Los Angeles herald., 1907-12-01
BEAUTIFIER
SUBMITS HIS
SUGGESTIONS
CHARLES MULfoRD ROBINSON
MAKES REPORT
TELLS WHAT IS NEEDED FOR
Los ANGELES
r. w. Blanchard, Who Was Chiefly
instrumental In Securing Services
of Civic Architect, Enthuses
Over Plans

Charles Mulford Robinson, the world
famous civic architect who makes two
blades of grass grow where none grew
before and who brings nature back to her
own sweet self after man has done his
utmost to ruin her beauty, has completed
his report to Mayor Harper and the
municipal art commission on what must
be done to make Los Angeles what shf
should be-the most beautiful city In the
world.
Mr.. Robinson requires 5000 words to tell
what Los Angeles needs, and with some
thing of sigh declares he has not told il
oil at that. But he is enthusiastic over
yhe material with which to work and is
iunstinted in his praise of the things Los
Angeles has done already to make her
self beautiful. The great abundance OF
vegetation, the glory of the richly hued
flowers. the brilliancy of the birds plumage
cnd the golden sunshine are things on
which he cannot improve, he frankly ad-
mits, but he believes all these things can
be worked into a gorgeous color scheme
that will make Los Angeles the Paris of
America and far surpass the Paris of the
nld world.
Like European Cities
That Los Angeles should be laid out
after the manner of Paris and other cities
is a point on which he dwells with em-
rhasis. Los Angeles he calls the one
great ali-the-year-round summer city Of
America and declares that every improve
ment should be made with the idea of a
thoroughly "out-of-doors" city.
The ornamental lighting system which
adorns the principal business streets, he
declares, is the best In the country, but
be chides the business men because after
showing their public spirit in putting out
the lectroliers they do not have their
.anitors dust them off daily. He also de-
clares they have been cheapened by the
green paint, and advocates bronze
finish.
The new city hall he would put on
Spring street where the Bullard block now
stands, and with the court house, the
new federal building and the new city
hall he proposes magnificent group of
public buildings
Arraigns Realty Men
He scathingly arraigns the real estate
men who have defaced the hills to the
northwest of the city, saying they have
laid out their streets at impossible grades
instead of following the contour of the
hills, and have cut the property into
small, cheap lots instead of large lots for
villa purposes. This, he declares, is the
reason home builders have chosen the
nat plains to the southwest rather than
the view-commanding hills.
He would have the city buy the norma
school property and erect a public library
and fine arts building on the site. Fifth
street he lays out for a beautiful boule-
yard from a new union station to take
the place of the present Arcade station.
Following are the salient points of Mr.
Robinson's report. Some of the minor
recommendations have necessarily been
omitted through lack of space, but they
are important. In the opinion of F. W.
Blanchard, the man who was chiefly in
strumental in getting Mr. Robinson to
come to Los Angeles, the civic architect
has covered the ground thoroughly, and
MIR. Blanchard is hopeful that Los An
geles will soon be in a position to carry
cut the plans submitted:
introduction
The Honorable, the Mayor, and the Hon
orable City Council and Members of
the Municipal Art Commission, Los
Angeles, Cal.
Sirs: In accordance with your instruc-
tions, I have spent thirty days in exam
lining the city OF Los Angeles and in pre-
pairing such suggestions and recommen-
dations as in that time were practicable
for the Improvement and Identification
of the city.
1t early became evident to me that to
give to this advice the greatest possible
value, it would be necessary to res strict
my Investigations to those portions of the
city in which conditions were most rap
idly becoming fixed. 1t was advisable to
take up these because here improvements
would affect the greatest number of peo-
PIE and delay would prove most likely to
be fatal to the successful carrying out of
Improvement plans. Such portions of the
city include the business district and all
the more thickly settled parts OF Los An
geles. When 1t is realized that these
contain 450 miles of graded streets, laid
down at the whim Of individual land
owners and absolutely without compre-
hensive system; that the topography is
exceedingly varied, and that in ten
months more than 10000 buildings are
erected in the region covered, there is
appreciated the immensity of the prob
lem and its Importance, even when thus
restricted. 1t would have been desirable
and more satisfactory to me to have in
oluded in my survey broad bet of sur
rounding country, that the city's growth
over 1t might be planned for in advance.