PARK AND CCME^TCRY 
234 
the future. Then the excitement dies out and nothing- 
more is done until conditions become sufficiently ex- 
treme to produce another spasm. The same spasmodic 
method is to be seen in Philadelphia park purchases, 
but it is a long time since any violent spasm has oc- 
curred. According to the figures given me, Philadel- 
phia had about 3,400 acres of parks in 1874, and dur- 
ing twenty years increased them at the uneventful 
average rate of one-third of one per cent per annum. 
During 1894 a slight spasm occurred and the League 
Island Park was acquired, together with six small 
parks or squares, a total addition of some 327 acres, or 
about 8 per cent in one year. During the decade since 
1894 the average rate of annual increase has fallen 
back to about a quarter of one per cent again, while 
the population has been growing steadily at the rate 
of about 2.3 per cent per annum for the last thirty 
years. Perhaps it is not unreasonable to hope for 
another spasm about now. 
It is true that New York, since indulging itself so 
freely in 1888, has been almost equally torpid in respect 
to park additions, in spite of its enormous increase of 
population ; but then a city which has made an increase 
of over 300 per cent in one year might reasonably take 
a longer period of repose than one which, after twenty 
years of preparation, only achieved a maximum gain 
of 8 per cent before resting on its laurels. 
But four years after New York’s outer park sys- 
tem was established in the Bronx, a movement came to 
a head in Boston that led to even more striking results 
in the way of securing outer parks ; more striking, not 
only in the extent of the system established, but in the 
difficulties overcome in achieving it. The communitv 
around Boston Harbor is divided into a larger num- 
ber of separate and independent municipalities than 
any similar area of equal population in the country. 
The proposition for a system of outer parks for this 
community, which was presented i-n 1892, involved ac- 
quiring lands in twenty-eight different cities and towns. 
PARK AREAS OF BOSTON, 
The population of the city (560,892) is indicated by the inner circle, 
and the population of the Metropolitan District (1,164,957) by the outer 
circle, on the assumed scale of 20,000 people to the square mile. 
and what was a much harder problem, getting at least 
that number of municipalities to share the cost. Finally 
thirty-nine towns and cities were embraced in a met- 
ropolitan park district, having a total population in 
1900 of 1,164,957, and these towns and cities in ten 
years have raised by the issue of bonds and have ex- 
pended for an outer metropolitan park system more 
than $11,000,000, apart from their individual expendi- 
tures . for local parks and playgrounds. The outer 
parks acquired by this district amount to 9,869 acres, 
forming together with the local parks, a total of 15,175 
acres in the district, or nearly four times the park area 
of Philadelphia. 
If as we are forced to conclude, there is to be no 
limit to the growth of our great urban centres, every 
city as it grows must keep acquiring outer parks, to be 
in turn embedded by the extension of the city and be- 
come the inner parks of the future. There can be no 
doubt of this general conclusion, but the interesting 
and vital question for each city -is how fast to acquire 
such parks and to what extent. 
If we seek a gauge in the opinion of the people as 
expressed in their actions, we observe that a general ac- 
tivity in securing such parks far in advance of the tide 
of population has followed in many parts of the coun- 
try upon the example set by Boston. Active steps have 
been taken by cities as widely scattered as Providence, 
R. L, and Seattle, Wash., Baltimore and Ottawa, San 
Francisco and Newark, while in the Middle West sim- 
ilar developments are general, from Chicago and Mil- 
waukee to Kansas City, and north again to Minneapo- 
lis and St. Paul. Philadelphia, I regret to say, is con- 
spicuous by its official absence from the list, although 
your agitation seems likely to secure results before 
long. 
If we are to be more definite in our comparison we 
must look at the ratio between population and park 
area. 
Philadelphia and Boston, drawn to the same scale. 
PARK AREAS OF PHILADELPHIA. 
For comparison, the population of the city and the county (1,293,697) 
is indicated by a circle on the assumed scale of 20,000 people to the 
square mile. 
