150 



TRANSACTIONS OF THE AMERICAN SOCIETY 



THE LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT IN CITY 

 PLANNING* 



Reprinted from "Landscape Architecture" 



Mr. Chairman and Members of the So- 

 ciety of Landscape Architects: My topic 

 is the landscape architect in city plan- 

 ning. We all like to he appreciated, and 

 I am going to try to appreciate you for 

 a few minutes. 



It certainly is refreshing to talk about 

 city planning to a group of men who do 

 not have to be shown. Usually it is quite 

 the other way, and you don't know what 

 a relief it is not to be on the defensive in 

 this matter, not to have to explain every- 

 thing, not to have to answer the usual 

 things that are said about city planning 

 as an expensive luxury. 



We must recognize that the subject 

 has made an astonishing advance in the 

 United States, an advance that is reflect- 

 ed in our own Commonwealth by the 

 existence of planning boards in forty of 

 its cities and towns. And yet, in spite 

 of this progress, we still must expect 

 even from a fairly intelligent citizen a 

 rather curious reaction on the subject of 

 city planning. This is so even among the 

 members of city and town departments, 

 and it is true also of the members of 

 planning boards composed very often of 

 the representative men of the city or 

 town. As Secretary of the City Planning 

 Conference, I spend much time and ink 

 on letters of explanation, only to be ad- 

 dressed by my correspondents and intro- 

 duced occasionally to an audience as 

 Secretary of City Planting; and that 

 phrase always strikes me as savoring 

 rather of the obsequies of the city than of 



a city which is reall}' alive and ready to 

 g(i about its proper development in a 

 j)ro])er way. 



My first feeling, then, is one of real ap- 

 preciation of men who know the value of 

 planning, of men who are really doing 

 the city planning, and, Mr. Chairman, of 

 the men who are teaching future city 

 planners. 



In the National Conference, we have 

 had a great deal of help from members 

 of your profession. In the first place, 

 your profession has furnished more mem- 

 bers of the National Conference than any 

 other profession, and more members of 

 the kind that are worth while, worth 

 more than the $5 annual fee — the kind of 

 members who are active in suggestion ; 

 and it is suggestion that is very much 

 needed in city planning today. Although 

 the ideas of city planning are generally 

 pretty definite, they have to be dealt 

 with in a way far diflferent than in the 

 intelligent working out of just one prob- 

 lem. But, even greater than that, your 

 society has furnished the president of the 

 City Planning Conference. .Since 1910, 

 Mr. Frederick Law Olmsted has been the 

 president or the chairman of the execu- 

 tive committee, and, as it now seems, has 

 given all too liberally of his precious 

 time. The formative years of the work 

 lia\e made great demands on him. The 

 Held was new; policies had to be deter- 

 mined : difficulties which were far more 

 than oral had to be threshed out. If I 

 may for a moment use biblical language. 



'.•\ddress before the American Society of Landscape Architects, Boston. February 

 by Mr. Flavel ShurtlefT. Secretary of the National Conference on City Planning. 



1915 



