Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-01-21
HIGHWAY CHANGES
URGED BY ELIOT
Millions Would Be Saved by
Move, City Palmer Tells
Trade Board Group.

Changes In the highway plan in con-
forrnity with advanced ideas on the
development of plan Of major trafnc
thoroughfares and purely residential
streets, designed for the District, with
the existing highway plan as a basis,
will save millions of dollars In city
costs, Charles w. Eliot, I'd, city planner
of the National Capital Park and Plan
ming Commission. told the committee
of the Board of Trade on streets and
avenues yesterday at the City Club.
Savings in capital funds thus
achieved, he said. would more than pay
for AL the parks here that we have
ever dreamed Of developing.
Discussing the definite system of ma
tor traffic thoroughfares and cross-town
connecting links which is being pre-
pared by the planning commission, Mr..
Eliot asked the trade body committee
to make studies of the system as a
whole and of individual projects under
consideration, and to- give the commits
sion the benefit of the opinions of the
committee.
Graham Approves Plan.
George v. Graham, chairman of the
committee, approved the plan of con-
situations, and a special group will be
BY the institution of major thor
ou9hfare plan here the saving will come
about, the speaker said, by the employ
ment of two new ideas in city plan
ning-the use of longer blocks in purely
residential sections where trafhc needs
do not require cross streets every 400 or
500 feet, and use of the curvilinear plan
for streets under which roadways are
made to conform largely to the natural
contour of the land rather than by fol-
lowing a predetermined gridiron street
pattern.
BY the use of longer blocks in resi-
Dental areas street paving costs are
greatly reduced. and by the use of
curved streets. where fitting and posi-
bic, additional costs are saved by re-
ducing. the necessary grading and filling
along the routes of streets.
BY the employment Of these two
systems, Mr.. Eliot said, approximately
$4,000 900 in capital expenditure could
be saved In public funds, plus an addi-
tional saving of about $500, 900 annually
in maintenance.
Narrower Streets in Places.
Where a major traffic thoroughfare
system has been employed it is possible
also to use narrower streets in purely
residential sections, more or less $50
lated in location, thus providing addi-
tional saving Of tax funds.
But this system of curved and mar
rover streets and longer blocks in resi-
Dental areas. he pointed out, pre-
supposeS prior determination and de-
velopment of q comprehensive system
of major traffic arteries. Work on such
q system now is we'll under way at the
planning commission. A general sys-
tenn has been tentatively agreed upon
by city planners, and technical work is
progressing on specific changes neces-
sary to bring this plan into fact.
One of the immediate projects Is the
tentative proposal of city planners to
realign Harvard street between Six
tenth ami Thirteenth streets to turn
the street into a straight course, in
keeping with its plan as one of the
main croSS-town connecting links. The
plan is to use Harvard street as a one
way east-bound trafic artery, employed
with Columbia road, in the same sec
tinn. as a west-bound street.
Another project which the COMMITTEES
will study is the tentative proposal t.
erect q high-level bridge over Rock
Greek Park between Park road and
Tildens street to provide another cross
town artery to avoid the steep descent
on the present roads along this route
which are of costly maintenance and
which are held to be inadequate to
carry the growing. trafnc through this
section Of the park.
Other projects to be studied are the
District arteries running to the pro-
jected underpass at the Baltimore &