Every evening, Wilmington daily commercial., 1920-07-02
The Pittsburg Plan
n~ N>d>d. 1 Haskin

Plttsburg, June 29.-For the first time
in it's history Pittsburg is now being
planned. A staff of city planning experts
rs busily engaged in creating a scheme
for transforming Pittsburg into modern,
comfortable and even beautiful city.
IL must be admitted that Pittsburg
today is not of these things. Industrial
lv, Of course, it is supreme. If it were
suddenly lifted bodily from the United
States every part of the country would
ne affected by its absence. Famous for
It's Steel coke products, iron, tin, glass
and electrical equipment, and celebrated
for its stopies, it owns the largest cork
plant, giant picking and preserving
business, and leads the world In the pro-
luction of finished aluminium. But as
a municipality, Pittsburg is tagging far
behind its middle western neighbors.
While the candle-power of Cleveland,
St. Louis and Detroit is rapidly increas-
ing in the metropolitan armament
Pittsburgs is but slightly brighter than
IL was decade ago.
This is not the fault of the present
generation of Pittsburgers, who are
extremely enterprising and energetic,
hut the fault of their grandfathers who
laid the foundation of what should prop
crly be great metropolis in location
peculiarly untitled for expansion. Geog-
raphy is vital factor in shaping the
destiny Of cities. The geography of
Chicago made il easy for it to become a
mammoth town, and the geography of
Pittsburg has persistently hampered its
growth.
Squeezed into n narrow triangle of
and between the Monongehala and
Allegheny rivers, which unite at one
I. L. h.,
with veritable barricade of hills as its
hypotenuse. These hills, while pic
turesque TO live upon, are the bane of
rittsburg's existence. Everything that
is sad or neglected about Pittsburg may
be blamed upon them. They present
stubborn obstacles to building operations;
they make transportation more costly
and slower than in most large cities, they
make improvements absurdly expensive
and they have retarded the growth of the
city in every way. When most cities
gct too crowded, they just move on
little farther, but Pittsburg has TO climb
a cliff
II was p. obablv the oppressive nearness
of these granite walls which caused the
early Pittsburg settlers to economise on
space and make the city's streets so MFR
iOw, although this is also attributed hv
one authority to caIelessness, which per-
mitted the town to proceed erraticallv
along the old cow paths. Anyway, Pitts
bug is now paving the price of this mis-
take Its business district is a hopeless
jumble of narrow, c,isscross streets, few
of them more than forty feet wide and
nearly all of them divided bv street car
tracks. Buildings seem to iostle each
other for room, the pedestrians almost trip
over each other, and the railroads are
so cramped for space that their terminal
facilities are painfully inadequate. Add 10
these conditions the fact that most Of the
streets are cobble-stoned, and Won will sec
why Pittsburg is beginning to feel the
tragic need OF a plan.
THOROUGH ORGANIZATION.
But as the spoiled child of manv phiIan-
thropists, Pittsburg waited for a plan 70 he
given to it, and this is just what has han
pened, although the CITY will eventuaIf,,
have to pay for it. IL is the business in,or-
ests Of Pittsburg, including bankers mann
facturers, merchants and professional mon
who are financing the planning. fiftv in
dlviduals and cotpo. ations having con-
trihuted the necessary funds to pet tbe
project started. They have organ;zed
themselves into what is called the Cit
zen's Committee on CITY Planning and
have already accumulated a large Office
force and staff of architectural and engi-
neerlng experts for their work.
Ihe cost of carrying out the propran
VIII run INTO the scores of millions during
the next twenty years according to one
OF the aforesaid citizens In the meantime
BlttsburV will be getting a NOW bo,,Ia,-o-J