Page:John Nolen--New ideals in the planning of cities.djvu/22

NEW IDEALS IN THE PLANNING OF men. Applying to all products everywhere the same method of indefinite increase, multiplying the workman by the machine, continually substituting hasty wholesale work for the individual and delicate task, they have, in fact, banished the picturesque from their republic. All these great cities, these- great buildings, these great bridges, these great hotels, are alike."

Such criticism becomes more pointed if we recall the older cities and towns of Europe and contrast them with our own. What is the explanation of this absence of individuality? In some localities it is the lack of an historic past and of mellow memorials and buildings. Most of it, however, is due to oversight, or to indifference to opportunities easily within our control. It is our failure, for example, more clearly to echo topography in our city plans. The rectangular street systems, the colorless street names, which are repeated from one end of the country to the other, regardless of natural features or local history, are