The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-10-04
SITE OF THE PUBLIC BUILDINGS.

lar vote at the coming election whether the
contemplated new public buildings of Phila-
delphia shall be erected on Washington
Square or Penn Squares, the advocates of the
former locality are making desperate exer-
tions to win votes. They seem to be con-
scious that they are bolstering up a bad
cause, for if Washington Square possessed
the intrinsic merits they claim for it, there
would be no necessity for resorting to misre
presentation, orfor the propagation of false and
puerile arguments in its favor. 1t is the real
or presumed pecuniary interest of those
owners of newspaper establishments located
near Washington Square who also
own the buildings in which their journals are
printed to have the new municipal edifces
erected near their real estate, and it is per-
haps too much to expect that they will
sacrifice their private interests for the public
good, but the voters of Philadelphia, reading
their numerous articles on this subject, will
remember that they discuss it as interested
property owners and not in the broad spirit
which characterizes their productions on other
subjects. The ivice of men whose incomes
from rents will be directly and per-
haps largely affected by the result
of the pending Vote cannot be received
with confidence, for personal motives will
give strong coloringte their arguments and
as their evidence, under the old rules of
law, would be totally excluded by courts of
justice in analogous cases, their assertions
affecting the present controversy should
either be absolutely rejected or received with
many grains of allowance.
The latest bugbear invented by the parti-
sans of Washington Square is that the Penn
Square project necessarily involves the
blockading of Broad and Market streets by
huge square building planted at the point of
junction, and blocking up travel. Large
diagrams of this monstrosity are placarded
on posters, and small wood-cuts scarcely less
hideous appear in 8 ome of our contempora-
ries.
We are at a loss to understand how
these gentlemen know that the Penn
Square building must inevitably assume
the obnoxious shape they attribute to it, and
we cannot conceive how such a triumph of
ornamental architecture could originate any
where except in their lively imaginations
No plan for the Penn Square buildings has
yet been finally adopted, but we are certain
that the Building Commission would never
dream of adopting the scheme of the enemies
of the Penn Square site. They may possibly
put up an oval or a circular building in the
centre of the square, or they may erect build
ings on the four vacant lots and unite them
in the centre by a dome, leaving space
for carriage-ways underneath, or they may
adopt any one of hundred schemes here
after to be submitted, but it is inconceivable
that they should do what the advocates of
Washington Square falsely attribute to them.
The Exchange, at Third and Dock streets,
was formerly the central point of business
and travel in Philadelphia, and imaginations
as lively but better trained than those of the
inventors of the Broad and Walnut street
diagram can devise plans whereby q slight
curve in both Broad and Market streets at
the junction will become an attraction rather
than hindrance or obstruction in our rec
.tangular city; yet even curves may be
avoided and the public buildings still
be erected on Penn Square. The
character of the gentlemen comprising the
commission affords guarantee that no
unsightly, inconvenient, or Objectionable
plan will be adopted; and if the people decide
in favor of Penn Squares, they may conf
dently anticipate that the large sum they
will be asked to contribute to the municipal
buildings will, like the means of the societies
and associations of the city, be spent in
adjoining Broad street, instead of obstructing,
defacing, or injuring it. AS we are to erect
an ornamental structure, at vast expense,
what can be more appropriate than that this
great improvement shall be placed where
it will greet the eye of the public and stran-
gers as the crowning triumph of long line
of splendid edifces, and where it will not
only show of to the best advantage, but be
nearest to the prospective centre of popula-
tion? When Independence Hall was built it
was rather the western limit of improvement
than the centre. Our ancestors were wise
enough to look to the future as we'll as to the
present. and if we do not wish to be cursed
for our folly and narrow-mindedness
by posterity We should also
consult their wants as we'll As our own, and
put our projected ornamental pile where it
will serve their convenience. Even if there
shou be slight disruption of business, and
few lawyers should be compelled to move a
little further westward than their present
locations ten years hence, how trifing is such
change compared with the accommodation
of the millions who are to come after us, and
with the consciousness that we are acting
fairly to all sections of the city now and here
after 81
NAPOLEON s MANIFESTO.
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