(3h. 
1. The Museum Butlding.—This, as determined by your 
Board from designs submitted by Mr. R. W. Gibson and ac- 
cepted, is to have a front of about 304 feet, with two equal 
lateral wings, their total completed length about 200 feet, depth 
50 feet, and acentral feature projecting beyond the main struc- 
ture, both to the front and rear. The decision of your Com- 
mittee on Plans, reported to your Board on March 4, 1896, 
and adopted, to place the museum building on the elevated 
land about 1,000 feet east of Bedford Park Station, has been 
very carefully considered by your Commission, and the whole 
Garden tract has been again carefully and repeatedly studied 
to learn if any better site was available. Several different 
suggestions were informally received by the Commission and 
critically considered. But after this study and a consideration 
of the other elements of the problem your Commission unani- 
mously decided that the site selected is incomparably better 
than any other within the tract. It provides the desirable fea- 
tures of proximity to Bedford Park Station and to the Mosholu 
Parkway ; an unexcelled soil for foundations ; its altitude above 
the surrounding land provides unsurpassed facilities for drain- 
age and a very commanding position. It will permit the erection 
of the edifice with plenty of room between it and the drive- 
ways, and will allow of nearly double the dimensions of the 
Museum in the future, even after the lateral wings shall have 
been completely built. It also permits of so placing the heat 
and power house that this shall serve both the Museum and 
the First Horticultural House, an advantage which will permit 
of very economic administration of these important features ; 
the plateau on which it is planned to rest does not necessitate 
an unreasonable amount of grading, as little perhaps as we 
could hope to expect in a region so diversified. 
2. The First Horticultural House. We recommend that 
this be erected on a plateau lying in front of Bedford Park 
Station and distant from it about 1,300 feet, its central en- 
trance distant from the central entrance of the Museum 
Building about 900 feet. This site was selected after long 
