Toledo Tomorrow (July 1945) - It works! - University of Toledo

of their growth, they found themselvescriss-crossed with rai lroad tracks ... wi th stationsand ever-growing yards, with sidingswherever any factory owner or shippercould induce a rai lroad to build one, withgrade-crossing after grade-crossing.City streets followed a traditional gridironscheme or else took the course ofleast resistance. Workers found themselvesliving a great distance from theirjobs, with no direct highways to speedthem to their places of business. The automobilebrought heavy tramc into streetsbuilt for horse and wagon.Parks and playgrounds all too oftenwere merely the spaces accidentally leftunused in a city's growth.Bridges were located for reasons longoutworn or forgotten and left to createbottlenecks, particu larly where streams car-ried boats which required constant openingand shutting of spans.The arriva l of the airplane often foundthe only remaining space open for airportsat g,eat distance from the heart of the city,so that it often took as long to get fromhome to airport as to Ay to a destinationmany miles away.Cities-most of them, at least-attackedthese problems piecemeal. But when one.problem was answered without consideringother., the "solution" merely added tothe growing pains.Cities spent great su ms of money for plan.for bealltiAcation, for more efficient, moresati.fying living, only to find that the plln.were short-ringed, soon to be frustrated bynew and grelter prob,lems.Toledo is such a city.Theolution • • •A t long last, city planners moved intoa cycle of th inkin g. Let uS Ithey said,draw up a MASTER PLA N ... one whichwill look ahead '1 0, 20 or 50 years. Letus consider not only highways and othertransportation, but the best use of the land.•• which areas are best for industry, wh ichfor homes, which for parks and playgrounds.Then we rea lly can make p lans for betterliving, these planners said.Such a MASTER PLAN would dra wthe broad strokes of the picture. Thed eta ils could be left for development ofspecific projects within the general framework.Such a plan would permit a city tomake its plans elastic ... it would say, forexample, there should be a highway con­the master plannecting the north and south parts of thecity i but whether it should follow StreetA or Street B would be determined bydetailed engineering studies.Part of the p lan could be combed out atonce, pa rt later, part deferred longer, untilfina ncing could be arranged ... or untilpresent buildings outlived their usefulnesli.But always the broad aims would bekept in mind, so that every piece of workdone would fit into the whole picture of Ipleasant lefAcient luseful city.Toledo To morrow is such a master plan.Toledo Tomorrow is adapted to the geography,the life and work of Toledo as itnow exists. It offers th e citizens of Toledoa unique opportunity to see what experts