean the acquisition 
 by the city of valuable property at a lower cost than will ever 
 again be possible. 
 
 The Parkway will be central. 
 
 In the hot evenings of summer the Parkway will be a park for 
 thousands who cannot afford to ride to Fairmount Park and who 
 are too tired after a hard day's work to walk so far. 
 
 The Park for busy people must be near at hand, and in this 
 Philadelphia is far behind the times. 
 
 Professor Zeublin, of the University of Chicago, gives the 
 following figures, comparing Paris and Philadelphia in this 
 fespect. Excluding the Bois de Boulogne and the Bois de Vin- 
 cennes, and similarly excluding Fairmount Park, all three of 
 which are at some distance from the centre of population, we find 
 that Paris has an acre of centrally located park-ground for every 
 985 of i ts population. Philadelphia has only one acre for each 
 17,000 of population . 
 
 The large parks of Paris are, besides, more easily reached 
 than Fairmount Park, each having a magnificent parkway leading 
 tojt, as shown in our illustrations on pages 8 and 35. These are 
 in themselves parks. Do as much for Philadelphia — extend Fair- 
 mount Park to the centre of the city — then compare the two cities 
 and it is another story. Paris then shows an acre for 495 people 
 and Philadelphia an acre to about 300 of population. Why 
 should not Philadelphia show as much concern for public recrea- 
 tion as other progressive cities in the United States ? Why should 
 not Philadelphia have sand -courts and wading -pools for the 
 children, such as other cities have? Shall not the communal 
 needs of recreation and amusement, or at least of fresh air, be 
 met as well as in many a city of one-tenth its size ? 
 
 The Parkway would offer the direct advantages which have 
 been hitherto rehearsed ; it also offers subordinate yet important 
 opportunities which could be gradually developed to keep pace 
 with the advance of public sentiment in favor of free pleasures 
 and free conveniences for the great public and its children. 
 
 P 
 
 75 
 
From this reduction of one of the official drawings of the Pasco or Catzada de la Kcforma 
 111 the City <it Mi xir<> -.me idea of its magnitude can l»e had The centr-tl driveway i-< s_. feel 
 across tli.it is, 12 feet wider than Broad Street from curb to curb, and the two footways, one on 
 either side of it. are over 26 feet wide each. The parking on either side is over 60 feel wide, 
 and with the two side driveway- the great thoroughfare is nearly vt* feel across which is 
 almost three limes as wide as Broad Street from building line to building line. 
 
Aston llehh. Ai,lul,;i 
 
 ACCEPTED DESIGN FOR THE VICTORIA MEMORIAL, LONDON 
 
- m - 
 
 rngtO u'»0 |m<OuI * C* 
 
 t lilt -*■&•■(. »'•««' »!"«■ LAM t ' 
 
 ACCEPTED DESIGN FOR THE VICTORIA MEMORIAL. LONDON 
 
 This great concourse is being constructed in the heart of I,om1<m The semicircle it in 
 front of Buckingham Palace and thi necessan room has been taken regardless of expense. 
 Beyond thi-. toward the centre 'if the city, leads the processional road, and the rich character 
 of pageantry has been maintained throughout in permanent material and in diverse forms, 
 monuments, arches, fountains seats Venetian mast-, and ornamental planting