Making Your Street More Attractive

The front yard is the direct physical connection between each home and its neighborhood. Even though privately owned and individually developed, it is nevertheless part of the over-all street picture, which runs from house front to house front across the street. The landscape is everything seen by an individual from any particular spot, or from any path they may follow. Thus it includes both the public right of way, with its street trees and grass parking strips (if any) , and all of the front yards insofar as they can be seen at one time. Furthermore, since we remember the things we have seen, as we travel down a street the continuous picture which it unfolds adds up to a continuous impression in our minds. This may be good or bad; it is one of the main factors which we use in determining whether we like a neighborhood.

Public Planning

Since the street is one picture which is experienced constantly by all the people who live along it or pass through it, we have the continuous problem, of determining how much cooperation or mutual agreement there should be in the design and development of this overall picture.

Attempts at solutions appear in such conventions as the planned control of street trees by local governments, setback ordinances and restrictions which control the height of plants or structures in front yards, and the universal acceptance of the great American front lawn. The occasional intransigent who wants to vary the trees, fence, or hedge in the front yard, or plant some ground cover or paving instead of grass, is apt to feel that he is going against neighborhood propriety in doing so. He may be projecting an idea which is better for his property, and very likely for many others. Nevertheless it is difficult for him to go beyond the conventional and accepted solutions.

The implication of these fragmentary controls which have become accepted, plus the fact that physically the street is one picture, is that we might have one coordinated and planned design for the entire street, block by block, including both private front yards and the public right-of-way. There are many examples of this (usually very over-simplified) in tract housing and multiple apartment projects of various sorts. There are occasional examples of this happening in ordinary single-family house neighborhoods through active agreement and cooperation among the neighbors.

Individual Freedom

The great fear which this idea is apt to invoke in the chest of the average American is that it may involve placing limitations on his personal freedom of expression. The only answer to this fear is the maintenance of democratic processes, through which no such limitations can be established until the agreement of the majority of those directly affected has been secured. This involves the simplest kind of direct meetings and discussion within blocks and neighborhoods. In general, in order to live in communities and work with other people, we all accept certain limitations on our personal freedom. We obey the laws, we conform with time schedules set by others, and so on.

It is not a question of choosing either planning or individuality. A little planning will generally improve the individuality of each front yard, by giving it a better framework in which to display itself. Try comparing the ordinary block of local stores, where the competition between signs and show windows makes it difficult to see any of them, with a planned shopping center, in which control gives each merchant a balanced display which can be seen. Colleagues have designed landscaping for groups of fifty or more houses, in which they made a conscious effort to bring out the individuality of each home within an orderly pattern. Planning in groups, and individualism, are not incompatible. They actually help each other, if basic democratic processes of full information, open discussion, and majority agreement are maintained.

The Master Tree Plan

Trees are the primary neighborhood amenity. Mature trees in good locations are priceless assets. This value is often realized only after the trees have been lost through carelessness, thoughtlessness, or even dire necessity as well as natural disasters. Comparison of any new tract on raw land with an old neighborhood full of well-grown trees is enough to prove this point. Almost every tree, whether in front or back yard, can be seen from more than one home. Therefore it affects the lives of more than one family.

The over-all pattern of trees in a neighborhood of detached houses is the single most important visual element. It can integrate the neighborhood, give it identity and character and a sense of unity. Too often it is haphazard, accidental, confused, spotty, or nonexistent.

It is apt to be difficult for us to visualize what a planned tree pattern might do for an average neighborhood. If we think of setting the houses down in a large developed park, or in a rural area with its patterns of windbreaks, hedgerows, and orchards, the possibilities will suggest themselves. The restful beauty of a street lined with fine old elms or oaks is no doubt the best known example. Not the least aspect of this beauty is the wonderful sense of three-dimensional space given by the spread and structure of large trees. A master tree plan, developed by co-operative action among the neighbors, could bring these possibilities to every block of houses.

The Master Plan

The only way to avoid a hodge-podge—and all the various conflicts of trees and views, fences and hedges along with other visual diversions which go with it - is to connect and integrate all the specific decisions as closely as possible. This must be done, not in words, but in drawings which are the language of physical development. Since all lots or building sites may not be developed at once, what you need is a master plan which projects the physical development of the entire neighborhood as specifically as possible without inhibiting present or future home owners. This plan should be maintained in a state of flexible development by coordinating it closely with de-tailed plans for each lot or building site, whether or not they are prepared by the same people. This master plan can project the following:

1. Land Use and Circulation Pattern. A detailed projection of relations between houses and other buildings. streets, topography, pedestrian circulation, and various private, semiprivate and public outdoor uses.

2. Neighborhood Tree Pattern. This is the basic, three-dimensional spatial structure of the neighborhood, integrating and expressing all the relations between topography, structures, views, open space, and circulation. All of the trees on every lot, as well as those on streets or public spaces, affect all of the neighbors. It is possible with careful planning, based on the needs and desires of all the neighbors, to produce neighborhood patterns of trees more satisfying and beautiful than any known examples. This does not necessarily mean a lot of trees—just the right amount to solve the specific problems of sun and wind and views and desires.

3. Enclosure Pattern. Coordinating detailed design of fences, walls, gates, and similar structures and all types of boundary plantings—small trees, shrubs, ground covers—in order to produce a detailed harmony at eye level through-out the neighborhood.

4. Detailed Development. Detailed development of specific community spaces or facilities which might grow out of the detailed land use and topography analysis, as discussed below.

5. Engineering. Coordination of necessary engineering, such as drainage, utilities, and streets, with these elements. There are many gaps between the engineering within public rights-of-way and that on private land.

The essence of the creative potential of the master plan is its coordinated projection of all such neighborhood pat-terns closely integrated with the private plans for each lot or site.

The Citizen’s Role

Your city or county has all the public agencies that could provide for the needs of the people. However, the planning of your neighborhood to fill these needs is a job you have to start. Alone you are powerless. As an individual your power lies in citizen organization.

Neighborhoods must recreate the spirit of the New England town meeting to obtain citizen participation, and citizen support for action. You may contact your city planning department, or other appropriate municipal or county agency, or you may have to go on under the power of your own organization. But improvement is always possible. Where there’s a will there’s a way.

by Ethan Grooms

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