A Danger Spot in the Zoning Movement

Abstract

The most interesting step forward in our day, along the line of city administration, the most fruitful, the most interesting, the most hopeful, is represented by the city planning movement; and more particularly by that phase of city planning which has interested us all under the name of zoning. It has been my privilege to be somewhat associated with this zoning movement from its very inception. I recall the National City Planning Conferences at which the policy of zoning cities in this country was first propounded. The idea came from one of the most progressive German cities of that day, Frankfort-on-the-Main, where the general principle of controlling the use of private property had been put into operation, with conspicuously advantageous results, under the leadership of Burgomaster Adickes. In all these early discussions of zoning, twenty-five years ago, the problem was approached from the standpoint of the public authorities. The chief argument in favor of zoning was that it would simplify some serious difficulties in municipal administration. It was pointed out that the invasion of an industrial section by residences, or the invasion of a residential section by industries or business, always resulted in complicating the tasks of the city's administrative departments. Assessors, for example, pointed out the difficulty of making fair valuations in areas which were being transformed from residential to mercantile use. The school authorities drew attention to the trouble which frequently resulted through rapid changes in the character of a district. I recall hearing one school superintendent complain that certain schools in a large Eastern city had lost nearly half their capacity enrollments through the exodus of families due to the incoming of industries. The cost per pupil in these half empty schools, he explained, was clearly excessive. It was so with other branches of public administration. Police costs were said to be forced up by the intermingling of diverse activities in a single area. With the encroachment of factories and shops, a district became less desirable for residential use; its dwellings and tenements were often transformed into cheap lodging houses or worse. The effective policing of a