Essays on the street re-alignment, reconstruction, and sanitation of central London, and on the re-housing of the poorer classes to which prizes offered by William Westgarth were awarded by the Society of Arts.

Date:
1886
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Essays on the street re-alignment, reconstruction, and sanitation of central London, and on the re-housing of the poorer classes to which prizes offered by William Westgarth were awarded by the Society of Arts. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service. The original may be consulted at London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Library & Archives Service.

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    a filthy rookery was pulled down, and a wide thoroughfare ad- mitting light and air in its place was opened, this was said to be done to permit cavalry charges and the use of cannon ; but the Republic has quite justified the Empire in that respect, by copy- ing the system and even continuing the former plans, for every one of the improvements carried out since 1870 were designed under Baron Haussmann's administration, and the present Go- vernment is quite as anxious to keep the working classes in good temper by providing them with employment. a. w. bottomley. 3. The Possible Beginning . of a Central London Reconstruction. While the enormous value of London's business centre defeats every idea of dealing reconstructively with it by direct purchase, I have hinted that something might be done by the voluntary co- operation of its wealthy occupants. If a trust of adequate resource took successfully in hand the ill-conditioned sections just outside of the centre, those occupants of the centre itself might be aroused to co-operative action. The aim everywhere in and about the crowded centre should be towards a systematic recon- struction, and I have endeavoured to indicate in some leading features what the future of our grand metropolis requires in that way. We should aim to rebuild the city upon a roomy, or lofty, and continuous subterranean, and upon a more healthful and convenient level, ejecting the foetid old soil, which may usefully serve for further Thames embankment. We should make a terrace construction, with bridged connections, in order to lift foot passengers out of the dangers of the streets, as well as to give the profit of the double line of shops, and to add a strikingly orna- mental feature to the city. Lastly, the new roofage should be a public park or garden. Science is sufficiently advanced with heating substitutes to enable us to forbid smoke to the recon- structed city. The best line for an initiatory step of Central London Recon- struction seems to me to be that between St. Paul's and the Royal Exchange. And in this view one may regret the reconstruction and improvement, decidedly good in itself but unsystematic, lately T