I.
Special Conditions to Which the Plan Must Be Adapted.

A place of public recreation being demanded for the people of San Francisco, I am asked to say in what way I should propose to meet this demand.

Before any discussion can be had with advantage upon this subject, it is necessary that a clear understanding should be arrived at in regard to the special conditions to which the proposed recreation ground should be adapted.

These may be either of a social character, such as the number, and the habits and customs of the people which are to make use of it, or such as are fixed by natural circumstances, as of topography, soil, and climate.

II.
The Wants of a Population Much Larger Than the Present to Be Provided for.

In regard to the social conditions, it is obvious that San Francisco differs from other towns which have provided themselves with parks, in the incompleteness of its general plan. As soon as the Pacific Railroad is finished, its importance will no longer depend as much as it does at present, upon its position relative to the wants and the productions of the people of the Pacific slope of the American continent, but it will begin to assume relations with the larger part of the population of the whole world,—and the most industrious and productive part, both civilized and uncivilized;—relations more direct, intimate, and profitable, than are now held by any existing town. The magnitude and variety of the field which will thus become tributary to its prosperity, will insure its progress against excessive fluctuations, and its citizens, influenced by a steadily increasing demand for their services, will provide for this demand by a steadily increasing enlargement of their means of accomplishing business, in the construction of manufactories, shops, warehouses, and otherwise. The present city is but a small section of that which is yet to be formed.

It is, therefore, important to remember, that a public pleasure ground, when once formed within a city, possesses a character of permanency beyond any civic building, and usually becomes the most unchangeable feature in its plan. Consequently, it is necessary, in designing such a work, first of all, to consider how the convenience and pleasure of future generations are to be affected by it, and in the present case, it is more than usually important that this should be borne in mind from the very outset, because a pleasure ground adapted to meet the wants of the population of the City of San Francisco as it exists to-day, will probably be needed to accommodate two or three times that number of people, even by the time it had reached in the growth of plants and other respects, the conditions aimed at in its design,—and, ultimately, a far larger number. Whatever pleasure ground is formed for it in the next ten years, should be laid out with reference to the convenience, not merely of the present population, or even of their immediate successors, but of many millions of people. Obviously this responsibility cannot be adequately met without careful prevision of circumstances very different from those with which we have immediately to deal.

The trees in the Regent’s Park of London are not yet half grown, yet so rapid has been the enlargement of the city, that since it was formed two new parks have had to be laid out, and another is now called for. It is worthy of remark also, in regard to one of these parks, that as no other conveniently accessible site had been reserved for it on the plan of the [521]city, a swamp, which needed to be drained and filled, was the only point at which it was possible to obtain the required area of land without the destruction of a great amount of property in buildings, and the interruption of important lines of established communication. But neither in this manner, nor any other, can the present generation of Londoners, by any expenditure it would be justified in making, acquire a pleasure-ground half as well adapted to its requirements, as those who planned the Regent’s Park could have provided for it, with but little additional expense, had they been sagacious enough to properly anticipate the demand that has since arisen, and skillful enough to make a suitable use of the opportunities that were then open to them.

It is less than ten years since a plan of public pleasure-drives was first made for the city of New York, and not half that time since the drives were completed, yet, with an increasing population, so rapidly has their use developed the public demand, that already they have been enlarged and extended, and it has been determined to more than double their length, while projects for still larger undertakings are discussed, and as yet meet with no opposition, the problem being only how and where can these drives be extended without great injury to existing property—a problem which could have been solved even five years ago much more easily than it will be to-day. In like manner, Boston, to extend her public-grounds, is obliged to fill up the back bay, there being no other direction in which such an improvement can be made, without a revolution of existing arrangements of business, and an entire destruction of what has cost the citizen many millions of dollars during the twenty years in which the question has been forgotten or neglected by the corporation. Philadelphia is in a similar quandary; and having eight years ago acquired a small, inconveniently situated, and very incomplete park, is laying over from year to year the question of a more adequate arrangement, although the difficulties and expense of properly responding to the popular demand are constantly increasing.

San Francisco has a future more certain than any of these older towns, and its probable requirements are more easily to be anticipated. It is important, therefore, at the outset, that due attention should be given to the fact that a pleasure-ground planned merely to meet the requirements of the present, or of the next ten or twenty years, will be an uneconomical undertaking, and a neglect of a very important municipal duty.

III.
The Immediate Demand Pressing, and Not to Be Slighted.

At the same time, the need of a public pleasure-ground for the use of the present population, is a very pressing one; and the immediate [522]demand should not for a moment be set aside on account of the difficulty of providing for the future. While an unusually large proportion of the population of San Francisco is engaged in no useful industry, the more important part of it is wearing itself out with constant labor, study, and business anxieties, at a rate which is unknown elsewhere. This is to a great extent, perhaps, a natural and necessary result of the present circumstances of its commerce; but that there should be so little opportunity and incitement to relief—to intervals of harmless and healthy recreation, as is the case at present—is not necessary, and is not wise or economical. Cases of death, or of unwilling withdrawal from active business, compelled by premature failure of the vigor of the brain, are more common in San Francisco than anywhere else, and cause losses of capital in the general business of the city, as much as fires or shipwrecks. Such losses may be controlled by the corporation to a much greater degree than losses by fires, and it is as much its duty to take measures to control them, as it is to employ means to control fires. Some will not be prepared to receive this as a practical truth, but if they will carefully study the experience of other cities, they will find that it is a simple matter of fact. This, at least, may be demonstrated. If a spacious and attractive public-ground is formed within or close upon a great commercial town, a custom or fashion will soon be established, which compels all the plans and arrangements of business men throughout the day to be controlled by reference to the fact, that, at a certain hour, many of those with whom business is to be done, will want to give themselves up to healthful recreation. Refreshing pictures of beautiful sylvan scenes, and of a multitude of animated, pleasure-seeking men, women, and children, thus crowd in upon the general daily experience of men strained with the eagerness of competition, or anxiously intent upon the means of meeting their engagements and preserving their integrity, and an invitation is constantly made to every man to yield himself to the custom. The more a man needs this invitation, that is to say the harder he is pressed, and the more he is tempted to prolong his attention to his business, the oftener is he reminded that he cannot depend upon finding others so misusing their strength, and thus the oftener does the invitation come to him. The result is conclusively established to be that the daily labor of each man becomes not less in value, but more methodical and regular, and that physicians are compelled, in a much smaller number of cases, to advise those who call upon them to withdraw themselves entirely and prematurely from business.

If this is the case in regard to that portion of the population most pressed by the great interests of the community and of the commerce of the world, the influence and value of a public recreation ground in preserving the health and vigor and especially the moral tone of the larger class, whose labors are of a less intensely intellectual character, is of no [523]less consequence. A small part of the whole population of any town is attracted to such a ground daily, nor is it necessary that it should be, but of the more steady, industrious, thrifty men with families, who are generally gaining ground and getting on in the world, there are few who are not induced to take an occasional half-holiday, or now and then at least an hour or two from a working day, to make a visit to the park with their wives and children, with vast advantage to all. This class is, indeed, to be more considered than any other, not because merely of its relation to all profitable production, and, consequently, to all soundly profitable business enterprise, but because out of it are constantly arising the men upon the soundness of whose judgment and the healthy development of whose faculties the destiny of the whole community is pretty sure to be sooner or later mainly dependent.

At present, the people in easy circumstances, and the spend-thrifts of San Francisco may be daily seen driving out to the beach, or occasionally to a race course; but this requires not only more money but more time than men engaged in the more confining pursuits of trade can spare, and to be wholly enjoyable and useful, more vigor and hardihood than their wives and infants generally possess. What healthful place of recreation then remains for them? Boys may be turned out into the streets or upon the wharves, but the women and girls will, as a rule, neither find their nerves tranquilized, nor their strength invigorated, nor their tastes improved by any recreation that is open to them in the streets or in any of the public places which have been so far established.

Suppose they take the horse-cars and go to the suburbs, what are the entertainments offered them? The answer is found in the fact that the most popular place of resort for pleasure-seekers of this class is a burial ground on a high elevation, scourged by the wind, laid out only with regard to the convenience of funerals, with no trees or turf, and with but stinted verdure of any kind, and this with difficulty kept alive. To such a place as this I have, more than once, seen workingmen resort with their families to enjoy a pic-nic in the shelter of the tomb-stones, and hundreds every fine day make it the beginning and end of an effort at healthful recreation.

This state of things is not merely disgraceful and shocking to all sense of propriety—barbarous and barbarizing—but it is positively wasteful and destructive of the sources of wealth and prosperity possessed by the city.

While, therefore, in planning any pleasure ground for San Francisco, it is of far more importance than is usually the case to anticipate the special wants of the future; it is a duty not less imperative to so contrive it that it will be enjoyable at an early day and conveniently accessible to the present population.

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IV.
The Plan to Be Liberally Devised and of a Metropolitan Character.

There are also, in the special circumstances of the city of San Francisco, reasons why no plan of a pleasure-ground should be entertained which is not conceived on a thoroughly liberal scale. These are not found alone in the topographical and climatic conditions which will be hereafter considered, but in circumstances intimately connected with the highest hopes of its future wealth, a fair consideration of which will lead to the conviction that the initiation of a narrow policy in this respect at this time, would inevitably result in a serious obstruction to its prosperity.

An inquiry into the circumstances upon which the prosperity of great towns in the present age of civilization is based, will show that it rests on several conditions. There are, for instance, large towns, the prosperity of which is evidently due mainly to the natural advantages of the positions they occupy for commerce, as where they control important seaports, mines, water-powers, the trade of a large agricultural back-country, etc. There are again others, the prosperity of which is due in a great degree to artificial advantages for commerce, as where the business of several important lines of railroad is concentrated. In the third and last place, there are towns the prosperity of which is largely due to the fact that they offer peculiar opportunities for the use of wealth aside from [525]those which are merely incidental to their commercial character. Such is the case in any great metropolis, the various intellectual and esthetic privileges of which give pleasure not only to the citizens themselves but form an attraction to strangers.

New York, built up upon natural and artificial advantages of commerce, has, in the last twenty years, begun to take on a metropolitan character, by forming libraries, museums, galleries of fine art, and more than in anything else, by the acquisition of its Park. As a metropolis, it is a long way ahead of any other town in America. Hence the extraordinary attraction it has for people who are not deeply absorbed in the mere pursuit of wealth, and which is indicated by the fact that the old residents are constantly being induced to let their houses and furniture to new comers and strangers, by the offer of a rent many times greater than the legal interest on their cost at gold valuation, and also by the remarkable increase in the use of luxurious carriages and fine horses. Thus, last year, 16,000 pleasure carriages were driven in the Central Park in a single day, while only two years before there had been but 6,000 in any day. Five years earlier not one-tenth of the latter number were ever seen. During the same period the number of shops for the sale of flowers and floral decorations has increased nearly a hundred-fold. The very rapidly increasing demand for articles of fine art, for artistic decorations of houses and luxurious furniture, for rare and valuable books and engravings, for musical talent of a high order, illustrates the same general fact. San Francisco artists send their works to New York for sale.

In Paris luxurious and well appointed houses have of late readily commanded rents three times as large as they did ten years ago, and this notwithstanding the fact that a much larger number have been built in that time than ever before. Indeed, the demand is so great and so rapidly increasing, that the calculations of capitalists are constantly overrun, and the supply by no means keeps pace with it. There is no similarly increased demand for the simple requirements of people of moderate means, nor does the population or the demand for articles of luxury and the fine arts increase elsewhere as it does in Paris and few other favored towns. Thus, while the population of Paris has increased eighty per cent., that of France as a whole, including all its great seaports and notable manufacturing towns, has increased but six per cent. While the population of England has been doubling, that of six favored English towns has quadrupled.

The explanation is simple. Men who have amassed wealth in the agricultural and mining districts, and in the manufacturing and commercial towns, when they feel able to retire from business, are drawn by the advantages which are offered them—not for making money, but for enjoying the use of it—to one of the towns which have gained a superiority over the many in this respect. There are hundreds of men of large fortune, [526]born in the United States, who are now, with their families, permanent residents of Paris and London, for this reason.

The population of San Francisco is at present of a peculiarly restless and shifting character. The last City Directory, which I am able to consult, shows that among 5,500 of the merchants and tradesmen of the more substantial class who were registered in 1861, only 3,400 remained in 1862, and of the smaller dealers it is estimated by the compiler that at least forty per cent. had “declined business” during the year. This was during a period of general prosperity, and when the business of the city, as a whole, was greatly increased.

Comparatively few of the changes shown by the Directory were probably caused by the departure of men from the city, but by their engaging in new speculations, and forming new associations for that purpose. It is nevertheless true, that the manner of life of the large class which is so ready for a change, and its interest in the permanent improvement of the city, differs but little from that of strangers or mere temporary sojourners. It is constantly postponing the best use of life. Its ruling purpose is to make a fortune that will set the maker free from all his present connections. It follows that he cares little for any permanent interests which the citizens have in common, and is ready, whenever satisfied, to seek his enjoyment in a systematic way, to at once dissociate himself from those with whom he has hitherto been living, and fly to those parts of the world where attention has been paid, not only to the art of making fortunes, but also to arrangements for turning them to good account when made.

This applies still more to the State of California at large than to San Francisco, and is a drawback upon its prosperity quite as great and essentially the same as that which curses some parts of the Old World, and which is known as absenteeism. It differs from it mainly in this, that the capitalists whose interests in the country are simply to get out of it as much money as possible, instead of living abroad most of the time, and making occasional visits to it, make one long visit, and when they go to live abroad take not merely their rents to spend there, but [to] a great extent their capital also.

It is however a great mistake to assume, as is commonly done, that, when men who have made fortunes in the interior of California move to San Francisco, the people of San Francisco benefit at the expense of those of the interior. On the contrary, it is the meagre metropolitan character of San Francisco which alone retains in California a great many who would otherwise leave the State, to a great extent withdrawing from it their capital, and their demand for the productions of the interior.

The attractions of San Francisco, however, hold but few. Every steamer takes away some man who has made his pile, who goes with his [527]family to live in an Eastern or European community, which has greater attractions for him and for them than San Francisco, or any part of California.

Still it is by no means in the final abstraction of capital, and the withdrawal from the home market of its manufacturers, mechanics and farmers, of the demand of so many consumers, that this evil bears hardest on California, but in the habitual indifference with which matters of permanent commercial interest are regarded by a large part of its most active and capable citizens, and in their loss of power to make use of the higher productions of civilization.

Even the fortunate speculator himself is apt to find, by the time he has gained the primary object of all his labors, that his uncultivated faculties for enjoyment refuse to perform their office when suddenly called on to do so, and that if he had been reasonably prudent, he would not only have laid up money day by day, but have formed habits that would enable him to enjoy his money when saved. But the case of the children of the city is far more deplorable. These cannot, of course, share in the somewhat coarse excitements of business which occupy the minds of their fathers, and they have no experiences in better organized communities by memories of which the tastes and capacities for healthful enjoyment of their elders may be sustained. San Francisco boasts of her schoolhouses, but the most important part of education is not that given by the schoolmaster. And it is to be borne in mind that the new generation is now arising, the children are now growing up and are yet open to genial influences. In another neglected ten years, a whole generation will have arrived at manhood and womanhood, with habits and tastes full-formed and rigid.

If this is trite and self-evident, it is none the less important with reference to the business under consideration, for a liberally devised public pleasure ground with its accessories, would be the most effective entering wedge that can possibly be conceived of by which to open the way to a better state of things. It can, indeed, never be formed until there is in San Francisco a conservative population really desirous of such an improvement, and not only capable of comprehending the advantage to themselves, their families, and the future welfare of the city which it will secure, but also sufficiently organized to have the necessary power to overcome the dead weight of indifference to all municipal improvements, which is characteristic of the transient speculative class. When the better element asserts itself in a positive way then the real life of the city of San Francisco will begin. Worthy to be, and destined to be one of the largest, if not the largest city in the world, it must at some time escape from the influences that happen to be associated with the discovery of gold in California, and the consequent adventurous emigration, and it will then begin to take the metropolitan position occupied by New York in the [528]East, and by Paris and London on the other side of the Atlantic. With what degree of rapidity this advance is to be made remains to be proved, but the mere fact of a report being called for on this subject at this time, is in itself a favorable indication.

The conclusion to which these considerations lead, is obviously that whenever a pleasure-ground is formed in San Francisco, it should have a character which the citizens will be sure to regard with just pride and satisfaction. It should be a pleasure-ground second to none in the world—a promenade which shall, if possible, become so agreeable to its citizens that when they go elsewhere they will remember it gratefully, and not be obliged to consider it a poor substitute for what is offered them by the wiser policy of other cities.

No one doubts now that in this respect it has been a wise economy on the part of the Corporation of New York to incur a debt of more than seven millions of dollars to overcome the great difficulties which stood in the way of its having a park which would compare favorably with those of the European capitals, and the tax-payers of New Yark do not now object to a great enlargement of this expenditure for the purpose of increasing its advantages as a place of permanent residence.

I do not propose to urge on these grounds that San Francisco should undertake to immediately compete, in the extent or the cost of her pleasure grounds, with New York or the great capitals of Europe, but to enforce the prudence of doing nothing of this kind, which, so far as it goes, is not done well, while I also desire to establish the conviction that there is no town where a liberal expenditure for this purpose will so surely bring a manifold return in the retention of taxable capital which it will effect, as well as in many other ways.

Hitherto, San Francisco has done nothing through its corporation to place itself in a position to compete with even the most insignificant cities of the Atlantic seaboard, as a place of permanent residence. Of its few public institutions, or monuments of public liberality in any form, there are hardly any, even of the most insignificant character, which have been designed for, or which contribute directly to the enjoyment of the citizens, except as making money to be used elsewhere or to be hoarded, is their enjoyment. To get the better of this, to offer inducements to men of wealth to remain, and to all citizens to pursue commerce less constantly, to acquire habits of living healthily and happily from day to day, and of regarding San Francisco as their home for life, instead of always looking to the future and elsewhere for the enjoyment of the fruits of their industry, must be a primary purpose of all true municipal economy, and no pleasure ground can be adequate to the requirements of the city, the design of which is not, to a considerable degree, controlled by this purpose.

V.
Limitations upon the Scope of the Plan, Fixed by Physical Conditions of the Locality.

The special conditions fixed by natural circumstances, to which the plan must be adapted, are so obvious that I need not recapitulate them here. Determining for the reasons already given, that a pleasure ground is needed which shall compare favorably with any in existence, it must, I believe, be acknowledged, that, neither in beauty of greensward, nor in great umbrageous trees, do these special conditions of the topography, soil, and climate of San Francisco allow us to hope that any pleasure ground it can acquire, will ever compare in the most distant degree, with those of New York or London.

There is not a full grown tree of beautiful proportions near San Francisco, nor have I seen any young trees that promised fairly, except, perhaps, of certain compact clumpy forms of evergreens, wholly wanting in grace and cheerfulness. It would not be wise nor safe to undertake to form a park upon any plan which assumed as a certainty that trees which would delight the eye can be made to grow near San Francisco by any advantages whatever which it might be proposed to offer them. It is perhaps true that the certainty of failure remains to be proved, that success is not entirely out of the question, and it may be urged that experiments on a small scale should be set on foot at once to determine the question for the benefit of future generations; but, however this may be, it is unquestionably certain that the success of such experiments cannot safely be taken for granted in any general scheme that may, at this time, be offered for the improvement of the city.

The question then is whether it be possible for San Francisco to form a pleasure ground peculiar to itself, with a beauty as much superior to that of other such grounds, in any way, as theirs must be superior to what it can aspire to in spreading trees and great expanses of turf.

I think that it can.

VI.
Special Advantages Possessed by San Francisco for Forming an Attractive Pleasure-Ground.

Strangers, on their arrival in San Francisco, are usually much attracted by the beauty of certain small gardens, house courts and porches, and, if they have any knowledge of horticulture, they perceive that this beauty is of a novel character. It is dependent on elements which require to be seen somewhat closely, and which would be lost or out of place in such expanded landscapes as form the chief attraction of parks and gardens [530]in the East. It is found in the highest degree in some of the smallest gardens in the more closely built and densely populated parts of the town, in situations where park trees would dwindle for want of light and air.

These results of private and unorganized experiments sufficiently indicate the limits within which we can proceed with entire confidence in planning a public pleasure ground, and, omitting a discussion here of the less difficult questions to which my attention has been given, I will now proceed to give the general conclusions of my preliminary enquiry as to the special requirements which the plan of a public pleasure ground for San Francisco should be adapted to meet.

VII.
General Conclusions of Discussion as to the Conditions to Be Observed in a Plan.

In any pleasure ground for San Francisco the ornamental parts should be compact; should be guarded from the direct action of the northwest wind, should be conveniently entered, should be rich in detail, close to the eye, and should be fitted to an extensive system of walks, rides, drives and resting places. These latter should also be sheltered as much as possible from the northwest wind; should be of such a plan that their public use can be efficiently regulated without cumbrous, unusual, or very expensive police arrangements, and should be easily kept clean and free from dust. No ground should be selected for this improvement which is already of very great value, yet the neighborhood should be of a character which will ultimately invite the erection of the best class of private mansions and public edifices. Entrance to it should be practicable at no great distance from that part of the town already built up; it should extend in the direction in which the city is likely to advance, or should be so arranged that an agreeable extension can be readily made in that direction hereafter. At the same time it should have such a form that when the city shall be much enlarged it may so divide it that, without subjecting the trees and shrubs it contains to destruction during great conflagrations, it shall be a barrier of protection to large districts which would otherwise be imperilled. It is further desirable that it should not make any great change in the present plans of sewerage, lighting and water supply necessary, should not present any insurmountable obstructions to the ordinary ways of passage or business transportation between different parts of the city, should not block the city railroads or other public works and should not greatly disturb buildings already erected, streets already graded, sewered and paved, or otherwise cause heavy losses or depreciation of value to the existing property of the city, or that of corporations or private citizens.

If there is any scheme by which all these seemingly conflicting [531]requirements can be met, no arrangement which can be proposed, that falls short of it, will long be considered satisfactory. Changes of detail, revisions, repairs, temporary expedients to meet special difficulties, will constantly be suggested, discussed, and from time to time adopted; and thus in the end any less comprehensive plan will prove excessively inconvenient and expensive. It will be much more economical to adopt a plan which comprehends everything that is likely to be wanted at the outset. The whole scheme of improvements should, as far as possible, therefore, be definitely established at the outset, and the plan of the city in all respects adjusted to suit it.

VIII.
Expedient Proposed for Overcoming the Chief Special Difficulties.

The expedient by which I would propose to overcome the chief difficulties imposed by the conditions of the case, will be most readily understood, if it be imagined that there had originally been a creek crossing the site of the city, not far back of that part of it which is at present occupied by buildings of an expensive character; that streets had been formed on the banks with houses facing towards the creek, and that cross streets had, at such intervals as would be required by convenience, been carried over it on bridges. (This may be seen in reality at Stockton, but it will be better to imagine the creek passing through a hilly country, instead of a flat one, and the houses facing toward it to be stately mansions instead of shops and warehouses.) Let it then further be imagined that the course of the stream which formed the creek had been divided, so as to leave its bed dry; that a road had been formed with broad walks in the middle of the old bed; that the banks had been dressed in agreeable shapes, the lower parts turfed and the slopes planted with shrubs and trees, with a thicket of hardy evergreens all along the top, and that hydrants had been set at proper intervals on the edge of the streets above and the road below, so that, (with hose and punctured pipes, such as are used for watering the lawns and roads of the Bois de Boulogne), the dust could be kept down, and the turf and plantations readily sprinkled as often as necessary. If all this had been done, provided the course of the creek had been originally from southwest to northeast—that is to say, across the sea-wind—it will be seen that a sheltered promenade or boulevard would have been possible within the city limits, which would meet all the prescribed requirements.

As nature has not provided such a creek-bed as has been imagined, what I propose to do is, first, to secure a similar condition by an artificial excavation, and then proceed to obtain a similar result, but of a much higher character.

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The citizens of San Francisco would in this way be provided with an extended walk, ride and drive, which would be open at all times to those seeking health, recreation, and social intercourse in the open air; but within which the dust, din, and encounters with vehicles, moving in various directions, to which they are subject in all the present public places, streets and roads in and about the town, would be entirely avoided.

IX.
Military and Play-Ground; Sequestered Garden;
Marine-Parade and Saluting Ground; Places for Music, Fire-Works, and Public Ceremonies.

But a mere promenade is not all or nearly all that should be provided in a metropolitan scheme of public grounds. Places are needed where military and athletic exercises can be carried on without conflicting with the pursuit of business and the safety or the quiet of those not interested in them. Civic ceremonies, music and fireworks should also be provided for, and a more secluded, quiet, and purely rural district should be added, in which invalids, and women and children may ramble, or rest in the open air, free from the disturbance of carriages and horsemen. There should also, if practicable, be a landing-place, with suitable surroundings, at which guests of the city could be welcomed, salutes fired and processions formed without interference with the public use of the streets or the commercial wharves.

San Francisco is so situated that it requires arrangements of this kind even more than other great cities, and no system of public grounds will be complete until they are added, even if it should be impracticable to plan them in such a way that they would be attractive and useful in every condition of wind and weather. Obviously, however, they should, as much as possible, be protected from the wind, and as near the present built part of the town as practicable.

To provide a parade ground in such a situation, large enough for the manrœuvering of a brigade or division, would cost too much, and it would be otherwise objectionable. For such a purpose the city should secure a large tract of ground some miles distant from the present centre of the town; but for each of the other purposes a smaller area will answer, and suitable positions should, therefore, be found without going far out.

For a municipal landing place and marine parade, suitable to the commercial position of the city and to the duties which it will be proper for it to assume as holding the portal of the republic on the Pacific, where foreign dignitaries and our own national representatives will land and embark, and a port of refuge to which men-of-war of all nations may at any moment be obliged to resort, there seems to be a suitable place on the east side of the ridge of Point San José, between the fort and the [533]Pioneer Woolen Mills. It enjoys considerable protection from the sea wind, as is shown by the growth of shrubs, and there is a good depth of water immediately off shore, with good anchorage. Here there should be a suitable landing quay and a plaza, with a close and thick plantation of evergreens on the west side, faced with banks of shrubs and flowers. The plaza or parade should be open and large enough to be used for a drill ground by a battery of artillery or a regiment of infantry, with some standing room and seats for spectators. It should also contain an elegant pavilion for the accommodation of committees of reception and their guests and a band of music, and should be decorated with flagstaffs, marine trophies, and eventually with monuments to naval heroes, discoverers and explorers. It should not, however, be very large or fitted for extended ceremonies, being considered rather as the sea-gate of the city than the place of entertainment for its guests.

The best place for a rural ground, to be retired from the general promenade, that I have been able to find near the city, is in a valley sheltered on the north, west and southwest sides by hills lying north and west of what is designated the “hospital lot” on the city map, and not far from the Orphan Asylum. This valley is not only unusually protected from wind, but the soil is moist, and I have observed that in the driest season the shrubs and herbaceous plants, of which there is very abundant natural growth within it, retain their freshness and health better than anywhere else.

There is a considerable extent of low level ground in the same vicinity, suitable for a parade and play ground of moderate size, which being close on Market Street, near the Mission, will be readily accessible from the present town. It is also very centrally situated with reference to all the suburbs of the city, and is just within the lines to which the streets of the city are laid out by the map of 1865. As beyond this point to the westward the rectangular system of streets will probably have to be abandoned, owing to the steepness and ruggedness of the hills, it offers also a convenient point of division between a scheme of grounds intended for the use of citizens during the next ten or twenty years, and a scheme for future improvements.

For these reasons I would propose to place here, as far as practicable, all those parts of the general system of pleasure grounds which require considerable lateral expansion. In European town parks, the more strictly rural portions are generally associated with the parts intended to be used as a promenade, in which but little lateral space is really needed. As by the arrangement already sketched out the social public promenade is provided for elsewhere, and as only a moderate area will be needed for military use here, the parade ground proper being located further out in the country, it will be desirable to bring this area in juxtaposition with the tract to be set apart for the more secluded garden ground, in order to [534]gain a greater general impression of spaciousness than either alone would give. As, however, the purpose of each is quite distinct from that of the other, they should, in the detailed arrangement of the design, be very completely separated. I propose, therefore, to place between them a grand terrace or tribune, readily accessible from each, as well as from the general promenade, and from the common streets of the town. This structure might be formed in two levels, one set apart for persons in carriages, the other for those on foot. On two sides of it might be rich parterres or formal flower gardens with fountains, and the whole might be given a highly architectural character with rich parapets of stone; or it might be cheaply finished with turf banks, bastions and bays, and plain iron or wooden handrails. In connection with this grand central concourse there should be suitable stands for music, for fireworks, and for public speaking. These should face toward the parade ground, in which a crowd of many thousand persons might be assembled without danger of injury to plants or objects of art, and where a regiment might be manœuvred, or a division reviewed in marching column. Additional accommodation for spectators on foot and in carriages should be arranged all around its margin. It should be placed at as Iowa level as practicable, with higher ground and thick plantations on the windward side.

On the other side of the terrace or tribune, in a still more thoroughly protected position, I would have a small garden formed in a nook of the hills, facing to the southeast, with a grove of trees in the upper part and in that part nearest the tribune, the remainder being thrown into a surface of picturesque form, with rocks and terraces, and planted closely and intricately with shrubs and vines, with walks running among them, and frequent seats, arbors, and small sheltered and sunny areas of turf and flowers. In the lowest part there should be a flatter space, in which there should be laid out and kept up at any expense for maintenance that might be found necessary, a small clear lawn of turf sloping down to the shore of a pool of still water, on the other side of which there should be the finest display of foliage in natural forms which art could command. From within this garden, no carriage road or buildings, except those of a rural character, inviting rest, should be seen, and no pains should be spared to make it a spot of pure and tranquil sylvan loveliness. If it is a question whether anything of this kind could be maintained in a large city without being misused, and rendered practically valueless for those who would most enjoy it through the misbehaviour of lawless men and boys, the Ramble in the Central Park, parts of which in a great degree realize what I should attempt, gives a sufficient answer.

For some years to come such a series of grounds and structures as I have suggested near the Orphan Asylum, with a Marine Parade at [535]

[536]Point San José, and a spacious promenade between them, would probably suffice.

A line between these two points would be nearly parallel to a line equally subdividing the present population of the city, being within ten minutes’ drive of the City Hall and the Lincoln School-house respectively; and the best course for a promenade to be laid out between them, having regard merely to the beauty and fitness of the promenade itself, would be a moderately direct one, carried in a succession of easy curves, generally in the depression of the hills.

If, however, the value of the land which would need to be purchased, and the disarrangement of the present lines of streets and properties which would be required to carry out this plan, should be thought a very great objection to it, it would be practicable to make use of Van Ness Avenue, from the water line to Eddy Street, and I think it best to presume that this would be deemed advisable.

X.
The General Promenade.

Taking Van Ness Avenue, I should add to it one tier of building lots on each side, which gives a space of 390 feet wide. Fifty-five feet of this space on each side might be appropriated to streets, into which the cross streets now falling into Van Ness Avenue would lead, without there being necessarily any change in the present plans for their grading, paving, sewering or piping. The present middle tier of lots of the blocks on each side of Van Ness Avenue would then be front lots on these two streets, which would be in all respects formed in the usual manner, except that it might be considered best not to lay any walk on the sides opposite the houses. There would remain a space to be given up to the promenade and ornamental ground 280 feet wide. With this an excavation would be made, varying in depth a little, according to the shape of the surface, but everywhere at least twenty feet deep. The sides of the excavation should slope so as to leave a nearly level space at the bottom 152 feet wide. In the centre of this might be formed a mall 24 feet wide, flanked on each side by a border, to be used as will hereafter be described. Between the borders and the foot of the slopes might be two roadways, each 54 feet wide, 15 feet being made of loose sifted gravel, as a pad for saddle horses, and the remaining 39 feet finished with hard rolled gravel for carriages. Immediately outside the roadways, the surface should usually rise very gently and be occupied by beds of turf or flowers, which should be carried up irregularly until lost under plantations of shrubs and trees. The upper part of the slopes adjoining the streets should be everywhere planted with coniferous trees set closely and trimmed so as to form a lofty hedge or [537]thick screen sufficient to break off the wind from the less sturdy plants within.

At such intervals as might from time to time be deemed advisable, bridges, to carry streets across the promenade grounds, would have to be constructed, and at each of these bridges entrances should be arranged by which persons on foot could reach the mall. Access to the roads may be obtained by carriage approaches descending the slopes in lines diagonal to the general course, starting midway between the bridges.

After crossing Eddy Street, the promenade might fork into two branches, that to the left going straight to the south-west corner of the present Yerba Buena Park, where the Pioneer monument is to be placed, which would form the vista-point of the mall. Here it would terminate with an entrance on Market Street, six blocks out from Montgomery Street. The fork to the right would be at right angles to the first, and run parallel to Market Street until it reached the vicinity of the low ground near the Orphan Asylum, where it would connect with the terrace before described. Here it would be divided, one branch of the roadway being carried around the garden, following the hills; the other making the circuit of the parade ground; the mall being arranged to branch out into the garden walks, and also to lead around the parade.

The system of roads and walks after leaving this point, would resume more or less of the original restricted form, and would be carried on as far as might be thought advisable, as an extension of the general promenade. Between the Pioneer Monument and the old Spring Valley Reservoir near the Orphan Asylum, little having been done toward the carrying out of the existing plan of the city streets on the west side of Market Street, I think it would be best to revise the city map, both to secure greater convenience for business purposes, and to increase the dignity of the approaches and surroundings of the parade and garden. The small pieces of ground now reserved in this vicinity for public squares, may as well be thrown into streets and lots, and the streets at present laid out to divide the property between Market Street and the proposed promenade, be given up, and a more simple and symmetrical plan adopted.

The accompanying map, marked A, shows the position and relation to the present street system of the city, of the ground which would require to be taken for these improvements, so far as I am able to define it without a special survey. In the plan marked B, a suitable arrangement of the side entrances to the general promenade is shown, and the plan and section marked C, illustrates a method of bridging the promenade for the common streets of the city, and of giving access from them to the mall. The plan marked D, shows all the pleasure grounds, as well as the [538]

changes above proposed to be made, between Eddy Street and Market Street, and between the Yerba Buena Park and the city line.

If such a plan should be adopted as I have suggested, each section of the general promenade formed by the bridges, should receive a somewhat different treatment, especially in the border between the mall and [539]

[540]the roadway. In some sections, the border may be treated in a natural style, in others, in a formal style. The latter would be especially applicable where the level of the natural surface and the adjoining streets is highest, and the cuttings deepest, as in these situations, it may be best to employ retaining walls, and throw the ground into terraces on the exterior slopes; then, at some points, the border may be decorated with vases elevated on pedestals, baskets of flowers, yuccas, aloes, orange trees, or other exotic plants in tubs, which would admit of their being placed under shelter. Another section of the mall should be planted with fastigiate trees and shrubs, another with cactuses, another with standard roses, another with a particular class of flowering shrubs, another with creeping plants pegged down, another with a vegetable embroidery upon fine turf, another with beds of tulips, of violets, or of callas, etc.

At some points, the walks should be carried out to the edge of the roadway, (as shown in the vicinity of the bridges, upon the sketch C), so that people can step upon it from their carriages, or converse with those upon it without getting out. Some of these openings should be covered by pavilions of rustic or lattice work, overgrown with vines and creepers, and furnished with seats; at other points the walk may be thrown out to the road on each side, and the centre occupied by smaller pavilions, or by fountains, statues, cages of birds, dove cotes, rabbit hutches, small paddocks of gazelles or antelopes, tanks of aquatic plants, globes of fish, or such suitable objects of art or curiosity, as may from time to time be acquired by the city, either as gifts or by purchase. By slight modifications of the general plan, the details could be modified to an indefinite extent, and every desirable object might be placed in the position most suitable to exhibit it to advantage, either from the carriage road or the walk, or from both. Portions of the mall, for instance, might be made lower than the adjoining road, and divided, so as to run within narrow rocky ravines, in the ledges and crevices of which would be the most delicate plants, or the rocks might be covered with ivy.

Thus, in minor points, the design could be everywhere varied, always taking care, however, that the slopes should be of a somewhat larger style than the one adopted for the borders of the central mall. At the same time, if considerations of economy should be required to control the design in this respect, a plain turf finish might be given to the borders, and the slopes might be planted with masses of common shrubs and small trees, such as the lilacs, mock-orange, calycanthus, acacia, flowering currant, elder, laburnum, buckeye, manzanita, photinia, ceanothus, magnolias, laurels, azaleas, œdenostema, eriodictyon, golden-leafed chestnut, holly-leafed berberry, and many others which may be obtained in large quantities from the canons of the coast range. Some sections might be devoted to an illustration of the shrubs of California, others to those of [541]Australia, China, Japan, or Siberia, in so far as they would suit the situation.

As, however, the winter of San Francisco is peculiarly adapted, whenever it is fair weather, to the enjoyment of the promenade, I should prefer to plant much the larger part almost wholly with evergreens, especially with the smooth-leaved evergreen shrubs and vines, like the laurel, myrtle, rhododendrons, Chinese magnolias, and ivy. With a smaller expenditure than several individuals in Europe and the Eastern States have made for the purpose, the citizens of San Francisco might, I believe, provide themselves in a few years, with a “Winter Garden” more beautiful than any now to be found in the world.

Beyond the central parade and garden I should be disposed to make the protected ground somewhat wider, and perhaps of varying width, and to plant it in a more rural and decidedly picturesque manner, introducing the approaches more circuitously, as indicated in the southwest branch leading out of the garden in the drawing D. The bridges may be formed mainly of timber, as shown in the section C. The principal timbers should, however, be massive, and the details artistically designed. A large part of the bridges may be covered with vines on wire trellises. Whenever desired in the future, bridges of masonry or wrought iron can, of course, be substituted for timber structures. There should be balconies on the bridges overlooking the promenades, thrown out from the line of the sidewalks as indicated in the drawing C.

Much less water would be required to keep the plants on the slopes in flourishing condition than would be needed if they were on the open ground, and the water would be distributed with much greater rapidity and economy. The water may be obtained by special contract with the water company, or by a system of wells from which the water would be raised to small reservoirs at the higher points on the banks by windmills or engines.

The principal advantage of placing the mall, as proposed, between the two roads, besides that of doubling the carriage and bridle ways without a corresponding expense of construction, is that it completely protects persons on foot from all danger, or feeling of apprehension, of being run over at any point within the pleasure ground; a matter of great consequence, not only to the infirm and to timid women and children, but to all who are disposed to enjoy the ground in a tranquil way, and especially to those in carriages or on horseback, who would otherwise need to be constantly on the alert, to avoid collisions, as now in the common streets.

Another advantage would be found on occasions when it would be desirable to use one of the roads for a procession. The width of each [542]road is sufficient to admit of the march of a military column by company front, and the whole mall, as well as the balconies of the bridges, might be occupied by spectators, without at all interrupting the ordinary pleasure-driving upon the other road, the width of which would allow four carriages to be driven freely abreast without crowding upon the bridle road.

The total length of carriage road would be over nine miles; of bridle road, the same; and of the mall, between three and four miles. There would be four or five miles more of walking ground in the walks of the central garden and about the marine parade.

This, I presume, is as much as would be required, or as it would be best for the city to undertake to finish and maintain for several years to come. It will be obvious, however, that a system of drives, bridle roads, and walks within quite narrow lateral boundaries, such as I have suggested, is one that is well suited for indefinite extension, and that the cost of the ground required for the purpose, provided the purchase of it should not be too long delayed, would be light.

The sketches which are now presented provide for extensions in two directions; one of these might be carried to the flat land lying southeast of the hill shown on the large map in the City Surveyor’s Office, with the name upon it of Cady & Gardiner, which is the most suitable ground that I have seen between the present city and the ocean, for an extensive parade ground; the other around the leeward slope of the hill west of the hospital lot, and by easy grades to the lowest point in the saddle of the hills near where the old toll-gate house upon the Ocean House road stands. Thence the latter might be carried either through the valley to the southward, and terminate upon the shore at Point Avisadero or Point San Quentin, or it might be carried (as much as possible near the bottom of the valleys), to the Laguna Mercedes and the ocean beach, or again it might be extended indefinitely into the country, toward San Bruno. It might be forked, and take any two or more of these routes. But it will not be practicable to determine upon any definite plan of extension for the promenade, or to secure the required amount of ground without an understanding of the general plan yet to be adopted for the extension of the common street system of the city. As already observed, it will hardly be practicable to attempt to push the present rectangular arrangement much further, and this consideration leads me to offer in conclusion a few observations relative to the general plan of the city.

To the present time the street plan of San Francisco has been contrived with scarcely any effort to adapt it to the peculiar topography of the situation. On a level plain, like the site of the city of Philadelphia, a series of streets at right-angles to each other is perfectly feasible, and the design is as simple in execution as it appears on paper; but even [543]where the circumstances of site are favorable for this formal and repetitive arrangement, it presents a dull and inartistic appearance, and in such a hilly position as that of San Francisco, it is very inappropriate. If the present site, as it was in 1850, had now to be laid out for a large city, it would be desirable to adopt a different arrangement in many respects.

If hills of considerable elevation occur within the boundary of a site marked out for a city, this salient difficulty should be met at the outset, and a series of main lines of road should be arranged that will ascend these hills diagonally, in such a way as to secure sufficiently easy grades. The skeleton lines being thus determined on, a series of transverse and connecting streets should next be provided that will divide the whole into sections of moderate size, and each of these intermediate districts should then be planned separately, and with as much regularity as the circumstances of the case admit.

The city of San Francisco is unquestionably in a very different degree of advancement from what it was in 1850; but even now it is evident that by far the larger portion of the city remains to be built up. Although, therefore, very much has been done that it would be impossible to think of changing, and the interests involved in the portions that are not improved, are, doubtless, so numerous as to make a change anywhere difficult and troublesome; still the future advantage to the city of a judicious reconsideration of the whole subject at this time can hardly be over estimated, especially with reference to that portion of the city that remains entirely unoccupied by buildings of a permanent character.

The first cost of constructing the streets upon such a plan as has been suggested, would probably be less than upon the present; and the advantage in the saving of wear and tear to horses and vehicles, to say nothing of fatigue to persons on foot, would be incalculable.

There are many side questions in connection with the general scheme I have presented, to which I have given the consideration necessary to satisfy myself that any difficulty likely to arise in carrying it out might be satisfactorily overcome; but the whole matter has already been laid before you in a more detailed form than properly belongs to a preliminary report, and I now leave it in your hands, sincerely hoping that you will be as strongly impressed as I am with the commercial, social, and moral importance to your State of an early attempt to develop on a liberal scale some such plan of metropolitan improvement as I have here sketched out.