The Worthington advance. [volume] (Worthington, Minn.) 1874-1908, 1898-10-20
WILL BE A COSTLY STREET.
The English Capital to Cut a New
ThOrouEhfare at a Cost OF
$3,5OO,OOO.

The city of London is about to un-
dertake another of those gigantic
operations which have marked it's de-
velopment during the greater part of
the present century, in the opening of
a new street for the convenience of
commerce, extending from Holboru
to the Strand. 1t will be cut through
district now intersected by crooked
and narrow thoroughfares and inhab-
tied by a population of about 5000
artisans. The improvement requires
the eviction of these people from their
homes, and the London council has
agreed to rehouse them within mile
of their present quarters, so as not to
disturb their vocations It is estimat-
ed that it will cost the municipality
81, 900 to do this, being an average
of $1,000 for each family. The rent to
be derived from these artisans when
quartered in their new homes will rep
resent only small Share of the inter
est on the capital invested, but that is
the penalty which the municipality
has been willing to assume in making
the changes involved in the main i'm
provement, which will cost $500. 900.
incidentally the measure has intro
duced curious problem into municipal
government, for in rehousing the
evicted working people employed on
the Line of the new thoroughfare it has
virtually blished the prin ciple that
the municipality shall reserve part
| of the constantly expanding and high
priced areas within it, which are de-
voted to commerce and warehousing,
for the housing of the laboring people
employed in them, and that the
municipality must bear the difference
between what the working people eau
reasonably be expected to pay for
such accommodations and the actual
interest due on the basis of surround
ing land values. The experiment has
been made there on small scale for
years past with some degree of success.
The great cities of the world have
grown during the present century as
they never grew before. Modern trav-
cling facilities, the development of
manufacturing Industries and the
growth of commerce have steadily
drawn into them the population of the
rural districts. As a consequence
the crowding has been so great and
rapid within them that many such i'm
provements as the one which London
now contempiates.m making to relieve
gorge, which were little dreamed of in
the earlier part of the century, have,
in the latter half of it, become i'm
perative necessities. Within the past
80 years the ground plans of Paris and
London have been materially altered
through the opening of new thorough
fares through congested districts in
the interest of convenience, adorn-
ment and commerce. During this brief
period all the boulevards which make
Paris the city beautiful and the mag
nificent sewer system which makes it
the best drained city in the world have
been constructed. So, also, the Thames
embankment and the great sanitary
problem involved in the relief of the
Thames of the .city''s sewage, which it
carried with it.; the opening up of
great thoroughfares through longest
ed districts, the construction of new
bridges to accommodate the ever-in-
creasing transriver traffic, and the
construction Of subterranean sys-
tenn Of metropolitan railroads, have
largely changed the face of the British
metropolis.-San Francisco Chronicle.