book list
A Practical Guide to their Planning, Design and Development for the use of Town Planners, Architects, Surveyors, Engineers, Municipal Officials, Builders and others interested in the technical and legal aspects of the subject.
The book is quite technical in places. For example, the chapter on the design and construction of sewers has formulae and tables for calculating flow rates. There are 168 illustrations, some of which are plans or line drawings, but 80 of which are black and white photographs, mostly of street scenes, but some of partly constructed houses. 7 of the photographs are of streets in Welwyn Garden City. There are also 19 pull-out plates, on very thin paper, in area equivalent to about A3, which are mostly plans of housing estates.
Chapter 1 - The Choice and Design of Estates.
This chapter discusses siting, contouring, types of street layout, building
densities, and shopping centres. The one b/w photograph in this chapter is of
Walden Place, WGC.
Chapter 2 - Design and Construction of Roads.
The layout, gradients, surfaces, lighting and drainage, of roads, are discussed. Gale then summarises the Ministry of Transport's Memorandum No. 575 on Layout and Construction of Roads which gives recommendations on layout, widths, curves, super-elevation, visibility, traffic lanes, and junctions. Three plans of road junctions illustrate. He then goes on to summarise another report, 1945 Model Specifications, jointly issued by The Institute of Municipal Engineers and the Ministries of Health and Works. This report covers the three types of road surface: Tarmacadam, Asphalt/Bitumen, Concrete.
Chapter 3 - Design and Construction of Sewers.
This chapter goes into the technical details of calculating the size of drains
necessary in certain situations.
Chapter 4 - Submission of Plans of New Streets and Layouts.
This chapter covers town planning appeals, deposit of plans, building by-laws, the Restriction of Ribbon Development Act (1935), Public Health Act (1936), Town and Country Planning Acts (1943 and 1944), and the submission of plans. The discussion is quite brief.
Chapter 5 - Private Street Works Procedure.
This is a second chapter on legal matters. It covers the process of the adopting of a road which was originally in private hands during the construction of an estate, and the various acts involved. As with the previous chapter, the discussion is quite brief.
Chapter 6 - Types of Houses and Practical Aspects of design.
Gale summarises the 1918 Report on the types of houses and accommodation required by the working classes, which was produced under chairmanship of Sir J. Tudor-Waters. Two of the recommendations were that each house should have a parlour and also a separate bathroom. Standards laid down by the Housing Acts (1935 and 1936) are described. The chapter continues with discussion of prefabricated houses and flats, and covers the Second House Construction Report (1946), and the Housing Manual (1944). There are numerous plans and other illustrations in the chapter, and also several photographs of partially-built houses to illustrate different methods of construction.
Chapter 7 - Further House Designs in Rural and Urban Districts.
This chapter summarises several reports, and is illustrated with many plans of house layouts. The Reports covered include: Manual on Rural Housing (1938), Scottish Housing Advisory Committee Report (1944), Rural Housing Report (1944).
Chapter 8 - Finance and Administration of Estates.
Methods of building finance; Housing Acts (1923, 1924, 1935, 1936, 1938, 1946); Town and Country Planning Act (1947); these are discussed briefly. There is a paragraph headed Garden City development which reads as follows: "The Garden City movement was initiated by the late Sir Ebenezer Howard in a book he wrote entitled 'Tomorrow', which was written at the close of the nineteenth century. In this book he expressed the need for a gradual decentralisation of both population and industry from over-crowded cities into new self-contained towns which he named 'Garden Cities'. His definition of a garden city, which was adopted by the Garden Cities and Town Planning Association, is as follows: A Garden City is 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." A footnote states that a new edition of Howard's book, retitled Garden Cities of Tomorrow, was published in 1946, price 6s net.
Chapter 9 - Legal Regulations Affecting Estate Development.
Thirteen pages of this chapter are taken up with quite a detailed description of The Town and Country Planning Act (1947). Other housing acts are discussed more briefly as are the Barlow Report, the Burt Report, and the Dudley Report. The rest of the chapter deals with satellite town schemes, of which Knutsford, Manchester is used as an example. There are 4 photographs of architectural models of proposed development at Knutsford, and a pull-out diagram of the scheme for the County College there.
Chapter 10 - Garden City and Private Development Enterprises.
This is the longest chapter (80 pages) and contains most of the photographs. In the text, Gale describes how the "Garden City Pioneer Company" was registered in 1902. This company chose a Letchworth site of 4562 acres for the first development, to be followed by the one at Welwyn. Some industrial concerns provided model housing estates for their workers; notably Port Sunlight (Leverhulme), Bournville (Cadbury), and Earswick (Rowntree). The co-partnership schemes at Ealing Garden Suburb and Hampstead Garden Suburb are mentioned. Then 16 schemes, listed below, are described in turn. For each of these estates there is a plan, and for some there are photographs of the housing.
There is only one page of text about Welwyn Garden City. There is a plan of the town with street index, and 6 photographs, including one of Digswell Road in which I lived, until age 17. We were in one of the smaller houses at the opposite end to that shown.
(Click on the images for a better view)
Walden Place
The Parkway
The Community Centre
Fretherne Road
Parkway Close
The Orchard
Corner of Digswell Road & Walden Road