Evening star., 1934-02-16
ARTICLE VI.
BY THOMAS II. HENRY.

AhONNho ~ hE4NhAs
tCopyrisht. 1884. BY The Evening star.)
TN A setting of wooded hills, about
20 miles south of Knoxville. is
rising the new town of Norris.
i 1t has been heralded widely as
the model town"-the sort Of
planned community which will re-
place in an Utopian future the pres
ent hit-or-miSS industrial villages
scattered over the United States. The
engineers, architects and landscape
planners started from scratch. With
complete control of land and ma
terials, they were given an almost un-
precedented opportunity to put into
practice the most up-to-date prin-
ciples OF their respective arts and
sciences.
But they are not building and
never intended to build-a model
town" That is precisely what the
Tennessee Valley Authority is trying
to avoid. The term model" implies
RECOMMENDATION of ways of life which
is foreign to the fundamental philos-
ophy of the movement. There is no
desire to see the American landscape
sprinkled with thousands OF lust such
towns, hardly distinguishable from
the original Norris" Such an out
come would indicate a communistic
bankruptcy Of the American imag-
lnation.
Is Experimental Town.
What is being built can better be
described as an experimental town
the sort OF community which fits best
into a given environment. The only
thing which might be considered
model is the method of approach
The sort of community is being built
which arises most naturally from the
lay of the land and the needs and
traditions of the people Every ef-
fort is being made to avoid a dupli-
cable formality.
The town is being erected to fit the
needs of the future, when industry
and agriculture will be co-ordinated
in single community, and when, it
is hoped, mans labor will be briefer
and his leisure greater. The aver
age suburban real estate salesman
probably would get gray hairs over
such a development 1t violates all
his fixed ideas OF the salable. 1t is
community built to live in-not to
sell.
The immediate purpose Of the new
town is TO provide houses for the
1000 or more men who will be en-
gagged for the next few years in the
construction OF the great Norris Dam,
about 4 miles away. This would be
necessary. in any event. Such town
always rises in the neighborhood of
a great engineering project-usually
of the most ugly and fiimsy sort Of
construction and intended to be
junked as soon as the job is finished
But the Tennessee Valley Authority
realized that the immediate neighbor-
hood of the great hydroelectric plant
would be an ideal location for an in
dustrial-agricultural community Of
the sort the policy calls for through
out the valley area. Why not expend
little more money and care on the
required housing facilities2 Then
something OF permanent value would
have been produced. instead Of some
thing to be junked with no prospect
Of return in q few years,
Covers $500 Acres.
Norris will cover an area OF ap-
proximately $500 acres, on a high,
rugged plateau between the Clinch
River on the west and the deep Buff
falo Greek Valley on the east, across
which arise the Cumberland Noun
tains. The size of the community will
be limited to about 1000 houses. This
does not mean that the Tennessee
Valley planners consider such the
ideal size for an agricultural-indus-
trial town of the sort they advocate.
It happens to be the most convenient
and best-adapted size for this par
ticular setting. Most of the homes
will be single-family houses. There
will. however. be several apartment
houses of moderate size and a board
ing house for single workers.
Norris never will grow into a COM
mercial or trading city. The plan
seeks deliberately to avoid any such
development. Otherwise 1t might
come about through the activity as
sociated with the building Of the dam
resulting in q building boom and
speculative values of real estate for
which there would be no future justi-
fication. Norris will never have much
use for boosters club"
The houses will be built on lots
averaging about a third acre with a
frontage of about rs feet. This mar
row frontage will tend to reduce the
costs of such public Improvements as
roadWayS, sewer and water mains and
street lighting. The 200-foot depth Of
the ordinary lot will give the family