Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-11-30
Washington's Building Problem.

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Washington's Building Problem.
The modern builders of a city beautiful
on the banks Of the Potomac have had a
simple problem to solve compared with
that set by Buenos Aires or Rio. In the
single item of broadening and straighten-
ing streets they were spared millions of
expenditure necessary in the southern
capitals. The forefathers provided q
MAGNIFICENT street plan before there was
city, The owners OF the soil donated a
served for building lots. AS late as
Charles Dickens visit, in 1912. the most
no able thing about the capital was its
pretentious plan, characterized by the
great novelist as the vast design Of an
aspiring Frenchman, displaying as it's
leading features spacious avenues that
begin in nothing and lead nowhere:
streets mile-long that only want houses,
roads and inhabitants: public buildings
that need but public to be compete,
and ornaments of great thoroughfares
which only lack great thoroughfares to
ornament"
Our modern capital builders have had
as their task: a. Protection OF the orig
let's Of the city's plan: CD expensive
maintenance and development of the
original streets and avenues covering
vast area. suitable for the thoroughfares
Of populous and wealthy capital, ludi-
crously out of relation to the resources
lot a self-supporting. self-developing
Maryland village: 60 extension Of the
city's original plan. as far as possible,
to the new Washington outside Of the
original limits, which is spreading urban
trict; ~ removal or conditions which
have sprung up to mar the original plan
and the harmonious development Of the
city beautiful; and (5) acquisition and
NJ oil he ANt mo- 49,
of the new system of connected outer
parks which did not enter into the plans
Of the fOrefatherS. but which are essen
tial to the adequate and rounded de-
velopment of the modern capital.
Redeeming Pennsylvania Avenue.
The special immediate labor under the
fourth heading Is the removal of Ugly
and discreditable conditions affecting
Pennsylvania avenue, the great historic
thoroughfare and parade street of the
capital. 16O feet wide, with Capitol Hill
and the Capitol building with its swelling
dome in vista at one end, and with the
Treasury Department and White House
at the other. Between this avenue and
the public garden of LEnfants plan. the
Mall, Is triangle, containing at th.s
time nearly twenty-nine acres of land no.
owned by the government. which when the
process of Transforming 1t began, fur
nished an entirely unworthy setting and
environment for one side of Pennsylvania
avenue. This space is clearly devoted
in the very nature OF thing to pub l..
purposes. to the sites Of public buildin
with park approaches and surroundi lgs.
The law has already placed with n 1t
the capitals Municipal building and the
nations Post Office Department, State
Department, Commerce and Labor Le-
partment and Department of Justice.
=
Of handling the situation was to cen
denim the whole triangle at once that the
public buildings to be placed in 1t nigh
with their approaches and cen 8 ard
environment be located In proper rela-
ton to one another and to the park on
one side and the broad Avenue IN the
other. Congress, however having now
acquired about one-fourth of the land,
tackled the problem piecemeal, in
creasing by each condemnation the price
SANITY s,rene thening the impulse Of mar
row, short-sighted economists to aban-
don the campais n for the redemption and
adornment Of Pennsylvania avenue and
as free sites for pub ic buildings
Adherence to the spirit which ami
mated the forefa:hers and which is so
strong in Buenos Aires and RIO today
dollars would solve for all time tie prob
lem OF public building emplacement n
Washington, and would make Of Pennsyl-
vania avenue one Of the most magnificent
thoroughfares In the world, w.rthy O
compare with the Aveniea de May . the
Pennsylvania avenue Ct Buenos Al es,
and the Avenida Central the Penns, Iva
mia avenue OF RIO.
The Continents Great Avenues.
Argentina has recently spent millions in
tearing down blocks Of houses at one end