and exercise their growing muscles. Such places are called parks, boulevards, and play-grounds. A boulevard is a great broad street with trees along it, and generally with a line of trees and grass down the middle with lines of pavement on either side for vehicles and walks. Playgrounds are so scarce in some parts of old cities that it is necessary for streets to be set aside at certain hours of the day for children to play in. Vehicles are excluded from these streets at such hours, or they are required to move with great care. As the new parts of cities are planned, spaces are reserved for all of these uses; and therefore a park department must be governed by efficient officers who are trained to make plans long in advance of the building of residences. Such officers are not likely to be provided unless cities are given enough home rule by the State to permit them to make their own plans.

128. Civic Centers. So long as our cities are permitted to grow without any plan, beautiful buildings are so scattered about that we do not get full benefit from them. If a city has one or more places where great handsome buildings are placed around a park, this spot becomes a center of interest and we become proud of our city. A result of all such grouping is that citizens have a greater interest in caring for all parts of the city. Such places are sometimes called civic centers. Let us suppose a small park as large as two or three city blocks planted with grass and trees; around it are such buildings as a library, high school, church, theater, a handsome hotel for those who visit the city, the court house, the post office, the city hall, the exterior of which the city art commission has approved. What citizen would not be proud to go there in the evening and think of the fine work his community is doing?

To have such a center, years of planning in advance are necessary, for such great buildings cannot be moved. The city government can provide that when new buildings are erected they may be grouped so that such a center will gradually grow under the direction of an efficient government.

129. The Suburbs. Many American cities have been permitted to grow under the direction of land speculators. It is to the interest of these speculators to have houses built rapidly and cheaply in order that land may be sold quickly for a large profit. This kind of building ruins the appearance of new sections unless the city government has authority and foresight enough to force all new sections to follow a general plan. Many of our city governments have paid no attention to city planning, partly because our city officers serve such short terms that they can plan for only a few years and partly because many of them have so little training in government that they do not know how to make a plan or to follow one which the officers who went before them have made. For wise planning the cities need more home rule, and the officers need longer terms. Besides this, the citizens should take more interest in their home town and should be willing to support public officers in their control of private business.

SUGGESTIONS AND QUESTIONS

1. Draw a map of the principal streets in your city, or if the city is large, of a part of it.

2. If there are no diagonal streets, show where some might be placed.

3. Indicate the location of parks in the map; and show where other parks are needed.

4. Show where a civic center might be placed.

5. Make a list of the buildings now in your city which might well be placed on the civic center.

6. Show which are the main residence streets; wholesale streets; retail streets. How are these paved now?

7. Has your city a planning commission? If not, who looks after planning the streets so that they will be convenient?

8. What is the condition of your suburbs? Are they planned, or does the city let them "just grow" as Topsy did?

9. Is it a wise economy for a city to spend money planning its suburbs and its other sections? What effect does it have on the value of property? Does it make the taxpayers richer or poorer? Does it attract other people and more business to the city?

10. What would be some of the main difficulties in the way of planning your city wisely? Would some citizens object to it? 11. What are the reasons why you have no beautiful civic center in your city, if you have none?

12. Are plenty of park spaces being provided in the suburbs of your city while the land is cheap? Are new parks in the densely settled parts of the city being provided?

13. Has your city government a department of parks? Who appoints the head of it? What kind of scientists does it need? 14. Are the heads of the street building department and of the utilities department under the same control so that they will work together?

CHAPTER XIV

BUILDING ZONES OR DISTRICTS

130. Rights of Property. We used to think that a man had a right to do what he pleased with his own property. If he owned a plot of land we supposed he had a right to build on it any kind of house he wished and to use the house for any lawful purpose. In those days people lived so far apart that it did not make much difference to a man what his neighbor did, and people had not yet learned the value of working together in protecting the rights of property. The first steps to limit the right of property owners to do as they wished with their town lots were taken by private agreement. A company would buy a section of land near a city for development; it would then sell lots to persons who wished to build on them, but would require the purchasers to agree that they would build only particular kinds of houses and use them only for particular purposes. For example, a company bought twenty acres in a suburb and divided the land into a hundred building lots. Each purchaser was required to build a house to cost not less than ten thousand dollars and to use it only as a one-family dwelling. He was forbidden to build a stable there, or to keep chickens or pigs. When all the lots were sold and houses built there was a pleasant district of one hundred well-protected homes.

131. The Use of Buildings. If some such limitations are not placed on the use of land in cities the property of

no man is safe from ruin. A livery stabie 'or even a public garage next to a residence may rob the owner of the residence of a large part of his investment. Let us suppose that a hundred families have built homes in an unrestricted district. Each has invested fifteen thousand dollars. It is a quiet, wholesome community, and the property is rising in value. Then suppose a newcomer buys a lot and builds a large factory which runs night and day, gives off disagreeable odors, and keeps up a constant noise. Each of the hundred families would lose several thousand dollars from the value of its home; and might even be obliged to give it up, for it would no longer be a desirable residence. The factory owner would not receive what the home-owners lost. There would be a great waste merely because the factory had been put in the wrong place.

132. The Height of Buildings. Property may also be reduced in value by the erection of a high building adjacent to it. The ground on which a house stands may become almost worthless by the act of a perfectly respectable neighbor. The sun which shines on it and the air which blows over it form a large part of its value. If a twelve-story apartment house is built next to a residence all of the sunlight and much of the air may be cut off. But not only residences are ruined in this way. In a part of the business section of a certain city, a number of office buildings for lawyers and other such people were erected. These buildings were ten stories high or less. Then came a new office building twenty-five stories high. Men wanted offices in this fine new building; they left the older ones, which could not get new tenants because the demand for offices was already met. Several families who owned these older