"attempts to give only the fundamental principles, hoping that our students will at least know what City Planning means". With a similar purpose, Mr. Thomas Adams has the general direction over a course at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston, which "acquaints students of Architecture with the significance of both Landscape Architecture and Town Planning from an Architect's point of view". Naturally, the engineering aspects of city planning work are fully covered in other departments of the Institute.

At Harvard, technical training for City Planning can be obtained at the Graduate School of Landscape Architecture. Related instruction is offered in courses in the Fine Arts, Social Ethics, and Government Departments of the College, the Engineering School and in the Graduate Schools of Business Administration and of Architecture. Harvard gives a degree of "M.L.A. in City Planning" which is believed to be the first and only degree in this subject.

The time is apparently not far distant when a separate school devoted primarily to City Planning will be needed. Such a school would best be at one of the larger universities where courses in specialized related fields are available. Indeed, it should be through a coöperation of technical schools of landscape architecture, architectural engineering, law, social economics, etc., as the subject itself requires a coöperation of these and many more activities. The theory and technique of city planning are rapidly developing, and instruction sufficient for active technical work in the field will soon become a recognized public need.

Conducted by GEORGE B. FORD, Chairman

LAWRENCE VEILLER

HAROLD S. BUTTENHEIM

THE MOVEMENT FOR AN AMERICAN GARDEN CITY

An event which may have results of no little importance to the city planning profession was the initiation on May 15, at the Town Hall Club, New York City, of an organized movement to promote the garden city idea in America. The occasion was a farewell luncheon to Ebenezer Howard, founder of the garden city movement in England, who had come to New York, with other European leaders in town planning, for the International Town, City and Regional Planning Conference.

As defined by the International Federation of Town and Country Planning and Garden Cities, "A garden city is a town planned for industry and healthy living, of a size that makes possible a full measure of social life, but no larger, surrounded by a permanent rural belt, the whole of the land being in public ownership, or held in trust for the community."

At present there are just two cities in England to which this definition may properly be applied-and none in America. The objects of the new association will be to stimulate the building of garden cities in America along the general lines of Letchworth and Welwyn, but with such modifications as American conditions may require. Among the possible variations suggested at the conference were: not making the restriction regarding size quite definite; wedges as an alternative to belts of permanent reservations of open land; and definitely and permanently zoning the use of the land as an alternative to public ownership, if the latter should prove impracticable.

The committee appointed at the Town Hall luncheon to formulate plans for a conference to be held in the fall to consider the forming of an American Garden City Association consists of Charles S. Bird, Jr., of Boston; Colonel Samuel P. Wetherill, Jr., of Philadelphia; Alexander M. Bing, President of the City Housing Corporation; Richard S. Childs, Vice-President of the National Municipal League; Lawson Purdy of the Charity Organization Society of New York; and Henry James of the Regional Plan of New York.

Among other forces recently set in motion which may play an important part in the garden city movement in America are the publication by The Survey, in its Graphic number for May, of a notable series of articles on regional planning and garden cities; and the activities of the City Housing Corporation, a limited dividend company, with headquarters in New York City, organized to build better homes and communities.

The success already made by the City Housing Corporation of its important housing venture at Sunnyside, Long Island City, and the unusual calibre of the

men and women associated in the enterprise, give reason to hope that the funds may be forthcoming for a real garden city project under the same auspices. As Mr. Bing well says in his article in the May Survey Graphic, "The business success of English limited dividend companies can be more than duplicated over here. Profiting by their experience, and aided by the greater resources of America, such an enterprise ought to be a great financial success. If the tremendous energy and resources which would be mobilized for such an undertaking were to be harnessed to that abundant store of idealism which is latent in us, splendid results might be looked for."*-H.S.B.

REGIONAL PLANNING IN PHILADELPHIA

In May and June 1924, several meetings attended by representatives of some forty civic and business organizations of Philadelphia were held to consider the possibility of launching a constructive regional planning program for the Philadelphia Metropolitan District. The outcome was the appointment of a committee to supervise a preliminary study of the possibilities of such a movement. Col. Samuel Price Wetherill, Jr., was chairman of this committee. The work was financed by a group of public spirited citizens.

The region includes approximately 2000 square miles, is located in three states, and is broken up into some 525 administrative units, including school authorities.

The summer and fall were spent largely in making contact with leaders of thought and representatives of organizations in the territory surrounding Philadelphia, to discover the sentiment in the region, toward Philadelphia, and the willingness of these groups to join with the city in a coöperative movement. Α rather unexpected hospitality to the plan was discovered, and a widespread appreciation of the fact that many of the individual physical problems of the various centers of the region are in reality a part of the larger regional problem. Particularly, expression was given to the need for assistance in solving highway and traffic problems, in port development, in securing water supply and sewage disposal, and in the development of an extensive system of park and recreational facilities. Special attention was called to the lack of circumferential highways around the city and connecting outlying towns, which results in funnelling traffic into the congested centers; to the rapid growth of real estate allotments in what is destined. to be a highly developed industrial section, with narrow streets unrelated to the general street scheme, and with no provision for open spaces or other facilities which will be essential in the near future; and to the preëmption for sewers, private estates and industrial purposes of the wonderful creek valleys, of which many are to be found in the region and most of which should be reserved as public parks. The need for regional action in these matters was constantly emphasized.

The past few months have been devoted principally to giving to the citizens of Philadelphia a more adequate understanding of the need for a metropolitan plan. *Readers of CITY PLANNING should read also the leading editorial in the AMERICAN CITY for June, (page 613).

Much interest and active coöperation have been secured from the leading organizations and citizens of the city. The newspapers have been unstinted in their editorial and news support.

It is planned that financial support shall be secured in the beginning principally from those corporations and business houses which have the largest stake in the logical future development of Metropolitan Philadelphia. This will be supplemented by memberships in a Regional Planning Federation by Associations, corporations and individuals throughout the tri-state region. The support is to be so distributed that a large area and representative groups will have a part, and that the movement may not be controlled in the interest of any section or single group. A number of organizations and individuals have taken membership and several corporations have pledged substantial sums over a period of three years.

It is hoped that in the near future this financial guarantee will be sufficient to warrant the installment of a technical staff and the undertaking of an active survey program.

During the period of its work the committee has been able to bring about a few practicable accomplishments. A coöperative highway and traffic study and program having the endorsement and assistance of the Governors of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware and the Mayors of Philadelphia and Camden is being undertaken by the highway departments of these states and cities in conjunction with the committee. A number of outlying towns are calling on the committee to aid them in solving their problems the planning of highway programs, the development of parks, parkways and playgrounds, the preparation of zoning ordinances, the creation of planning and zoning commissions and other similar projects.

HOWARD STRONG, Director

Committee on Regional Plan for the Philadelphia Metropolitan District.

KANSAS STATE LEAGUE PROMOTES CITY PLANNING AND ZONING

Authority to zone was granted by the 1925 legislature of the State of Kansas to cities of two thousand population or more. All the cities have authority to plan their areas and regulate the planning of areas outside and adjacent to the city limits. The League of Kansas Municipalities, an organization of three hundred of the cities of Kansas, has been promoting the passage of this legislation. This organization of cities now maintains a municipal service bureau in connection with the Municipal Reference Bureau of the University of Kansas.

In addition to a staff of four consultants, the League has employed Mr. Harold D. Smith, B.S. '23 of Kansas, who now also holds a degree of Master of Arts in Municipal Administration from the University of Michigan, to assist in general with the municipal consulting work which is carried on by the League, and to be a special assistant to the cities and city planning commissions desiring to plan or

zone their city areas. It is not the purpose of the League to take the place of a city planning consultant; but to promote city planning and to give city officials and city planning commissions the fundamental instructions to help them organize for their work.

Mr. Smith is also an assistant-secretary of The International City Managers' Association, which has offices in connection with the Municipal Reference Bureau of the University, the League of Kansas Municipalities and The Association of American Municipal Organizations, all of which are under the direction of an Executive Secretary.

The activities of these various municipal organizations are developing into a general municipal service bureau, in connection with which there is maintained a large municipal library, where Kansas Municipalities, a monthly state municipal magazine, is published together with City Manager Magazine, a monthly international publication, devoted exclusively to city administration and the city manager profession.

JOHN G. STUTZ, Executive Secretary. PLANNING ADMINISTRATION IN ROCHESTER, NEW YORK

I believe that the City Planning Commission or Bureau should be directly connected with the Department of Engineering in a city. While I do not advocate our plan for other cities, I believe it is the best plan for our city.

We believe in the idea of single-headed departments, rather than Boards or Commissions. The City Planning organization here is a Bureau in the Department of Engineering. The head of this Bureau is the Superintendent, having more authority than is usually given to Commissions in other cities. He works in active coöperation with the other branches of the Department of Engineering. This makes for both efficiency and economy. The Advisory Board, composed of four citizens appointed by the Mayor for different terms, together with the Corporation Counsel, constitute a continuing body with power directly from the State Legislature.

Our

While I am in entire sympathy with the proposition for the creation of Boards of Appeals, I believe in our case such an additional Board is unnecessary. Advisory Board has more power than is usually given to a Board of Appeals. This Board, together with the Superintendent, may make changes in the zones from time to time, as circumstances may require. It may also make all modifications and exceptions authorized by a Board of Appeals. As a matter of fact, the larger portion of the time of every session of the Board is taken up with consideration of such matters as would come to a Board of Appeals. Exceptions for the location and operation of gasoline stations in Commercial and Residential districts receive the consideration of the Board, when brought to its attention by the Superintendent, or when a property owner is aggrieved by the refusal of the Superintendent to grant such an exception. As a result the character of these stations has been materially improved during the last five years. EDWIN A. FISHER,

Consulting Engineer to the City of Rochester.