WONDERFUL PLAN

Manawatu Herald, Volume L, Issue 3938, 4 May 1929, Page 4

WONDERFUL PLAN

A CITY I OF GLASS. Houses built of glass and steel, great skyscrapers so constructed that every room will have its full quota of sunshine, shops and large stores built' in tiers, with promenades to each tier above the street, and window displays, restaurants and orchestras on the terraces, are only a feiw of the features of the London that will rise in the future, says Oliver P. Bernard, in the If there is one startling'fact today it is this —that the vast majority of what we call “modem” buildings are hopelessly obsolete. We have houses that keep out air and sun, enormous blocks of shops and offices that do the same, and, in general, an architectural method utterly unsuited to the needs of present-day transport. Our houses 'harbour dust and dirt, they require complicated and expensive systems of ventilation, and they demand continuous artificial lighting, save in a small proportion of their rooms.

How will this be remedied? It will (be remedied by making use of simpler, uncrnamcntal designs, scientifically planned interiors, fittings and furniture, and the efficient utilisation of modern materials, such as steel, concrete, and glass.

We shall live in a London built on great piers. The old method of digging down and building on foundations that let in damp’ and rot will be abandoned, and with it the unbealthmess, inconvenience and inefficiency of basements. The new buildings on stilts will increase road space to an Incalculable extent, since traffic will be able to run beneath theim. There will be gardens full of trees and flowers, swimlining pools, ornahiental lakes, recreation grounds—till in the heart of the city, under great buildings of steel, glass, and concrete.

These buildings will be constructed on the “zone” plan, already practised in America, by which, for an eh hundred feet of height, the structure must be set bao'k ten feet. The successive terraces thus provided will not be wasted, but turned into promenades, gardens, and hanging gardens—gardens hundreds of feet up in the air, free to the sun and the wind.