PARK AND CEMETERY. m 
THE CIVIC AWAKFNINr. ■ ■ 1 
Ihe Board of Metropolitan Park Commissioners of 
Rhode Island in their large and handsomely illustrated 
volume a “Report Upon a System of Public Reservations 
for the Metropolitan District of Providence Plantations'’ 
have presented another epoch making report on a park 
system on the broad lines of the metropolitan system 
of Boston. The book is on the same elaborate scale as 
the Report on American Park Systems issued by the 
Allied Organizations of Philadelphia. The commission 
has made a thorough investigation of all the territory pro- 
posed to be included in the Metropolitan Park District 
about Providence and this voluminous work with its 
many beautiful illustrations should be sufficient to impress 
the legislature with the value and importance of starting 
the work of acquiring the land as soon as possible. The 
large map which accompanies the report shows that the 
district covers less than one-eighth of the area of the state 
but contains about three-quarters of the population. Mr. 
Henry A. Barker the secretary of the commission with 
the expert advice and assistance of Olmsted Bros, has 
personally photographed or otherwise obtained nearly 
fifteen hundred pictures illustrating scenes in the reserva- 
tion and a series of thirty-six plans has been prepared 
showing the contour of the land, the lay-out of the streets, 
and the location of the existing buildings within the entire 
Metropolitan District. The commission believes its first 
duty is to secure such parts of the natural park lands 
as are in danger of rapidly disappearing and to provide 
for their preservation. Since the Metropolitan District 
has no political existance the commission recommends 
that the state act as “underwriter” in a bond issue of 
$250,000, the interest to be paid by the cities and towns 
in the district as ia done in the Metropolitan Park District 
about Boston. The total expenses incurred by the com- 
mission from April i, 1905, to Feb. i, 1906, were $1,148, 
and appropriations since then have amounted to about 
$3,000. The commission requests an appropriation from 
the present legislature of $2,500 to make a more careful 
examination of the tract and with the assistance of land- 
scape advisers make a more detailed study and to procure 
surveys that may seem necessary. The commission pro- 
poses to hold public meeting in various parts of the district 
exhibiting the plans and soliciting advice as to local needs 
and opportunities. The appendix to the report contains a 
mass of useful information about the park systems of other 
cities from the report of the Allied Organizations of Phil- 
adelphia several reports by Olmsted Bros, on the park 
systems of other cities, and special articles and quota- 
tions about park work from authorities all over the coun- 
try. The illustrations present a beautiful panorama of 
the scenery throughout the proposed district. The book 
is handsomely bound and contains about a hundred and 
thirty pages. 
Th Board of Public Service and the Park and Bolue- 
vard Commission, of Columbus, O., have authorized the 
appointment of a commission of five experts to prepare 
far-reaching plans for a more beautiful Columbus. The 
commission is a well-balanced one containing a member 
from every profession that is concerned with civic beauty, 
and is composed as follows ; 
Austin W. Lord, of the firm of Lord & Hewlett, New 
York, architects; Charles Mulford Robinson, Rochester, 
N. Y. ; Albert Kelsey, Philadelphia; Charles N. Lowrie, 
landscape architect. New York. H. A. MacNeil, sculptor, 
of New York. 
Austin W. Lord has been associated with Chas. F. Mc- 
Kim in the beautification of Washington, D. C. 
Charles Mulford Robinson is an expert on beautifying 
of cities and the author of several standard works on 
Civic Art. He recently returned from Honolulu, where 
he prepared a report for improving that city. He has 
completed plans for Oakland, Cal, Colorado Springs, 
Denver, Detroit and other cities. 
Albert Kelsey was at the head of the commission on 
the model city at the St. Louis World’s Fair and did the 
landscape work for Chautauqua, N. Y. He is now work- 
ing on plans for Atlantic City. 
Charles N. Lowrie is a young but well-known land- 
scape architect and an engineer. He laid out the grounds 
of Cornell university and is in charge of the work for 
Essex county. New Jersey, park commission. 
H. A. MacNeil, the New York sculptor, modeled the 
McKinley memorial recently unveiled at Columbus, and 
has a national reputation as a sculptor of the American 
Indian. 
It is the intention to start the work in the spring. 
The Merchants’ Club of Chicago has authorized D. H. 
Burnham, the architect famous for his city plans, to prepare 
a broad and comprehensive plan for the future development 
and beautifying of Chicago. The club will raise a fund of 
$50,000 for the work. Some of the suggestions to be made 
are as follows : 
To build an outer parkway encircling the city. 
To make the river front more goodly to the eye by stone 
docks, ornamental bridges and pathways along the banks. 
To make all poles necessary on the streets of a uniform 
and ornate design. 
To pave the downtown district so that it will be a pleasure 
to traverse it and to arrange to keep it clean at all times. 
To do away with all unsightly obstructions on the streets, 
such as news stands, signboards and the like. 
To carry out the scheme to beautify the lake front as 
already begun and to erect there the Field museum and pos- 
sibly the Crerar library. 
To build one or two great railroad stations and have all 
the lines coming into the city enter at these, instead of the 
haphazard manner in which they now come in. 
To put the street cars underground in a huge subway. 
To plant trees at all points where they will not be in the 
way of traffic. 
To have a competent committee of artists pass on' all 
statuary before it is placed in the public parks and to re- 
move all that now offends good taste. 
To do away with all overhanging and abnormal signs in 
the downtown district. 
An elaborate plan looking to a future “City Beautiful” 
has been worked out, and the initiative steps for its in- 
auguration have been taken by the organization 
known as the Initative One Hundred at Portland, 
Ore. It is proposed to expend approximately $1,000,- 
000 in the construction of a boulevard or driveway 
around the city to bring into prominence its scenic 
beauties. As a part of the scheme a large park is to be 
laid out at Mount Tabor, and perhaps at other points 
along the route. In order that the plans may be properly 
worked out in detail, and as an artistic, comprehensive 
whole, the city council will be asked to appropriate the 
sum of $5,000 to secure the services of a competent expert, 
under whose direction the routes for boulevards and the 
location of park sites will be selected. 
