Modernism and Early Urban Planning

The seminar topic for week 3 (26th of August) was based on the text:
Early Urban Planning (1998)
Richard T. LeGates and Frederic Stout In 18

Speakers: Jani and Reuban

NINETEENTH-CENTURY URBAN CRISIS AND REFORM

The parks movement

One of the first responses to the horrors and social dislocations of industrial urbanism was the parks movement. In 1844, the city of Liverpool engaged the gardener Joseph Paxton to lay out Birkenhead Parl as the first urban garden, complete with recreation areas for sports, open to the general public. Parks were also opened in London (Victoria Park - 1845) and Paris. In America, the man who transformed land-scape gardening to a vehicle of democratic social reform was Frederick Law Olmsted (1822-1903). In 1811, the city of New York published a plan to build a great Central Park for the citizens of New York. This was recognised as a masterpiece, and it remains today one of the most examples of the enhancement of urban space by the intervention of artfully designed nature.

The garden city movement

Ebenezer Howard developed a plan to improve health by eliminating the congestion and reintegrating the urban and the rural. This was called the Garden City Plan. Howards plan was first published in 1898, where all land was to be collectively owned, with start up loans retired over time from yearly municipal revenues. Howard's plan attracted a cohort of dedicated followers and financial backers. Howard hoped that the new Town Planning Law, passed by Parliament in 1909, would spur the construction of dozens of new garden cities and the movement would slowly begin.

Progressivism and the city efficient

Progressivism grew out of "good government" reformers who battled the corruption and managerial inefficiency of big-city, immigrant based political machines. The Progressives, often representing middle class societies and economic interests, sought to apply the best scientific thinking - including new social scientific theories of education, welfare, and social work.


















Other significant ideas and developments that have lead to a modern city design:

• The contribution of Patrick Geddes
• Formation of new towns in America (Lewis Mumford)
• The master plan for New York and its environment
• Utopian Modernism
• Cities and the crisis of capitalism
• Modern housing for the Depression poor