DESIGN OF PARK AND RECREATION AREAS 219 



better terms in land acquisition. It should be noted here, however, that 

 it is of the utmost importance in negotiations for land purchases and dis- 

 cussions of plans to be extremely careful about the terms of any agree- 

 ments or promises, express or implied, which can possibly be interpreted 

 as obligations legally or morally binding the public authorities to do or 

 to leave undone at the demand of the abutters any particular thing within 

 the park lands. Especially where there is any question of prospective legal 

 right of abutters to have access to their own lands over parkway lands, 

 either by border streets or otherwise, it is essential to have a clear under- 

 standing in each case, in the light of well considered general policies, as 

 to whether and to what extent the cost of facilities provided primarily 

 for their benefit (such as paving, sewering, etc., in border streets) is to 

 be borne by the abutters through special assessment or otherwise. 



Of course what is expedient and just in this respect depends wholly 

 on the circumstances in each case, including other terms of the negotia- 

 tions for land purchase. In Massachusetts, where the terms of the Act 

 under which special assessments are levied are far from satisfactory, it is 

 the usual practice of park commissions in making purchases and in settling 

 condemnation cases out of court, to waive the right of 'assessing better- 

 ments' on abutting property of the owner from whom they acquire land, 

 using this waiver as one of the considerations offered for settlement at a 

 price satisfactory to them. But in such cases especially it is very important 

 to make certain of a clear understanding as to what specific improvements, 

 if any, of special benefit to the abutter, the park authorities are obligated 

 to install at the expense of the general taxpayer, and what improvements, 

 if any, within the parkway land the abutter has a right to demand at his 

 own cost. 



Where border roads are determined on, whether for parkways of the 

 * elongated park type' under discussion here, or for parks not elongated 

 into this form, there are many advantages in laying these border ways 

 out as 'streets' and putting them under the jurisdiction of the agency in 

 charge of other streets, even though they be one-sided streets and though 

 the jurisdiction of the park authorities begin at the curb on the park side 

 of the street. The entire legal status of parks is very different from that of 

 streets and from that of most other public lands, as has been very ably 

 discussed by the Legal Department of the Regional Plan of New York 

 and its Environs; and it is important to avoid all doubt as to whether any 

 so called 'parkway' land has one status or the other. 



What looks like a border street along a park, and is used like a street, 

 may be, and in some cases may advantageously be, legally speaking, part 

 of a park and not legally a street at all. For example, at the Revere Beach 



