This page was created by Jane Darcovich. The last update was by Dan Harper.
Creating Beauty
A boulevard system had several proven advantages. First, expanding the system of boulevards and parkways would add to the existing system of parks. Over the previous thirty years, the system of parks and roadways along Chicago’s fringe had facilitated transportation and communication between disparate parts of the metropolis. While the well-to-do used their carriages and automobiles to travel along these boulevards, other residents picnicked, played baseball and other sports, and relaxed along the parkways. Second, Chicago could learn from the experience of other cities that had already experimented with and embraced this type of planning. The Commission studied Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, each of which had built extensive boulevard systems since the 1870s. Third, an outer belt of parks, what some reformers liked to call the “lungs of the city,” was cheaper than building an extensive park system within the city. Creating parks in densely settled urban areas would come at a prohibitive cost. But by establishing a boulevard system just ahead of population movement, the city and county could create park space before the costs became too high. The work of the Municipal Science Club and the efforts of the Outer Belt Park Commission instilled a sense of urgency among park and preserve supporters.
Within the Municipal Science Club, and among several groups associated with the creation of the forest preserve, an important conversation took place. The difference in philosophy of two concepts pertaining to land management — an emphasis on preserving natural forests versus an emphasis on creating a boulevard and park system – is important. The first law designed to create a forest preserve, the Forest Preserve Act of 1905, would emphasize the boulevard and park system. It called for the creation of highways “for pleasure driving only” through scenic corridors in rural Cook County.
