USA > Missouri > Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I > Part 102
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Spring Valley makes historic the site of a former source of pure, cold water, before the growth of the city surrounding it made necessary the suppression of the natural fountain for sanitary reasons.
In several instances names of persons well chosen have been attached to the park and boulevard system. Entirely proper was it that Swope Park and Budd Park should honor the memory of two citizens who added by noble gifts to the breathing capacity of Kansas City.
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Swope Park.
The first park board had in view when the original system was planned the matter of great outer parks, although that was not included in the earliest recom- mendation. After a beginning had been made toward the park and boulevard system within the then existing city, topographical surveys were made of an extensive area of country southeast of Kansas City. The end in view was to select the location for at least one great outer park. The board realized that such a park would be needed ultimately and hoped that the acquisition might be made before values advanced. Thomas H. Swope heard of the desire and gave to the city 1,354 acres. Swope Park extends between two and three miles along the narrow, cliff-bound valley of the Blue. Entrance from the city is at Sixty-third street, nine miles from the business center. Much of the tract is dense forest. Swope Park was accepted by the board in the interest of another generation. Extension of the street car line, the building of a great shelter house with observatories, the erection of a monumental entrance, the laying out of the beau- tiful garden, with the natural attractions, brought the park into immediate pop- ular use. When Swope Park was farm and pasture the land all around it was worth $150 an acre. Suburban homes were built on the borders of Swope Park and the land acquired for them cost over $2,000 an acre.
The possibilities of Swope Park have been demonstrated. The greater part of the tract of 1,354 acres is still virgin. But the refreshment pavilion, the sunken garden, the athletic field, the Zoo, the Lake of the Woods, the swimming beach, the camp ground, the target range, the lagoon, the golf links and tennis courts are existing evidences of the varied uses which may be found for this
SWOPE PARK, THE GREAT RECREATION TRACT OF KANSAS CITY, ON JULY 4, 1912
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THE MAKING OF A CITY
ideal strip of the valley of the Blue. The British ambassador, James Bryce, said of Swope: "I have never seen a city park in this country that equaled it, and it certainly is unrivaled among the cities of the Old World, so far as my travels have extended. Its strongest appeal to me is its magnificent reaches of wild grass and cool forest."
The System up to Date.
In 1914 Kansas City had a total area of parks and parkways within the city limits of approximately 2,560 acres. This included Swope Park. Kansas City had more than fifty-eight miles of parkways, boulevards and park roads com- pleted. The land for fifty-six miles more had been acquired and construction was in progress. Projects not closed included twenty-four miles additional.
Andrew Wright Crawford, the city planning expert of nation-wide repute, said: "Of all the actual accomplishments that American cities can boast, within the past twenty years, none surpasses the park and parkway system of Kansas City. That system, by and of itself, is making the city world-famous. It is in its completeness, its pervasiveness, in the way it reaches every quarter and section of the city, that it surpasses the park systems of other cities of the world."
The park law of Kansas City was a unique experiment in the history of American cities. Every acre of land which has been purchased in Kansas City up to 1914 for park and boulevard purposes has been established or taken by the power of eminent domain put into operation by resolution of the board of park commissioners, carried into effect by ordinances of the city, enforced by the decrees of the courts, and paid for solely and exclusively by the assessments of benefits upon the real estate, exclusive of improvements, within the various dis- tricts in which each particular park or boulevard was established. Not a single acre of park land in Kansas City was ever paid for by general taxation or by the issue of bonds of the city at large.
What Kansas City's System Teaches.
. By those who have had most to do with the creation of the Kansas City system two points are emphasized :
First, that special assessment or special taxation is the most suitable method of acquiring and improving lands for park and boulevard purposes; that by that method the burden is more nearly imposed upon the property benefited than by any other method of taxation.
Second, that this method and the plans and methods that were devised to carry it into effect have proved to be the best, if not the only, way of securing for any city a symmetrical, well-balanced and harmonious system of parks and boulevards.
The reasons for these conclusions are that the division of the city into park districts as units of taxation prevents that jealousy and contest between different sections of the city which always develops from the standpoint of money which has been raised by general taxation or by issue of bonds. The payment of the cost of acquiring and improving lands for park and boulevard purposes by the method of special taxation is based upon the theory that these costs are met, 'and more than met, by the increased values which they create in the lands which
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are assessed for the cost of such improvement. In other words, it is the poten- tial increase in value only that is taxed to pay for the improvement. The ex- perience of Kansas City, in the judgment of those best qualified to speak, affords a remarkable demonstration of the proof of the correctness of this principle of taxation. The establishment of the parks and boulevards served not only to enhance real estate values in Kansas City, but actually created a real estate market where none had existed.
In 1910-II the park board undertook an exhaustive investigation to ascer- tain the influence of the parks and boulevards upon realty values. This was the result :
"Taking the assessed and actual values of property fronting on the various boule- vards, before and after the establishment of such boulevards, it was shown conclusively that the smallest increase in value which had resulted from the establishment of any boule- vard was equal to 183 per centum. After deducting the cost to the property owner of every class of improvement for which his frontage had been assessed, and deducting also the average increase of land values throughout the entire district due to other causes and other improvement in the same district, a net gain to the property owner was shown of practically fifty per centum of the value of the property. On some boulevards the gain has averaged from 200 to 500 per centum, the greater portion of such gain, being directly attributable to the establishment of the boulevards. In the same manner but in a lesser degree the parks have enhanced values, proving that the construction of Kansas City's park and boulevard system was a profitable industry for the taxpayer without reference to its artistic, moral and social benefits. This fact is now universally recognized by citizens who are unanimous in their approval of this great expenditure."
It is an established fact that during the past ten years many thousands of people have been attracted to Kansas City, as a place of residence, by her fine exhibition of civic spirit, the most conspicuous product of which is her mag- nificent parks and pleasure grounds. Many men who have been successful in business in town and village within the territory tributary to Kansas City have felt the spell of her influence, and when retiring from active labor have built beautiful homes along the boulevards and settled here to rear and educate their children. Other thousands among the industrial classes have likewise come, attracted by the same advantages, to seek employment here and swell the popu- lation.
Kansas City's population increased 51.7 per cent in the decade 1900-1910. Of twenty-five cities this community ranked third in the percentage of increase. The other two were Detroit and Denver. These twenty-five cities constituted a class having over 100,000 population. The significant deduction warranted by the census returns was that the cities which had done most to improve conditions of living had gained most in numbers. Kansas City led all other cities in her park and boulevard development during the decade and was one of the first three of these twenty-five cities in respect to gain of population. Both Denver and Detroit have been, since 1900, notably active in city planning and accomplish- ment. Cleveland and Chicago are other cities which have been made more at- tractive as places of residence and Chicago and Cleveland are of the marked gainers in growth. On the other hand, the larger cities which fall below twenty per cent increases in population are with very few exceptions the laggards in the betterment of residential conditions. A canvass of Kansas City's newcomers
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THE MAKING OF A CITY
since 1900 would show that the park and boulevard system had been a strong factor in the growth of population.
Park and Boulevard Economies.
Economies have been practiced at every stage of the park and boulevard development. Cliff Drive was limited in construction to a serviceable roadway. When it was proposed to "improve" the drive with some Italian architecture at certain outlook points, the suggestions were vetoed. The park board accepted the theory of the landscape architect that the Cliff Drive and the paths alone should be man's handiwork; that all else along the drive should be as nature " made it. For protection of vehicles a rail was stretched along the outer edge of the drive, intended to give place in time to a low, rustic stone wall in strict keep- ing with the rock-strewn slope below.
The practice of economies has led naturally to a great diversity of park conditions. When the visitor has traversed Gillham Road he had no conception of the surprises which await him in the miles of the Paseo. North Terrace is as dissimilar as possible from West Terrace. One high point of observation is the climax of interest in many park systems. Kansas City has a dozen of these points of view and no two of them are to be compared with each other.
Observation Park is only two and one-tenth acres, but it has been developed to present a perfect panoramic spectacle of the entire southwestern section. The path encircles the reservoir and to every step forward a new scene presents itself.
Penn Valley Park possesses a bold promontory overlooking the new Union Station and the terminal system following the valley between the North and South Sides. From another point in Penn Valley Park there is a fascinating view across a little lake to the business part of Kansas City.
The West Terrace presents half a dozen different views of the railroad yards, the packing houses, the stock yards, the great industries on both sides of the Kaw river, with the other Kansas City spread over the Kansas hills beyond.
From North Terrace are to be seen some of the finest stretches of the Mis- souri river where it comes down from the north, makes its mighty sweep at the feet of Kansas City and disappears in a valley eastward as fertile as the Nile. Thomas H. Benton, having in mind this great elbow of the Missouri, said : "There is the point that is destined to become the largest city west of St. Louis."
The destiny is being fulfilled.
The System's Influence on the Ideal City Plan.
George E. Kessler, to whom the planning of the park and boulevard system of Kansas City has given national reputation, summed up the varied influences of the system upon the development of the city during the past twenty years :
- "The boulevard system has aided in preventing, through the expansion of ample, stable residence areas, the establishment of concentrated dwelling house barracks which usually follow a rapid accretion of population. Kansas City has, therefore, in an unusual degree, great areas of residence sections uniformly built upon and of uniform character wherein there is little likelihood of change, and so has accomplished one great purpose in any
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CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF MISSOURI
rational city planning or replanning, namely, the establishing and holding of the character and value of home places.
"Through the expansion of the city by means of boulevards and parkways, together with the street railway transportation system, over great areas away from the business district, it has been possible for the people to get their homes at reasonable prices and without fear of encroachment of antagonistic activities in those residence areas.
"Together with the excellent street railway system, the boulevard system has made Kansas City in effect a garden city. It has become almost entirely a home owners' com- munity, made up of individual homes surrounded by their gardens; and in all sections, penetrated by the boulevards, the influence of the building and fine maintenance of these highways has resulted in a response in similar care on adjoining and intersecting streets and upon all homes in those districts.
"Where it has been possible, the parkways have occupied the valley lands, which largely coincided with the directions of thoroughfare necessities in those localities; and through the absorption of these low-lying lands, the lands above have been safeguarded against intrusion of private improvements of lesser value.
"In its principal result, the parkway and boulevard system has made Kansas City a 'good place to live in,' and this was the slogan of the civic bodies and of the commercial club in their constant support of this movement.
"Incidentally, and in less pronounced form, it has affected many other elements of conscious city planning. In its development of means of egress and ingress to the com- mercial area of the city, the boulevard system has greatly aided in classifying and facilitat- ing the vehicular traffic on its streets and has aided in holding the commercial area with- out serious shifting. The parks and playgrounds, in so far as they have been improved - and made use of, are serving the normal recreational needs of the community as one important element in city planning.
"As a result of the construction of the boulevards, Kansas City accomplished an unusual thing in street tree planting. The city has practically been turned into one great park by the planting of avenue trees on comparatively wide parking spaces, and as these trees are of uniform character and kinds and are planted on practically all of the residence streets, the city as seen from above, in the summer months, seems embowered in foliage.
"The relation of the Kansas City park system to the purpose for which a city plan 'is supposed to be developed is direct, and in its results pronouncedly evident. The park- ways and boulevards pierce practically every section of the city, commercial, residential and to some extent industrial. They, therefore, make communication between the different sections of the city direct and distinctive.
"The boulevards, however, which are in fact nothing more than wide, fine streets, give to the occupants of adjacent private lands reasonable assurance of stable conditions, and in uniting all the great residential districts, give opportunity in the areas which they serve for the development of individual home sites.
"The occupancy of large areas solely for residential purposes, except where they are interspersed with local commercial areas, has directly, sometimes unconsciously, discour- aged the intrusion of industrial developments within those sections. The effect of the whole has been to hold definitely the unbroken high lands for residential, and the principal valley lands for transportation and industrial uses.
"The park lands have by no means been improved in their full possibilities, the founda- tion work alone having so far been accomplished; yet Kansas City's public responds promptly and generously to the essential development of this system and through this has established a paying investment in every sense of the word.
"Throughout the city local recreation grounds quickly follow the population, and while they are not yet fully supplying present and future needs, the greater areas of properties needed for these purposes have been acquired. The large frontage along lines of assured value for all classes of residential use has made it possible for the homeseeker to obtain ground at reasonable cost, and has prevented the establishment of excessively high values in residential properties anywhere in Kansas City.
"Finally, in sharp contrast to the feeling of sectionalism and consequent antagonism of one section to another within a city, existing in some communities, the boulevards
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THE MAKING OF A CITY
and parkways of Kansas City have accomplished the real purpose outlined by Mr. Meyer in the first report of the park and boulevard board, namely, the tying together of all sec- tions and the uniting of Kansas City as a whole into a community whose purposes and actions are for the benefit of the city as a whole at all times."
ยท Still in the Making.
But the Missourians who have created a park and boulevard system which has done directly and indirectly all that Mr. Kessler claims for it do not consider Kansas City made. With the commercial center stabilized for the present, Kan- sas City looks forward to the inevitable expansion of business according to defi- nite plan. William Bucholz, member of the Park Commission, told the National City Planning Conference at its annual meeting in 1917 :
"Kansas City has not yet done its duty to its people. It has neglected to define and restrict the uses made of its lands. It has done nothing toward permanently establishing industrial or commercial zones, and, within those zones, classifying the use of lands. It has done nothing to secure a residential neighborhood against unwarranted intrusion of business property, or to safeguard the section of individual homes against the intrusion of the apartment house, the gasoline and oil-filling station. The solution of this problem, in my opinion, can only be made by proper restrictions and proper zoning."
In other words, what Kansas City has secured through the physical appli- cation of the park and boulevard system is to be made permanent through mu- nicipal legislation to guard the future. And this is only one of the steps toward "the making of a city" which is being taken. The betterments already realized have brought population which by the new census is a more than a normal increase, moving Kansas City to higher relative position on the list of the larger Amer- ican cities. It has brought demands for the genius of Kessler from a dozen other cities. It has been pictured on the screens for the inspiration of other commu- nities. But Kansas City is not yet made, in the minds of its people.
Kansas City's park and boulevard system has been twenty-five years in the making. It embraces more than 3,000 acres in parks and parkways and nearly 150 miles of boulevards and park drives, seventy miles of which has been per- manently improved. The cost has been about $17,000,000.
When Kansas City began to lay out boulevards a width of 100 feet was deemed sufficient. But with the influx of the well-to-do retired farmers and the men being made wealthy by the oil development in the Southwest to make homes in Kansas City, there has come such a volume of automobile traffic as to prompt serious consideration whether the coming boulevards should not be at least 150 feet in width. Kansas City is face to face with the spread of suburban districts and the necessity of providing easy and quick access between them and the busi- ness center. When boulevards were begun they were lined with the homes of the wealthy. The crowding automobile traffic on the boulevards has prompted the selection of the suburbs for the detached residences, and the family hotel and apartment house have taken the places of the fine homes in many inside localities.
City planners coming from the East to study Kansas City's development com- mented with regret that the $5,000,000 Union Station, with its imposing archi- tecture and its amazing flow and ebb of travel had not been given better environ- ment. But they learned that this was one of the problems which was in the
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process of solution with the prospect of a public reservation which would show the traveler who looked out of the front doors of the great building a first vision of the park and boulevard system.
Coming down from the border between Missouri and Kansas, the Blue river is true to its name until it passes through Swope park. North of the park, on its way to the Missouri, the Blue presents one of Kansas City's most pressing problems, and one which is not being ignored. On paper the improvement to make the Blue valley a part of the Greater Kansas City plan is forecasted. Steam railroads and industrial plants will be given the east side of the valley, with traffic ways to accommodate business. Along the west side will be a boulevard tying into Swope park and the system of boulevards. Sewers will intercept the present surface drainage which makes the Blue untrue to its name, and a series of dams may give a chain of lakes for pleasure boating.
These are some of the problems to which Kansas City now turns attention inspired by what the quarter-century experiment with parks and boulevards has taught.
The census of 1920 gave Kansas City 324,410 population, a growth of 30.6 per cent. or 76,029 in ten years, proof that it pays to "make the city better to live in." which was the slogan of the park and boulevard beginning twenty-five years ago.
Kansas City in Eleven Episodes.
Charles Phelps Cushing, trained in the Kansas City Star's school of journal- .ism, epitomized for Leslie's in 1920 the century's evolution of Kansas City. He called it "Kansas City, an Epic in Eleven Episodes." More of an American city's history could not be condensed in fewer words :
KANSAS CITY. AN EPIC IN ELEVEN EPISODES.
I-Birch Canoes.
1821-1827. In canoes and pirogues a band of thirty-one French fur traders paddled up the Missouri River from St. Louis and established a trading post (1821) near the mouth of the Kansas (better known locally as the "Kaw") River.
II-Prairie Schooners.
1827-1840. The fur trading settlement continues to remain insignificant upon the map because a near neighbor, named Independence (the northern terminus of the old Santa Fe trail), holds trade supremacy of the western plains.
III-"Westport Landing."
1840-1855. Another neighbor, named Westport, snatches away the claim of Inde- pendence to be called the West's "City of Destiny." The docks of the "City of Kansas" handle Westport's freight from Missouri River steamboats, so the little levee town is nicknamed "Westport Landing." Population in 1855, only 478.
IV-Golden Days of River Trade.
1855-1860. In the golden era of steamboating on the Missouri River, the "City of Kansas" thrives. In 1857 as many as 729 boats put in at her docks. On the eve of the outbreak of the Civil War the city has a population of 7,180 and threatens Westport with commercial annihilation.
V-The Blight of War.
1860-1865. The Civil War deals the hopeful community a staggering blow. Half of the population flees its war-stricken neighborhood. In consequence, Fort Leavenworth,
GENERAL STERLING PRICE Reproduced from a Civil war picture in the collection of the Lafayette County Historical Society
Vol. I-59
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safely located forty miles upstream, gobbles up the trade of the territory, and by 1865 has 15,000 population as against only 3,500 in the "City of Kansas."
VI-Reconstruction Struggles.
1865-1870. In reconstruction days and fighting against terrific odds in favor of Leaven- worth, Kansas City struggles to secure railway connections with the East and North, for the golden era of the steamboat is past and all hope now lies in securing lines of modern transportation. . Kansas City wins in a desperate battle, and by 1870 has seven railways and a population of 32,260-greater than Leavenworth will boast in the census of 1920.
VII-Pulling Out of the Mud.
1870-1880. Kansas City begins to feel the urge of civic improvement and sets to pull- ing herself out of the mud. In ten years she spends 11/2 million dollars upon street improvements. This despite the fact that her population at the end of the decade is only 55,785.
VIII-When the "Boom" Collapsed.
1880-1890. A real estate "boom" falls through with a sickening crash, and Kansas City is knocked out for the count of nine, but struggles to her feet and begins fighting again. In 1889 officially names herself "Kansas City" in a new charter and absorbs West- port within her enlarged city limits. Population, 1890, is 132,716.
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