MODERN TENDENCIES The tendencies in all countries for good city planning are better to-day than they have been for the past century. The coming of the railroad destroyed interest and activity in planning cities. In recent years, electrification and improvement of steam-pro pelled trains, together with architectural treatment of railway stations, have been gradually destroying the convention that rail way equipment and operations are essentially displeasing. The motor car has restored the highway as a principal means of travel, and the improvement of the public rights of way now absorbs the chief energies and expenditures of local governments. There is found to be need of vigilance in planning street systems, and in relating street spaces to the uses and bulks of buildings. The use of steel frame construction and of the elevator has given a new direction to building. (See ARCHITECTURE.) The growth of rapid transit lines is partly a cause as well as an effect of a demand on the part of the citizens for better environment in the neighbourhoods where they live. Concurrent with these devel opments, the wealth of cities has been greatly increased and more widely distributed, and the mass of citizens has become more highly educated; consequently an increased demand for improve ments in physical surroundings has been created simultaneously with a growing ability to pay for such improvements.
One of the least satisfactory features of modern town develop ment is the disorderly growth taking place around cities that possess great architectural quality. Paris outside the ramparts, Washington outside the area planned by L'Enf ant, and the mod ern part of Edinburgh are all suffering from lack of planning and architectural control. In the English university towns of Oxford and Cambridge the suburbs are being woefully commercialized.
The newest development in town planning in all countries arises from the need of landing places for aeroplanes. Most large cities are now developing airports, and it is important that they be attractively designed. The architectural treatment of buildings surrounding airports is of great importance too. The trend of
the time is towards improved living conditions and more spacious ness in city building. Unfortunately fallacies, to the effect that congestion and overcrowding are unavoidable because of lack of space, and that concentration may proceed to any limits without destroying its own advantages, still persist. Hence there are now improved standards of living, more facilities for rapid movement, better sanitation and finer buildings on the one hand, and un healthy crowding, absence of light in buildings, congested traffic, lack of recreation spaces and uncomfortable travel on the other. The good elements in the first category give a starting point for a better conception of city building, and the very existence of the evils is, in the face of growing intelligence, a necessary stim ulus to action in bringing about the realization of this conception. In the task that lies ahead, the architect, the landscape architect and the engineer must work together, for in city building, as in architecture, the best work of all three results from their co operation.