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Garden Cities of To-morrow
 
 

Garden Cities of To-morrow [Kindle Edition]

Ebenezer Howard
5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)

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About Book:

Among the many 'utopian' proposals of the 19th century, this particular short text stands out. Howard was a 19th century British reformer and city planner. He was influenced by Bellamy's Looking Backwards. He saw new, planned towns as a necessary counterbalance to the squalid, Dickensian 19th century London. These towns would balance urban and rural occupations, and include a whole range of amenities which we have come to take for granted: libraries, museums, schools, wide avenues, and a mix of commercial and residential zones. Howard strove to keep a balance between the community and individual needs, and to operate within the framework of Capitalism, rather than rejecting or attempting to replace it.

This book was originally published in 1898 as To-morrow, and reissued in 1902 as Garden Cities of To-morrow. The first Garden City, built under the aegis of Howard, Letchworth, was founded in 1903 (Howard was one of the first residents). Later he founded a second Garden City, Welwyn, 1919. Both, now London suburbs, are still very much in existence and proved successful over time, with its residents, in particular, in better health than the general population. Howard's proposal had a great influence on urban planning in the 20th century, particularly post-WWII. The American urban planning critic, Lewis Mumford, was one of Howard's proponents. In the history of planned societies, Ebenezer Howard stands out as one of the successes, even though he is little-known other than to architects and urban planners.

About Author:

Sir Ebenezer Howard (29 January 1850[1]– May 1, 1928[2]) is known for his publication Garden Cities of To-morrow (1898), the description of a utopian city in which people live harmoniously together with nature. The publication resulted in the founding of the garden city movement, that realized several Garden Cities in Great Britain at the beginning of the twentieth century. Billerica Garden Suburb,Inc.(1914), was the first housing in the United States on the Howard plan.

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17 of 18 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
One of the most far-sighted publications of the last 100 years or so. Within five years much of what the book proposed became reality when Letchworth Garden City in Hertfordshire was founded with 1903 - that is astounding enough. But the real fact is that almost anyone who lives in a town or city anywhere has been affected by this book, and the movement it launched. The very notion of town planning began here. New towns, green belts, zoning - so many things about the modern urban environment - worldwide - began with this book.

It was even more far sighted than that and it gives us a glimpse of what might have been but for the Great War, perhaps.

But this is no dry historical text - it is still relevent today. 100 years on something very like the network of Garden Cities Howard proposes is again being discussed.

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Amazon.com:  2 reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
ONE OF THE TRUE "CLASSICS" OF MODERN URBAN PLANNING 13 Jan 2010
By Steven H. Propp - Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Ebenezer Howard (1850-1928) was actually a professional stenographer and court reporter rather than an architect, who lived in England nearly all of his life. In 1898 he self-published the first edition of this book, and proposed migration of populations from overcrowded urban centers (thus relieving their congestion) to sparsely-settled circular rural districts he called "Garden Cities"----so named from the greenbelt of undeveloped or agricultural land that surrounded them, limiting the size and growth of the city. People would live and work in these cities, which would be cooperatively run by quasi-public organizations renting the property to tenants (both businesses and individuals).

In the Introduction, Howard notes, "Palatial edifices and fearful slums are the strange, complementary features of modern cities." By way of contrast, "Garden City is not only planned, but it is planned with a view to the very latest of modern requirements, and it is obviously always easier, and usually far more economical and completely satisfactory, to make out of fresh material a new instrument than to patch up and alter an old one." He thought that Garden Cities would combine the best attractions of both "town" and "country," and would be just large enough to promote a full social life, and would be linked to each other by a rapid-transit system.

At the end of chapter 10, Howard summarizes, "My proposal is that there should be an earnest attempt to organize a migratory movement of population from our overcrowded centres to sparsely settled rural districts; ... that the migrants shall be guaranteed ... that the whole increase in land values due to their migration shall be secured to them; that this be done by creating an organization which ... shall receive all 'rate rents' and expend them in those public works which the migratory movement renders necessary or expedient ... by so laying out a Garden City that, as it grows, the free gifts of Nature---fresh air, sunlight, breathing room and playing room---shall be still retained in all needed abundance, and by so employing the resources of modern science that Art may supplement Nature, and life may become an abiding joy and delight."

This book is of abiding interest to utopians, those interested in intentional communities, New Towns, urban planning, the New Urbanism, and more. ESSENTIAL READING!
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Buy a different edition 11 Sep 2010
By MkD - Published on Amazon.com
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
This is a very, very cheap edition. It has references to diagrams in the text that are not included in the book, typos, misspelled names. I'm sure there are tons of older editions and I suggest going that route.
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