TOWN-PLANNING.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXIX, Issue 12283, 9 July 1914, Page 8

TOWN-PLANNING.

LESSONS FROM GERMANY. A CANADIAN'S PILGRIMAGE

Some very interesting notes of ii Canadian from the North-West, who made a special trip to Germany to see how towns have been and are planned in chat country, appear in the Toronto Globe.. The writer. Mr G. AVniy Lemon, belongs to Calgary, which is, ol course, a quite new city, similar, in iN lav out. its buildings, and its aspiraor want of them, no doubt) to some towns in New Zealand, and not so old as most of them. Mr Lemon was secretary o£-ithe Calaaiy City Planning Commission, and lie has evidently experienced the difficulties besetting the reformer, but- he does not think they are quite unsurmountable; further, he seems.to think, that Germany can teach, other countries something in the way of laying b'titla. fine citv. In Germany( ue says) town-planning is "not a fad engineered bv a few enthusiasts. If it had' been a,' fad the sober, practical, going German would not have accepted it as a national system, as he has done. Munich, Leipzig, Dresden, Berlin, Frankfort-on-the-Mtiin, these find many others cities have, in connection with* their municipal offices, departments of town-planning._ and at their head officials who are called" Stadhaiiarhanns. These officers arc responsible for the laying out of thestreets, parks, and dutv to pass upon the buildings which shall-or .shall not. be .built-in a given area. In short, theirs is the- task bl providing adequate thoroughfares for traffic, open spaces for health and' plea-sure;-and. the enforcement of regulations to prevent unstable, unhealthy, or unsightly buildings. And what is the net result of this thoroughly scientific supervision of urban development ? This: that, the world over, the cities of the German Empire are held tip as modeLs of convenience, cleanliness, and beautv. Cities are the citadels of civilisation! The problem of the modern city is engaging the minds of thoughtful' people as never before.

—businesslike Forestry.— It was from the window of a .railroad carriage during the journey from Zurich, to Munich, on a certain stormy day in March, that I first realised what foresight and conservation meant in the land of the Kaiser. Onr train was rushing through. Southern Bavaria. For mites we ran along beside tracts of wooden, country. Here was a piece planted- with young saplings hardly more than two feet in height; there; vonder,. a plot of ground upon which grew line trees ready to be turned into lumber. Germany, 'I thought, is looking toward the future. In this land, at least, the forest wealth, is not wantonly destroyed. This simple, concrete example from the country prepared the. mind of the writer for the application of Hie same principles in the cities he was to visit.

Munich, noted for two widely different things—art and a certain beverage which is'brown in color —stands out, : n mv mind, as the city which has solved the problem of ;ihe. street railway. Never have I been in a city where the street car lines so well served the requirements of the citizens, nor where it is so simple for a tourist to reach the points he desires to see. Every car is placarded with its number, its ■route, and its destination. Every ''stop signal" contains the very information the stranger most requires, even showing, by an arrow, the direction all cars oh a given track are going. The superb grouping of its public buildings was another thing which impressecf me in Munich, also the unbroken and stately splendor of the. shops and stores along its principal 'thoroughfares*. Where, for instance, conld one see finer or more picturesque surroundings for a- City Hall than ono linds in Munich? The imposing GothieRathhaus has-at'its rear the odd Baroque towers of the Church of Our Lady, while flanking it on the east is the old Rathhaus, with its quaint archway and noble old tower, dating back to the twelfth century. Magnificently placed are also the Palace of Justice and the old .and new Picture Onileries-. In fact, it is impossible to find in Munich —would that" it were so in Canada! — a splendid building spoiled by an unsightly or inappropriate setting. I should venture the assertion that, in matters of taste., both ' Munich and Dresden greatly excel the much-praised' capital of.the Empire, Berlin.

—Women Scavengers.— Before leaving Munich I must record one unpleasant impression. Practically all the street cleaning is done by women. To see them, three or four abreast, wearily pushing lsyge brooms over the wide and splendid streets, or shovelling refuse into the dumpcarts, may not excite even a thought in the mind of the average European, but those of us who live in America find it ■hard to suppress a feeling of indignation at scenes like the one to which reference has been made. To think of Dresden, the Elbe Florence, is to think of art and culture—of china, pictures, opera, flnd architecture. A" bit surprising, then, it was to find in this "Flower of all Germany" such mundane things as street and river traffic so excellently arranged as they are in Dresden. Everyone who has visited Dresden has walked up the famed "Bruhl Terrace." It is on the south shore of the swiftly-flowing Elbe and. commands n magnificent, view of the new city in the immediate foreground, with the heights of Loschwitz, the Spaar Mountains, and the Seven. Oaks in the distance. Within a stone's throw of itv-s fine- entrance —a broad flight of forty steps, -adorned with bronze groups of Night. Evening. Noon, and. Morning—are "the King's Palace, the Court Church, and- the House of the Saxon Diet. 'We are in the midst of magnificent .architecture and sublime scenery. Yet under our very noses — :diroct■ly'below the famous promenade —huge river barges are being loaded and unloaded, and heavy coal' trucks are rumbling along upon the roadway beside .the-breakwater. As an example of iGermnn practicality this scerie was, to me, deeply impressive. Here was the answer to those who fancy that tojynplanning simply means beautification with' no concern for the interests of .trade and commerce.

the City Hall I found in the court a large plaster of Paris model of the. river and the new Frederick Augustus Bridge, depicting the very scene to ■which I.have referred, even to the showing of the barges in the river and also passing under the bridge. It had required! years, not a few months, I found, to bring to pass the perfection of traffic arrangements 1 had witnessed.

—German Thoroughness.— The. Stadtba'uamann was busy collecting data, in regard to the. proposed widening of a street not far from the famous "Zwinger" Picture Gallery, so as to relive* a congestion of traffic which occurs daily at noon and at 6 o'clock in the evening. There was a model of the whole district as it is, with wires tagged to show the proposed change m the streets. At a glance oven a complete, stranger could see. the advantage of the recommendations. Dresden's railway stations 1 are of modern-' design. Even - train enters and leaves tlie stations on tracks elevated' ahove the street. There are about the station spacious piazzas, and the congestion of traffic one usually finds .about a depot was absent, not alone in Dresden, hut also in Leipzig and Frankfart-oii-the-Main. That widespread fallacy-, that townplanners want to "tear a city to bits" in a. wholesale, manner finds a sufficient '•answer in Germany, where town-plan-ning is more general than in any country in the world. Town-planning, as those who understand -it -well 1 know, seek? simply to seize the opportunities for improvement as they present themselves, letting no chance slip to make their city-more convenient, wholesome, livable, and therefore more beautiful. Beauty is simply air expression of efficiency*. Anything which well performs ffcs function is beautiful. These axioms cannot be too. often reiterated. In Leipzig, Frankfort, and Cologne I' found a "ring," or circular boulevard. In all three cases this "girdle of green" clasped the very heart of each city. "How -could your citv afford to build such a. boulevard?" I asked a city official in Leipzig, where I first saw this unique and beautiful park scheme. "Oh. the boulevards are on the site of the old fortifications." he replied. "When the old walls fell into decay—and in these days walls are no longer required—we-simplv planted trees and laid out walks and roadways in their room." Later I found that exactly the same

thing had occurred in Cologne and Frankfort. One of the outstanding advantages of such a ■•ring" is this: If the visitor ha.'-; but a. short time in anvone of these three cities a walk ol 40' minutes, or a drive of 20, will enable him to see the best part of the city ; for, as may be imagined, private enterprise was quick to seiioe upon rile obvious desirability of locating substantial business houses and elaborate places of amusement on a- much-fre-quented thoroughfare. Mr Lemon was rather less impressed with Berlin than other German cities. In Berlin he found the beautiful proportions, and rows of pine trees of the famous Sieges Allee not really improved by its statuary, so much of whichwas the personal' gift of the Kaiser. The well-known Fricderich Strassc he found far too narrow for the enormous traffic in it. "I have called.attention to a few faults jn beautiful Berlin to show that that city, unlike Dresden, Leipzig, and Munich, has evidently occupied itself more with the showy and decorative side of town-planning than with the solution of the practical, every-day problem, of trafiic am! 'trade,", writes Mr Lemon. —Unter Den Linden.—

'•Far more agreeable is the task of briefly noticing, some of the outstanding excellences of Berlin's town-planning. What visitor can ever forget his first impression, of the line: of streets extending from the .Brandenburg Gate on. the'west to the ."Royal Palace." on the east, consisting of Unter den Linden ? The Linden, which is 200 ft wide, derives its name, from the avenues of lime trees (interspersed with chestnuts) with which it" is planted. This thoroughfare, the Piccadilly ol Berlin, is not, as some might imagine, simply a show street. Oh, no! The German, though, he loves beauty, is a. very shrewd man of busines. If .Unter den Linden is the handsomest part of. the city, so it is also the busiest. Splendid, ancl commodious banks, _ stores, and shops flank it on either side. "Berlin has not an Elbe like Dresden or a Main like Frankfort —but what she does with her small river, the Spree, is amazing. Cement embankments confine it as it flows through the heart of the citv, and the bridges in the vicinity of the' Protestant Cathedral and the King's Palace are triumphs of art and utility. In the average Canadian or American city- so small a river—it is a. stream rather —would have been left to meander according to. its-own sweet will, and not, by clever diversion, to lend, additional beauty to palace, museum, or church. -/ —A Definite Factory Area. —

"T think every visitor to Berlin must be struck with "ite all but immaculate streets and the general air of cleanliness which the monuments and ever. 'the public buildings exhibit; and yet Berlin is perhaps the greatest manufacturing town in Continental Europe. After climbing to the to]> of the Column of Victory which has been mentioned, I understood better how this imade, possible. Of course, there is an army of cleaners at work everywhere: hut even thev would fail if it were not that the bulk of the factories' are 'located in the eastern part- of the, city. The prevailing winds being from the west, I. noticed that the smoke from a thousand chimneys is blown away from and not towards the city. In Leipzig quite the countrary i l * the case —much to the .annoyance of tlje Stadtbauamann, who told me that one man was the cause of locating Leipzig's industrial centre in-that-section of the. city from which the prevailing winds blow. 'He owned a lot- of land there,' lie confided to me. 'and promoted the district with great skill. There's a monument to him "here, and- he is called a benefactor of "h'is" native, city. Some of us don't feel that way about- it when our city is covered with a. thick pall of smoke.'

"There is lots of scope for midiyidualitv in town-planning, some objectors to'the contrary notwithstanding. The writer has often heard people make remarks to the effect that they 'liked to have a city nataral.' T once hoard- the Mayor of an American city make such, mi' observation in the course of an. after-dinner sneech. at- the National Conference on Town-planning held in Boston, Mass. Germany_ again furnishes the refutation of this- fallacy.

'Munich affects the Gothic and Baroouc: Dresden is. of course, the •Cradle of Rococo Art'' ; Leipzig is pre-eminentlv a modern city. a. publishing and business centre, which boasts the finest station in Europe; Frank-fort-on-tho-Main has. with its German Gothic, more thai? a flavor of the Madiaeval; while Berlin leans to the classic in .architecture —to dome, pillar, and colonnade. Yet in each of these cities he who runs the evidences of planning and design, or foresight and premeditation. The. truth of the matter is this: The genuine town-planner makes the best ol what he has got. Sometimes he finds a wealth, of natural advantages which lend themselves to his designs; at 'other times all but insuperable obstacles which must be overcome. The famous 'English Garden' in Munich, with its splendid group of trees, its mesidows. its walks, its sunny restingplaces, its lake, its stream, its wood; —this magnificent park was a desolate, and marshy wood region until 1797,

when it was resolved toJ lay out a. park after the model of the celebrated Kchn-otzinger Garden, at the suggestion of Count Rumford. an American by birth. —.Esthetic and Utilitarian.—

•'.How often, in .Germany, I thought of the phrase. 'Business and Beauty.' ITere. vo an extent which 1 had. not seen in America,, or elsewhere on the Continent, the aesthetic and the utilitarian combined.' With us there seems ever to be- a sort of antagonism between, those who would make our cities beautiful and those who would make them commercially great. When we go about it to make a park the site usually selected is on tlie_ outskirts of the city. Tn how many cities in Canada, can one point to a park in the business section —to a. Princess street, as in Edinburgh, or to an Untc.r den Linden, as in Berlin?. LeC us 'plant ;: little bit .of. green' among the haunts of busy men. This cannot- be done in

all cities; but it can'be done in some — if at once.

"There remains but a little space to say a word about Frankfort-on-the-Main. In no city that. I visited was I more impressed' with 'the glory of the old and the splendor of the now.' Visiting the quaintly beautiful 'Romer' (old City Hall), originally constructed as a town hall out of several adjoining houses in 1805, one gazes in astonishment at the harmonious surroundings of these buildings. By law, new- buildings erected in the 'Romerberg' must, in their architecture, conform to the ancient hall. But a s-tep and we are in a narrow, twisted, but clean, "street, with picturesque gabled and balconied houses, twisted! and leaning toward each other as if seeking support, or at; least companionship, after their vigil of a century or so. "Why leave it so? Why do not-the town-planners.- straight-en out these twisted lanes called streets? Why? Because they arc not insane. No wide thoroughfare is needed here—ample provision, but a block away, has been made for traffic. This is the small shop and family ' residence district, very, very old and inexpressibly Quaint and beautiful. But the new Frankfort? Not .in all Germany will the traveller find a more modern' business section. Broad streets, lined with trees and hundreds of splendid "buildings of the modern design, give Frankfort an air of commercial prosperity and progressiveness which will strike even the most casual visitor.

"Town-planning in Germany is. then. a practical, common-sense movement, which manifests itself in different cities. There is about it little of dress parade: but by its operation the cities of _ Germany are 'better cities to live in, to come to. and to move in.' "