The Development 0f Park Systems in American Cities 25 



izations Allied for the Acquisition of a Comprehensive Park Sys- 

 tem." The formation of the alliance has been accompanied by a 

 good deal of agitation and that city now has one parkway, ten miles 

 in length and three hundred feet in width throughout its entire 

 length, under construction. It has approved a plan for a parkway 

 from the City Hall, the centre of the city, to Fairmount Park, a 

 distance of a mile, and has voted $2,000,000 toward its construction ; 

 one-half of this parkway will probably be in use within a year. The 

 city has provided $500,000 for an approach to its second largest park 

 and has placed one of its creek valleys, two miles in length, upon 

 the city plan as a park. 



Chicago has a system of boulevards which is perhaps the best 

 known of any in the country. Its citizens seemed to believe for a 

 long time that sufficient had been done in this direction, but it has 

 recently been rudely awakened from that belief and has voted to 

 remedy its needs. Mr. J. F. Foster, general superintendent of the 

 South Park Commission, thus epitomized the situation in February, 

 1904: "The North Side Commissioners have authority to expend 

 one-half million dollars for small parks or playgrounds, the West 

 Side Commissioners one million, and the South Park Commissioners 

 one million. The South Park Commissioners have also been author- 

 ized to expend three millions in the acquiring and improving of 

 larger parks. These funds are available and will be used by the 

 South Park Commissioners at any rate, without delay in the carry- 

 ing out of the intention of the law. Fourteen new parks have been 

 selected, the land has for the most part been purchased and the 

 plans for most of them have been adopted. The president of the 

 Board of County Commissioners has appointed a committee of mem- 

 bers of the County Commissioners, the different park boards, the 

 Common Council and public-spirited citizens, for the purpose of 

 taking what steps are necessary to bring about the establishment of 

 an outer system of park reservations, something similar to that 

 existing about Boston." 



In a letter to the writer, dated December 27, 1904, Mr. Foster 

 shows the situation ten months later. "As I wrote you last Febru- 

 ary, the South Park district has acquired twelve new parks, and 

 two more are under condemnation. Five of these ten are small 

 playgrounds ; that is, from six to ten acres in extent, in the densely 

 populated part of the city. The others are larger parks ranging 



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