The American Institute of Architects, the Octagon, Washington, D. C (Classic Reprint)

Angebote / Angebote:

Excerpt from The American Institute of Architects, the Octagon, Washington, D. C All of these functions must be considered together and co-ordinated in order to get intelligent and satisfactory results. The extraordinary growth in recent years of cities in the Old World, as well as in the new, has naturally been the cause of much wonder, comment and analysis. In the United States, at least, it has been found impossible by the railroads to plan for future needs more than twenty or twenty-five years in advance, under the most favorable circumstances, and in many cases, projects for extensions and improvements that were thought, when planned, to provide for traffic so far ahead as to be extravagant, have soon proved to be inadequate. Condition Affecting The Plan Of Cities. a. Geographical and Topographical Conditions. - The general plan of cities is, obviously, chiefly controlled by geographical and topographical conditions: they may, for convenience, be divided into three typical groups: 1. New York (Manhattan Borough) is a type of city whose development and growth have been forced into certain hard and fast lines by the fact that it is built on a long and comparatively narrow, strip of land between two great rivers. 2. Pittsburgh is an example of a second type, being located on hills divided by deep and comparatively narrow river valleys. In such cases, of course, railroad entrance to the city is almost necessarily forced into the valleys, and the development must be adapted to the geographical as well as the topographical conditions. 3. Chicago, Detroit and Buffalo are good examples of a third type, in which the city has first developed along a large body of water and then grown in concentric circles back from the water, the topography being so nearly flat as neither to suggest nor to interfere with any particular plan. In the case of Chicago, the river presents some special problems and obstacles to natural growth, but, generally speaking, this type of city develops on the plan of an opened fan. b. Effect of the Height of Buildings. - Although we hear much of the advisability of city ordinances limiting the height of buildings, the ordinances of one administration are likely to be disregarded or repealed by the next, and it may be said, speaking generally, that in this country we have not been successful in fixing any limit to the height of buildings, Boston being a notable exception, I am told, and there it is regulated by some legislative enactment. [Applause.] Many of our large office and store buildings accommodate 10, 000 people, and it is said of a large retail store in Chicago, which occupies not quite an entire city block and has a height of only twelve stories, that it frequently happens that there are 25, 000 people in this store at one time. If the so-called "Loop District" or business heart of Chicago were filled with twenty-story buildings, a condition which seems to be fast approaching, we should have say forty blocks, each accommodating 25, 000 people. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.