302 SLanfcscape Hrcbttecture 



tary of War. J The region tinder consideration in this 

 plan as designated by the Act of Congress includes 

 that section of the District of Columbia situated 

 between B Street S. W., the Capitol, Pennsylvania and 

 Delaware Avenues, and requires a connexion with the 

 Zoological Park. It should be specially noticed in this 

 plan that the original design of Major L'Enfant made 

 one hundred years ago has been treated with due respect. 

 Pennsylvania Avenue and all the boundary streets have 

 been retained in exact accordance with the original 

 design. Like L'Enfant's design also the main treat- 

 ment of drives and lawns is kept on the axis of the 

 Capitol and Washington Monument. Moreover, by 

 setting apart the Botanical Garden and the grounds of 

 the Smithsonian Institute and the Agricultural De- 

 partment and the space around the White House, an 

 actual park in the heart of Washington has been already 

 secured. The design under consideration seeks as far as 

 possible to retain and improve all this highly developed 

 and desirable park effect and also seeks to enlarge and 

 complete it by purchasing the necessary land to extend 

 it to Pennsylvania Avenue and Delaware Avenue. 

 Very few cities in the world have such a park develop- 

 ment as already exists in the Washington of the present 

 day, which is much of it in a peculiar degree really the 

 Washington of the past and of L'Enfant's creation. 

 The essential and underlying idea of the plan in question 

 is that in place of a park crisscrossed by traffic streets 



1 The preparation of this plan was awarded to Samuel Parsons in 1900 

 by the Chief Engineer of the United States. 



