The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1930-06-27
Concerning Big Cities

Are our great cities a boon to humanity or the
most disastrous social manifestation Of the law OF
diminishing returns? The SNUG complacency of the
metropolis worshipers is challenged rudely by Warren
S. Thompson in his article "On Living in Cities" in
the American Mercury.
Dr. Thompson sharply queries the conventional
assumption Of the great economic advantages OF big
cities
"one may ask whether the great insurance COM
NAMES in New York City really know that it cheaper
to build onehundred-sory buildings Zone Of them has
announced such building recently housing 10000 to
10000 people than to have number of branch othces
located in different parts of the country.
whether many railroads, whose eastern termini
are hundreds of miles from New York are better oil
for having general Offices in New York and employing
hundreds of clerks there rather than in the smaller
cities along their lines.
whether our great public utilities are more eco
nomically conducted from New York Chicago, Phlia-
delpha and other large cities than they would be II
local Offices did more of their actual business
whether an automobile factory can be operated
more cheaply in Detroit than in some smaller city,
where workers pay smaller rents and spend but few
minutes getting to work.
whether economical merchandising can only be
carried on in large stores downtown. Whether thou
sands of both large and small offices could not De
moved from the downtown sections of our large cities
with a lowering of rents and an improvement IN
efficiency among the workers One could continue
such inquiries almost indefinitely but there is no
need"
Manufacturers already have found big cities to be
uneconomical Higher wages have to be paid to meet
the far higher living costs of workers Yet workers IN
big cities are not as productive as the same type OF
men when employed in small towns in equally we'll
equipped factories The great majority of those en-
poved in cities are clerical workers Their efficiency
is impaired by the conditions under which they must
live:
.eThere can be no reasonable doubt that the slum
ar near-slnn conditions under which most of these
clerical workers live make terrible drain on their
efficiency Most of them live in tiny apartments
where there is little chance to relax comfortably when
the days work is over and to recuperate satisfactorily
for the next days work.
Those few who live far enough away from their
work to avoid the evils of congestion in living quar-
ters suffer almost equally from the congestion OF
traffic r. going and coming from their work"
The law of diminishing returns operates especially
vigorously in relation to the traffic problem The
higher the buildings on Manhattan island the greater
the number of people who must come in from outside
to fill them In spite of the enormous expenditures
on traffic facilities the traffic in New York City is
incomparably more congested today than it was
twenty-five years ago.
DR.. Thompson believes that the chlet reason we
do not consider seriously the cessation of metro
politan growth and the redistribution of the popua-
ton in smaller urban units is the deporabe American
tendency to worship mere size.
There may be another side to the picture but GER
tanly Dr. Thompson's queries are peculiarly cogent
and timely in this year of the census, when there is
wild rivalry for high place the rank of urban popu-
lation. Should not a city mourn to find that 1t has
passed those which formerly led it in population
density?