In a plan which I had the honor, in conjunction with the City Engineer, to submit to you a year ago, the drainage difficulties of Back Bay were proposed to be met by forming a part of it into a basin in which water would, under ordinary circumstances, be maintained at a nearly uniform level, but in which, when an unusually high tide would for a few hours prevent out-flow, a larger amount could be harmlessly stored. Public roads were to be laid out around and across this basin, and its banks to be planted, and otherwise treated picturesquely.

The plan was adopted, and with the concurrence of the City Council work is now advancing under it. In presenting it last January to the Council, you pointed out that while its scope was limited to that part of the Back Bay which had some years before been placed in your charge with a view to a public park, the evils which it was designed to meet would still remain to be dealt with in that arm of the bay known as Muddy River.

The question has since been raised whether the best plan for this purpose might not be found in extending a corresponding arm of the Back Bay basin to the head of tide-water in Muddy River, and the present report is designed to present this suggestion (as far as practicable in advance of surveys and mature study) in a form to invite preliminary discussion.

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The tidal part of Muddy River above the basin now under construction has the usual character of a salt creek winding through a valley, the marshy surface of which, lying from fifteen to twenty feet below the general level of the adjoining uplands, is partially submerged at extreme high-water. The tide ordinarily flows to a point about a mile above the basin. Streets have been laid out upon the uplands upon no continuous system; those of each side independently, and regardless of what may be eventually required in the low lands; the leading motive being to make small bodies of land immediately available, at little cost, for suburban residences. The city is rapidly advancing in compact blocks towards the region, and public convenience will, before many years, require a more comprehensive treatment of it.

It usually happens when a town is building up on both sides of a small water-course and valley that the sanitary and other disadvantages of the low ground prevent it from being much occupied, except in a way damaging to the value of the adjoining properties. In process of time the stream and valley and the uses to which they are put, come to be regarded as a nuisance; and radical measures, such as the construction of a great underground channel, and the filling up of the valley, are urged as the only adequate remedy. The cost of these, and the local disturbance they make, excite opposition to them; their complete beneficial operation is long delayed, and the character of the district becomes so strongly fixed before this period is reached that it can only be partially changed. Though necessary, therefore, to public health and to convenience of general transit through the district, the result in the increased tax-bearing capacity of the locality is no compensation for the required outlay.

As an alternative to such a possible course the policy now suggested for Muddy River would look to the preservation of the present channel with certain modifications and improvements adapted to make it permanently attractive and wholesome, and an element of constantly increasing advantage to the neighborhood. Except where the valley is now narrowest, it would be reduced in width by artificial banks, so that the river with its shores would everywhere have a general character, resembling that which it now has near Longwood bridge, only that its water would be kept at a nearly uniform level, and guarded from defilement by intercepting sewers and otherwise. The Brookline margin would be the broadened base of the present railroad embankment, bearing a woody thicket. The opposite or Boston bank would have an elevation above the water of ten feet where wholly artificial, rising where the natural bank is used to twenty feet. Upon this would be laid out a public way ninety feet wide in continuation of that now forming upon the Back Bay basin; divided like that into foot, [519]

“Suggestion for the Improvement of Muddy River and for Completing a Continuous Promenade from the Common to Jamaica Pond,” December 1880

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It is proposed that this parkway should be continued along the small water-course above and through the valley to Jamaica Pond, which would add another mile to its length. There are three smaller ponds near the head of the valley, which would thus be skirted, and below them a large marsh, which, though formerly reached by the tide, is now a fresh-water swamp, and cannot long remain in its present condition without great peril to the health and life of the increasing population of the adjoining parts, both of Boston and Brookline. Physicians practising in the neighborhood believe it to have been already the source of serious epidemics.

The supply of water to it from local springs is supposed to be large enough to maintain a pond to be formed by a dam at the lower end, by which it would be changed from a foul and noisome to a pleasing and healthful circumstance. The property is of little value speculatively, and of none otherwise, and the improvement thus projected would be neither difficult nor costly. If the fresh-water supply should finally be thought insufficient for the purpose, it would be possible to extend the salt-water basin to cover the ground. The swamp-soil excavated would be of value for covering the slopes below, and the operation would not be costly.

Adopting either expedient, the result would be a chain of pleasant waters, including the four closely adjoining ponds above the swamp, extending from the “mill-dam” on Beacon Street to the far end of Jamaica Pond, all of natural and in some degree picturesque outline, with banks wooded and easily to be furnished with verdure and foliage throughout. Except at one point where there are about a dozen cheaply-built wooden dwellings and shops, the whole would be formed on land of little value, occupied by no buildings, and for no productive purposes, and all of it now in a condition hazardous to public health.

Such a chain of waters, even if connected and having a sweeping current, always becomes objectionable in a town, when streets are so laid out that its immediate borders are private property, or have private properties backing upon them. In such case it is found necessary to give it the character of a canal, to wall its banks with masonry, and, if the water supply greatly fluctuates, to take other measures to prevent its becoming a nuisance. At the best it is an eyesore. But if uniformly filled, its banks made comely, and kept neatly, in the usual manner of public parks, and if no private property is allowed to abut upon them, any natural water-course will be attractive and wholesome.

On the other hand, private property looking upon the parkway would at small cost be well drained; there would be nothing objectionable in its rear but in general a pleasant neighborhood, already formed, and, as it would lie midway between an attractive urban and an attractive suburban residence district, agreeably connected, there would be no doubt as to its ultimate character, [521] or that it would be rapidly taken up for dwellings of a superior class. This prospect would have an immediate favorable influence on adjoining properties, and the entire operation would be attended by an advance of market and taxable values securing the city a rapid return for its outlay.

The indirect course of the parkway, following the river bank, would prevent its being much used for purposes of heavy transportation. It would thus, without offensive exclusiveness or special police regulation, be left free to be used as a pleasure route.

The Brookline Branch Railroad and the drive of the parkway, where they come nearest together, would be 200 feet apart, and there would be a double screen of foliage between them.

Taken in connection with the mall upon Commonwealth Avenue, the Public Garden and the Common, the parkway would complete a pleasure-route from the heart of the city a distance of six miles into its suburbs. These older pleasure-grounds, while continuing to serve equally well all their present purposes, would, by becoming part of an extended system, acquire increased importance and value. They would have a larger use, be more effective as appliances for public health, and every dollar expended for their maintenance would return a larger dividend.

The scheme offers hardly less advantage to Brookline than to Boston, and a plan of equitable coöperation in carrying it out is probably feasible.

If the interests of the city required that the region affected should be largely occupied for manufacturing and commercial purposes, and that for this reason it should be provided with frequent, continuous, and direct lines of communication upon easy grades, the proposition would be more open to objection. But such provisions would be very costly, and if the tendency at present manifest on every side to make the district a residence quarter, with only such provisions for trade as local convenience may call for, is not desirable to be checked, then the suggestion would seem to offer a much-needed sanitary improvement at moderate cost, and with a promise of large incidental profits.