Under Chapter 191 of the acts of 1907, Massachusetts towns may authorize their selectmen to act as a board of survey with the same power to lay out official streets as the Boston street commissioners. Several towns of the state have accepted the act and in a very few cases survey lines have been imposed on particular streets, but there has been no general extension of the street plan into unoccupied areas.
New York. New York had a topographical bureau for four years, dating from the first Greater New York charter, January 1, 1898, but during these formative years there was little or no progress with official plans. On January 1, 1902, the amended charter placed the topographical work in each of the five boroughs under the control of the borough president, and since then five separate bureaus have had charge of the completion of the map of the city and the drainage plan. The disadvantage of separate planning bureaus, particularly where the territory of two boroughs is contiguous, is obvious. There is, however, one opportunity for securing co-ordination in street planning. All plans must be submitted by the presidents of the boroughs to the board of estimate and apportionment, and they do not become official without the approval of that board. In Manhattan and Brooklyn the plans submitted consist almost entirely in changes in the official map which is practically complete for both boroughs. The following table shows the work of the topographical bureaus in the other boroughs since 1902:
TABLE 7.—PROGRESS MADE IN MAPPING THE BOROUGHS OF THE BRONX, QUEENS, AND RICHMOND, NEW YORK CITY, TO JANUARY 1, 1913[157]
| BOROUGH | |||
| The Bronx | Queens | Richmond | |
| Total area in acres | 26,523 | 75,111 | 36,600 |
| Acres approved for mapping prior to Jan. 1, 1902 | |||
| Tentative | — | — | — |
| Final | 14,430 | 5,402 | 60 |
| Total | 14,430 | 5,402 | 60 |
| Between Jan. 1, 1902, and Jan. 1, 1912 | |||
| Tentative[158] | 956 | 3,416 | 7,940 |
| Final | 10,004 | 14,476 | 964 |
| Total | 10,960 | 17,892 | 8,904 |
| During 1912 | |||
| Tentative | — | 12,984 | 2,540 |
| Final | 234 | 3,070 | — |
| Total | 234 | 16,054 | 2,540 |
| Total area in acres mapped to Jan. 1, 1913 | |||
| Tentative[158] | 956 | 16,168 | 10,480 |
| Final | 24,668 | 22,948 | 1,024 |
| Total | 25,624 | 39,116 | 11,504 |
| Per cent of borough area in acres mapped to Jan. 1, 1913 | |||
| Tentative[158] | 3.6 | 21.5 | 28.6 |
| Final | 93.0 | 30.6 | 2.8 |
| Total | 96.6 | 52.1 | 31.4 |
Baltimore. The Baltimore topographical survey commission was created by ordinance in 1893 for the purpose of making a complete survey of the city, including about seventeen square miles of undeveloped territory, rural in character, which had become a part of the city in 1888. With the completion of the survey an official plan was adopted for the annexed territory in 1893 by the mayor and city council, and subsequently by act of the general assembly of Maryland, Baltimore was prohibited from accepting a deed of dedication or the opening in any manner of a street which did not conform to the general plan or the plan duly amended. Amendments of the official plan must be approved by the topographical survey commission and adopted by the city council before they can be incorporated.
In spite of the legislation in Maryland which seems to put the control of city planning in the hands of the city, and in spite of the activity of topographical bureaus of New York City, the limitations on municipal control of street planning in both Baltimore and New York are the same as in Boston. Official streets in both cities have been blocked by the owners of the land or speculative builders, and cases of successive house planting in New York City are notorious. And yet, the advantages of official street plans are considered to offset these limitations and street planning bureaus have passed the experimental stage.
Their success furnishes a precedent for many cities in the United States which still exercise little or no control over a phase of planning where the interest of the private owner is so often opposed to the public good. The possibilities of administrative pressure in the solution of other city planning problems now determined on the initiative of private or corporate interests suggest themselves. The development of the water front, the location of railroad terminals, the transit problem, have all been distinctly recognized as requiring the permanent attention of a special planning board representing the public interest. But in those fields where the public interest is apt to conflict with the advantage of private or corporate owners, the value of expert suggestion and study can never be as fully realized as where the execution of a plan is entirely in the control of the municipality.
PLANNING OF PUBLIC WORK OTHER THAN STREETS
In the location and design of public parks and in the location and design of public buildings, including bridges, the administrative agency of the municipality or other governmental unit has a free hand. The establishment and development of a system of parks and parkways are now entrusted very generally to an administrative board which employs expert advice and considers the park problems of the entire city as a unit. The location and design of public structures are, however, in most cases left to the judgment of the several departments which will use or maintain them; but occasionally the function of a municipal art commission is enlarged so that its approval is necessary to the selection of the site and design for public structures as well as for the location and design of “works of art.”
In New York City the art commission must approve the location and design of all structures for which the contract price exceeds $250,000; but in the case of other public structures the approval of the commission need not be required if the mayor or the board of aldermen request the commission not to act.[159]