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Garden City Movement

The Garden city movement was founded in 1898 by Ebenezer Howard as a reaction to overcrowding and pollution in industrial cities. Howard proposed the creation of new towns that would be limited in size, surrounded by greenbelts, and provide a healthy environment with green spaces and well-designed homes. His ideal garden city would house 32,000 people on 6,000 acres arranged in a concentric pattern. Two garden cities, Letchworth and Welwyn, were later established based on Howard's principles.

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Shraddha Bahirat
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236 views3 pages

Garden City Movement

The Garden city movement was founded in 1898 by Ebenezer Howard as a reaction to overcrowding and pollution in industrial cities. Howard proposed the creation of new towns that would be limited in size, surrounded by greenbelts, and provide a healthy environment with green spaces and well-designed homes. His ideal garden city would house 32,000 people on 6,000 acres arranged in a concentric pattern. Two garden cities, Letchworth and Welwyn, were later established based on Howard's principles.

Uploaded by

Shraddha Bahirat
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF or read online on Scribd
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GARDEN CITY MOVEMENT

 The Garden city movement is an approach to urban planning that was founded in 1898 by Sir
Ebenezer Howard in the United Kingdom. It arose as the reaction to the crowding and pollution
of cities happening as a result of Industrial Revolution which also made water supply and drainage
inadequate and rents and prices high in cities .  In his 1898 book, To-Morrow: A Peaceful Path to
Real Reform, Ebenezer Howard laid out his ideas concerning the creation of new towns The
concept outlined in the book is not simply one of urban planning, but also included a system of
community management. Howard believed that these towns should be limited in size and
density, and surrounded with a belt of undeveloped land. A Garden City would have well
designed houses with gardens set in tree lined avenues, clean and healthy work places and a
pleasant and healthy environment in which to live, work and follow leisure pursuits.

The Theory

Howard analyzed in his book the reasons for people to


move to the city or to the country side. He found out that
both have advantages and function as magnets. Therefore,
his solution was to develop a city structure which contains
the advantages of a city and those of the countryside. He
expressed this in his image of “The three magnets”

'There are in reality not only, as is so constantly assumed,


two alternatives - town life and country life - but a third
alternative, in which all the advantages of the most
energetic and active town life, with all the beauty and
delight of the country, may be secured in perfect
combination. Human society and the beauty of nature are
meant to be enjoyed together.'
Ebenezer Howard's 3 magnets diagram
Ebenezer Howard, 1898 which addressed the question 'Where will
the people go?', the choices being 'Town',
'Country' or 'Town-Country

City Structure

His idealized garden city would house


32,000 people on a site of 6,000 acres
(24,000,000 m2) = 24 sq km, planned on a
concentric pattern with open spaces,
public parks and six radial boulevards,
120 ft (37 m) wide, extending from the
centre.
The Garden City would consist of different zones, street
types and green belts. The core in the centre is about 4
km² and contains a central park, surrounded by a
commercial, cultural and administrative zone. Here, the
idea of the shopping mall came up, as Howard wanted to
develop a “Crystal palace" where goods such as hand
craft produced by the inhabitants could be sold
protected from weather. During the weekends the core
was supposed to be the cultural and recreational centre.
Six magnificent boulevards connect the centre with the
circumference, dividing the city into six parts.

A wide (Grand Avenue) and some smaller (First to Fifth


Avenue) ring roads are arranged circular around the
centre, and together with the radial roads, they form the
wards - living area. Every family has a house of a
minimum size of 6m x 30m with a shared or owned
garden. Social infrastructure (i.e. schools) is located along the Grand Avenue .The outer ring is
supposed for small scale industries and manufactories to keep the inhabitants away from
emission and a green belt and a circle railway mark the border to the countryside.

City Expansion

To avoid problems which occur in expanding cities, the concept limits the city maximum
population up to 32,000 people, the garden city would be self-sufficient when it reached full
population. Further growing of the Garden City is not
possible. Therefore a new city has to be founded in a
reasonable distance of about 7 km to the others to
protect the countryside. Howard envisaged a cluster of
several garden cities as satellites of a central city of
50,000 people, linked by road and rail.

Garden cities

Howard organized the Garden City Association in 1899. Two


garden cities were founded on Howard's ideas: Letchworth
Garden City and Welwyn Garden City, both in Hertfordshire,
England.

In 1903, First Garden City Ltd commenced the building of an


experimental town on 3,818 acres of land at Letchworth, to
prove that Howard's ideas were practical. The Garden City became a reality and so a unique town was
created where the profit from the management & development of the land was to be returned to the
benefit of the town.

Architects, Barry Parker and Raymond Unwin were appointed to design a master plan for the first
Garden City using Ebenezer Howard's design for new communities.

Their 1903 layout plan was based on the principles of land use with defined areas for commercial and
industrial development, varied residential districts and an agricultural belt. The plan set out the
environmental standards for the 20th Century.

Welwyn Garden City was founded by Sir Ebenezer Howard in the 1920s following his previous
experiment in Letchworth Garden City. The Garden Cities and Town Planning Association had
defined a garden city as

"A town designed for healthy living and industry of a size that makes possible a full measure of
social life but not larger, surrounded by a rural belt; the whole of the land being in public
ownership, or held in trust for the community".

There is a resurgence of interest in the ethos of the garden city and the type of neighborhood and
community advocated by Howard, prompted by the problems of metropolitan and regional
development and the importance of sustainability in government policy at Welwyn.

The Location of Letchworth. The Location Of Welwyn.

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