82 G. H. KNIBBS. 



public institutions, and in making the city ornate, can be so much 

 better expended. Similarly, an exhaustive consideration of the 

 treatment of each street in regard to the necessity for tram or 

 railways, will admit of the construction being developed on lines 

 that avoid waste through the undertaking of various useless works, 

 or injury to necessary ones. It will be a wise economy also to make 

 the foundations of all streets thoroughly, and in no way to stint 

 the means for so doing. 



The scheme of lighting to be adopted, is an element in which 

 decision antecedent to the development of the design is also 

 requisite. Inasmuch as electric lighting does not involve, except 

 at the generating station, any consumption of oxygen, and as the 

 light itself does not produce those deleterious gases formed in the 

 burning of coal gas, it is to be preferred wherever a start may be 

 made ab initio, 



More generally, it may be said that the predetermination of the 

 whole of the engineering or constructional features for the streets 

 is essential to the design being so elaborated as to reduce the 

 expense to an absolute minimum, and it is only through the initial 

 location of such features that everything dependent thereupon 

 can be consistently and harmoniously adjusted and the best results 

 attained. 



12. Sizes of blocks between streets. — If in any site, the relation 

 between the total area, and that to be occupied as streets, be ante- 

 cedently assigned, the problem of ascertaining the size of blocks 

 becomes numerically determinate, as soon as the general scheme 

 for the streets is decided. In Paris the streets cover an area of 

 about \ of the total : in Washington the ratio is still greater. 

 With increase of street area, however, the construction and main- 

 tenance becomes correspondingly costly. The following suggestion 

 as to suitable dimensions will sufficiently indicate the idea of 



general proportions: — 



Metres. 

 Public institutions, large factories, and large establish- 

 ments generally ... ... ... ... ... 100x200 



