A Garden City is a town designed for industry and healthy living; of a
size that makes possible a full measure of social life, but not larger; surrounded by a permanent belt of rural land; the whole of the land being in public ownership or held in trust for the community. - C.B. Purdom, 1919
Given by Sir Ebenezer Howard in 1898.
He analyzed the reason for people to move to city or country side. To avoid problems which occurs in city expansion, the concept limits the city max population to 32000 people. Thus new city has to be found in a reasonable distance of 7km. So the cities are well connected. The garden city consist for different zones, street types and green areas; circular city growing in a radial manner or pattern. Divided into six equal wards, by six main Boulevards that radiated from the central park/garden. Civic institutions (Town Hall, Library, Hospital, Theatre, Museum etc. ) are placed around the central garden. The central park enclosed by a crystal palace acts as an arcade for indoor shops and winter gardens. The THREE MAGNETS In trying to understand and represent the attraction of the city he compared each city to a magnet, with individuals represented as needles drawn to the city. Instead he believed that Human society and the beauty of nature are meant to be enjoyed together hence giving his solution the two magnets must be made one. "Town and country must be united, and out of this joyous union, will spring a new hope, a new life, a new civilization."
Garden city an impressive
diagram of THE THREE MAGNETS namely the town magnet, country with their advantages and disadvantages and the third magnet with attractive features of both town and country life. Garden City in Practice: RADBURN CITY Radburn was planned by architects Clarence Stein and Henry Wright in 1928. It is Americas first garden community, serving as a world wide example of the harmonious blending of private space and open area. Radburn provided a prototype for the new towns to meet the requirements for contemporary good living. Radburn was designed to occupy one square mile of land and house some 25,000 residents. However, the Great Depression limited the development to only 149 acres. Radburn created a unique alternative to the conventional suburban development through the use of cul-de-sacs, interior parklands, and cluster housing. Although Radburn is smaller than planned, it still plays a very important role in the history of urban planning. The Regional Planning Association of America (RPAA) used Radburn as a garden city experiment. Facts and Figures Residential areas basketball courts 149 acres of interior A community parks, center, which Walkways. houses 2 swimming pools, administrative 4 tennis courts, offices, library, 2 playgrounds, gymnasium, Archery plaza and a clubroom and school, service and 2 outdoor maintenance areas. Park as backbone of the neighborhood. Specialized Highway system, Complete separation of vehicular and pedestrian traffic with 21% of road areas. The Radburn planners achieved the separation of vehicular and pedestrian traffic through the use of the superblocks, cul-de-sacs, and pedestrian-only pathways. Through the use of the superblock, houses in Radburn were uniquely designed to have two fronts. The back side of the house, what we would normally consider the front side, faced the culs-de-sac and parking. The kitchen was normally placed in the back to provide visitors a place to enter the house. The front side of the house faced towards the green spaces or parks encouraging pedestrian traffic. Since automobiles were given limited access to the backs of the houses, the fronts of the house were relatively quiet, therefore, the bedrooms were always placed on this side of the house. The 2900 residents of Radburn share 23 acres of interior parks, which yield 345 square feet / person. Garden City in Practice: LETCHWORTH CITY Letchworth is the worlds first Garden City, created as a solution to the slum and poverty of urban life in Britain in the late 19th Century. The company appointed architects Barry Parker and Raymond Unwin to design the masterplan for the new community. This Garden City is located in North Hertfordshire, 35 miles north of London which is spread over an area of approx. 5000 acres. To eliminate the private ownership, whole of the land is to brought under co-operative basis or held in trust for the Designed forcommunity in of a population order to have 35,000 the control on finance and the profit gained thereby be utilized people. for uplifting Having the community. reserved green belt of 1,300 acres. The dwellings for all classes of people are distributed about a large central court in which public buildings are located. The Shopping Centre is located on the edge of the town. The employment facilities for all the people is provided by starting a variety of industries. The industries are located on the outskirts of the town. REFERENCES
MA Architecture + Urbanism, Manchester School of Architecture.
Garden Cities of Tomorrow, Published by The University of Adelaide. Miller, Dr Mervyn (1998) Letchworth Garden City Dream and Reality, Town and Country Planning, October 1998. Hall, Peter and Ward, Colin (1998) Sociable Cities the legacy of Ebenezer Howard, Chichester, John Wiley and Sons Ltd. GARDEN CITIES OF TOMORROW by Sahil pahal and Deepanshu Singh.