440 CONFERENCE ON NATURAL BEAUTY 



This new metropolitan condition is one for which the present 

 political subdivisions were not designed. There is a conflict, a stale- 

 mate, between the actual and complete economic, natural resource, 

 and social interdependence of the various components of the metro- 

 politan area versus illusions and established mechanisms of sovereign 

 independence of political subdivisions. 



To put it another way, the conflict is often between short-run local 

 interest and long-run metropolitan interests. 



The stalemate must be resolved. A region, State, and Nation 

 where three-quarters of our population will soon live in these urban 

 areas cannot afford the stalemate in these very competitive and 

 sensitive times. I don't believe that the stalemate is a result of 

 stupidity. I do not believe it is the result of intransigence or inabil- 

 ity. My own conviction is that it is the result of a lack of informa- 

 tion, a lack of understanding of metropolitan geography and 

 metropolitan economics. 



The interdependence of people and of resources is not realized 

 and, without this realization, the metropolitan area is without a 

 policy and without a program, and therefore totally unable to move 

 ahead. Nowhere is the cost of this stalemate more vivid than in the 

 general failure to acquire and develop open spaces ahead of metro- 

 politan expansion. These are the spaces that would give the 

 metropolitan area a unity, a dignity, and a habitability and that now 

 are being chopped up, marred, or destroyed. 



This panel met Sunday afternoon and talked for four hours about 

 these values and the problems that I have just tried to outline to you. 



We have a series of recommendations on this subject and I will 

 go very hastily through these. 



The first point which Mr. Rouse made very forcefully and will 

 develop for you is the need for a national policy directed toward the 

 conservation of natural resources and amenities of the urban en- 

 vironment to achieve the values of a habitable, productive, and 

 durable community. 



The second point, on which Mr. Rockwell is a specialist, is the 

 encouragement of metropolitan regional planning as a necessary 

 basis for economic, human, and environmental development. Fed- 

 eral grants and loans should probably be withheld from localities 

 until they establish that their program is part of the metropolitan 

 comprehensive plan. 



The third is that Federal agencies should facilitate the fullest and 

 most effective application and understanding of existing programs 



