THE THEORY OF CITY DESIGN. 77 



traffic, is the best. From the sanitary and aesthetic standpoints, 

 on the other hand, wide streets are to be preferred; these too, do 

 not subject pedestrians to acute danger in crossing, and the risk 

 of vehicular accident is correspondingly reduced. If provision is 

 to be made for future means of mechanical locomotion, street rail 

 and tramways, greater width will of course be required, a fact 

 which argues the desirability of seeing that the necessities of the 

 future in this respect are liberally anticipated. 



It is evident at once, not only that the streets should as a whole 

 be somewhat narrower both in the intense business centres, and 

 in the less important parts of the city and its suburbs, but also 

 that the general character of the city must affect the question. 

 Therefore in a Capital city the aesthetic requirements are rightly 

 regarded as of commanding importance, and utilitarian consider- 

 ations as secondary, and properly subordinated to the last possible 

 degree consistent with the fact that the general arrangements 

 must of course be really practicable ones. Speaking broadly, the 

 towns of the Commonwealth have been designed with small regard 

 to aesthetic features, and the idea of avenues constituting an 

 ordinary feature is practically foreign to us, 1 though not absolutely 

 so. The magnificent example however of Paris suggests the pro- 

 priety of the greater radial lines from the chief centres, forming 

 boulevards. It may be questioned whether such examples as the 

 Boulevarts Richard Lenoir, or de 1' Hopital, or the Avenues des 

 Champs Elysees, de la Grand Armee, or de Neuilly in Paris, the 

 Boulevards du Midi, de Waterloo, du Regent, of Brussels, or the 

 Unter den Linden in Berlin, can be lavishly followed. Still 

 Australian experience has shewn that boulevards of considerable 

 size 2 are appropriate and advantageous, and greatly enhance the 

 beauty of a town. 



Coming to actual dimensions, it may be said that lanes or 

 streets of less width than say 10 metres or 33 feet (J chain) are 

 extremely undesirable. Unimportant roads and streets, so situated 



1 There are of course exceptions to this. 

 2 E.g., Sturt Street, Ballarat. 



