Bringing this thread back from the dead again...I was reading through Alan Artibise's book "Gateway City: Documents on the City of Winnipeg 1873-1913",
http://www.mhs.mb.ca/docs/books/mrs05.pdf , and there is an entire chapter dedicated to the City Planning Commission that is interesting to read through. This is the same planning commission mentioned in WFP book by Randy Turner I wrote about in the first post of this thread.
Here are a few interesting quotes (I posted a few of these in another thread sometime ago but not sure which one)
"...the detail of the street lamps and of everything else allowed upon the streets is a most important factor in educating the taste and stimulating the pride of citizens and in attracting the better classes of those who travel and of those who seek new homes." (pg. 228)
"...the idea of boulevards around the City should be encouraged and advantage taken of the River banks in the neighborhood of the City to establish picturesque driveways, so that a great natural opportunity which has been largely lost within the City itself may be worthily utilized wherever it still remains in the interest of the district as a whole." (pg. 232)
"...to create by architecture and by the landscape gardener's act pleasing vistas in the streets, effectively breaking wherever possible, by an attractive resting place for the eye...the City Council should take power to regulate the height of building in proportion to the width of streets...the heights and styles of architecture of adjoining buildings should be correlated." (pg. 232)
"The encouragement of rapid transportation to the suburbs, to relieve and prevent the formation of congested districts and the encourage of any tendency of the working class to move in to the out-lying districts." (pg. 236)
"...the general plan of the City should make it clear that railways will only be allowed to enter at certain points." (pg. 236)
"The building of a main boulevard around the City connecting the outside park system." (pg. 236)
"...a plan should endeavour to arrange for the location of a factory district or groups of factory districts." (pg. 236)
"The provincial government is about to commence work on the Capital building, which will be without a doubt, the finest in the Dominion, and the Citizens of Winnipeg will soon be obliged to build a City Hall in keeping with the City's important as the capital of Manitoba and the commercial Centre of Western Canada. What is more logical than that these two buildings should form a basis of a civic centre?" (pg. 237)
"...this joint Committee recommends a trans-city highway along the following route, Pembina, Osborne, Colony, Balmoral, Isabel and Salter, to give greater facility for north and south traffic..." (pg. 237)
"...the present City Hall and Market Site be transformed into a Public Square similar to St. James' Place, Montreal." (pg. 237)
"The scheme...calls for the widening of Vaughan Street...creating a "Mall" or "Plaza" 134 feet wide, connecting the Provincial group of buildings dominated by the dome of the Capital Building, centered on the Mall to the south, with the City Hall to the north, also centered on the axis of the Mall facing the Capital. The Plaza furnishes an opportunity in the future for the location of buildings which will be required from time to time in the City's development, such as a Public Library, Museum, Art Gallery, Post Office, Auditorium and other buildings of a similar nature." (pg. 237-238)
"...while the scheme is not entirely dependent upon the City Hall project, it is greatly enhanced by the establishment of a City Hall Park, bounded by the Trans-City Highway on the west, and the City Hall centered on the axis of the Mall. The City Hall Park should include all the property in the triangular space between Kennedy, Balmoral and Ellice, and Balmoral Street should be widened to one hundred feet and become a pan of the Trans-City Highway." (pg. 238)
"In the laying out of new streets, changes in direction or alignment should be made to break the dreary monotony of an endless vista." (pg. 245)
"Much can be done, before realty values become prohibitive, in the way of decorating our streets with small squares adjacent to the busy thoroughfares." (pg. 246)
"Legislation should be secured to regulate and restrict the rapidly growing nuisance of advertising signs and billboards...Regulations as to size of signs, height and style of billboards, and size of letters to be employed would do much towards improving existing conditions." (pg. 246)
"...buildings in the business districts should be made to conform to a common standard of height, and, in any case, it is recommended that the height of buildings be rigidly regulated by legislation to one and a half times the width of streets on which they face..." (pg. 246)
"...your Committee recommends that steps be taken to prevent further buildings being put up along the river banks, and that sections of driveways be constructed along the Assiniboine and Red Rivers..." (pg. 246)
"The extension of Scotia Street along the river bank to the new Kildonan Park...continuing this driveway to St. Andrew's Locks...The diversion of Crescent Road to follow the river bank and out to Tuxedo Park." (pg. 246)
Some of these plans were started but never completed due to the slowdown in Winnipeg's pre-WW1 booming economy and others never got off the table, like the City Hall. With a slight change in the timeline of events, one wonders how the city might look if WW1 had been delayed by only a year or two.
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