THE PLAN OF CHICAGO

By Eugene S. Taylor, Manager Chicago Plan Commission,

Chicago, Ill.

History

The authors of the Plan of Chicago were Daniel H. Burnham, Edward H. Bennett, and a staff of notable artists and technical men. Mr. Burnham was persuaded to undertake the task by the Commercial Club of Chicago, an organization of one hundred of the leading business and professional men of the city. These men had seen Chicago's swift industrial and commercial development; they believed that the future had even greater things in store on condition that the future city were intelligently anticipated and provided for. Many of the members of the Commercial Club had been directors of the World's Fair and wanted to preserve the beauty and order which they had seen so well exemplified in the fair. The Commercial Club contributed the money required for laying out the plan, and it also contributed valuable ideas and suggestions born of ripe experience in the conduct of large-scale business.

Purpose

The purpose of the Plan of Chicago is two-fold. Regarded in one light, it is a commercial proposition, as shown by the fact that the projects in the plan are so designed that the city's streets, arterial highways, railroads and waterways may be put to their highest and best uses for the utmost economy in the conduct of business.

Regarded in another light, the purpose of the plan is a social or humanitarian one, because the plan aims to conserve the natural resources-the woods and water-surrounding the city for the health and pleasure of the citizens; to establish large and small parks, playgrounds and bathing beaches; to reclaim neglected neighborhoods; to give the worker quick and easy access to and from his home and his work; to reduce the cost of doing business and therefore the cost of living; and,

in a word, to make Chicago a highly desirable place for residence as well as an equally desirable environment for business.

Recommendations Contained in the Plan of Chicago

The Plan of Chicago therefore recommended, in line with this two-fold purpose, the development of the lake and river fronts; and the acquisition of the woodlands all about the outskirts of the city for a permanent forest preserve. It recommended the development of a circuit of streets for through traffic about the "loop," as the central business district of Chicago is called. It recommended every possible connection practical to connect the loop with the other sections of the city, and these sections with each other, in order to produce a unified city. It recommended the co-ordination of city streets with the highways exterior to Chicago. It recommended proper rail and water terminals. In addition, the plan makes certain other recommendations looking toward the harmonious and economical physical development of the city.

Organization of Chicago Plan Commission

The technical work on the Plan of Chicago took two years. Then the conclusions and recommendations, the maps, plats, diagrams and designs were published in book form by the Commercial Club, and the plan was ready for use. It was thereupon presented to the city as a gift from the Commercial Club, with the recommendation that a commission be appointed to study the plan and advise about its execution. This was accordingly done. The mayor appointed 328 representative men with Charles H. Wacker as chairman and Frank I. Bennett as vice-chairman, to form the Chicago Plan Commission. The commission has no executive powers. The execution, therefore, of Chicago plan projects rests with the public officials, certain of whom are always ex-officio members of the Plan Commission. The commission enjoys today and has always enjoyed the hearty co-operation of the men in public office.

Accomplishments of Plan Commission on Plan

The Chicago Plan Commission was established in 1909. Its efforts ever since have been directed toward carrying out first those improvements which would yield the greatest benefit to

the greatest number of people, and which-if they were to be made at all-would have to be made without delay. Such a course of action clearly pointed to the conservation of the city's natural resources; to the speedy improvement of street traffic conditions within the loop, and to the unification of the city. by means of new connections between the loop and the three sides of the city, as well as improved connections between the sections of the city distinct from the loop. Parts of this program have gone on simultaneously from the outset of the commissioner's operations.

The conservation part of the program is going forward rapidly. The lake front is being reclaimed for park purposes for five miles to the south of the center of town. The work is being done by the Board of South Park Commissioners in accordance with the Plan of Chicago. The new park lands will be 1,138 acres in extent with a lagoon 600 feet wide in the center of the whole length. This park is being laid out with drives, and it will be equipped with every facility for outdoor recreation for all seasons, including numerous bathing beaches. The Board of Lincoln Park Commissioners is engaged in extending Lincoln Park north to the city limits, in harmony with the Plan of Chicago. Eventually the new drives to the south will connect with the drives in the Lincoln Park system, so that Chicago is about to have a waterfront drive for the entire extent of the city and well beyond in both directions - approximately forty miles in all. These lake-front park projects have proved to be very popular, and the voters have readily authorized large sums of money from time to time. to carry them out.

Another popular movement has been that to acquire the forest preserves. The total acreage thus far acquired by the Forest Preserve District of Cook County is 28,154.50 acres (out of a possible grand total of some 35,000), purchased at a cost of $13,669,948. They are meant to be country playgrounds for a great urban population, and they are being kept in a state of nature, except where simple conveniences have been supplied for visitors.

With respect to the improvement of the Chicago River: The Chicago Plan Commission in November, 1917, recommended a plan to the City Council whereby the south bank of the river from Michigan Avenue to Market Street might be reclaimed,

and at the same time the street facilities of the loop enhanced by two immensely important new streets, one above the other. The whole project is known as the "South Water Street Improvement," and construction work has been going on for nine months under the jurisdiction of the Board of Local Improvements of Chicago. The new embankment will have two levels, the upper 110 feet wide for all classes of traffic, and the lower 135 feet wide, 25 feet of which is dock space. This lower surface will be used entirely by heavy commercial vehicles, three lines in each direction at the same time. It will provide a direct route along the northern edge of the loop district, unobstructed by any cross traffic, for the commercial vehicles traveling between the boat and rail terminals east of Michigan Avenue and the warehouses and terminals on the west side of the city. The lower level of the new embankment gives the city the equivalent of an entirely new street. The upper level displaces the South Water Street produce market, which has for fifty years or more absorbed South Water Street, practically closing it to general traffic. The restoration of the street as a public thoroughfare is going to be of great significance, all the more so, as this street is designed to form the northern edge of a circuit of wide and improved streets around the loop. The purpose of this circuit, or quadrangle, rather, is to enable through-bound traffic to skirt the loop rather than to have to go through it and add to the congestion there. The quadrangle is the basis of the street circulatory system in the Plan of Chicago. The streets comprising it are South Water Street on the north, Roosevelt Road on the south, Michigan Avenue on the east, and Canal Street on the west.

Roosevelt Road, the southern edge, has been widened from 66 to 108 feet from Wabash Avenue to Michigan Avenue and from Canal Street to Ashland Avenue-a distance of over two miles. For the stretch between Wabash Avenue and Canal Street, Roosevelt Road is carried over the Chicago River and the adjacent railroad tracks by means of a bridge and viaduct together about a mile and a half long and 118 feet wide. These are under construction and are scheduled to be completed in 1926. The cost of the whole improvement will be approximately $10,000,000.

Michigan Avenue, the eastern edge of the quadrangle, has been widened from 66 feet to 130 feet between Randolph Street

and the river, and to 141 feet north from the river to Chicago Avenue, a total distance of about one mile. This improvement is on the two-level plan for the purpose of separating east-andwest and north-and-south traffic in one of the most congested parts of the city. The upper level extends from building line to building line from Lake Street to Ohio Street, one-half mile. Michigan Avenue is carried over the Chicago River via a twolevel bascule bridge 235 feet long and 90 feet wide. It is flanked by plazas approximately 225 feet square on the upper and lower levels at both the north and south approaches. The street was opened May 15, 1920. The cost of the improvement was approximately $16,000,000.

The Michigan Avenue, South Water Street and Roosevelt Road improvements have been or are being executed by the Board of Local Improvements and the Department of Public Works of the city of Chicago. When we come to the fourth edge of the quadrangle — Canal Street, at the west we find Canal Street being widened to 100 feet from Roosevelt Road to Washington Street under the supervision of the Commissioner of Public Works in accordance with a city ordinance, but financed entirely by the railroads which own all the abutting property. The improvement of Canal Street is very near completion. The operation of the quadrangle will relieve the loop of through-bound traffic-25 per cent of the whole; while the removal of the produce market caused by the South Water Street improvement will take the market vehicles, which now represent 16 per cent of vehicular traffic in the loop, off downtown streets a total reduction in loop traffic of 41 per cent. An insufficient number of through streets is the greatest handicap under which Chicago traffic labors outside the loop. The Plan of Chicago fully recognized this and the Plan Commission has made many recommendations for the opening, widening or extending of strategically located streets, among which are the following:

Ogden Avenue, a radial street, has been extended to Lincoln Park from the west side of the city, a distance of three miles. The 108-foot wide extension has been completed by the Board of Local Improvements, but the section across Goose Island and the north branch of the Chicago River remains to be bridged. This will eventually be done, but until then traffic will have to detour around Goose Island and cross the river