Starting Point

The Garden City Concept is one out of many attempts to reduce and solve social problems during the Industrialization Period. The problems occurred, as more and more farmers became workers in the factories. The living conditions became worse, due to the fact that many workers' settlements were located next to the industrial areas or within the cities.
The idea of the Garden City was formulated by Ebenezer Howard in his book: "To-morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform", 1898, and was revised in 1902 under the title "Garden Cities of To-morrow".

1. The Theory

Howard analysed in his book the reasons for people to move to the city or to the country side. He found out that both have advantages and function as magnets. Therefore, his solution was to develop a city structure which contains the advantages of a city and those of the countryside. He expressed this in his image of " The three magnets ".

2. Settlement Structure

The main objective of the concept is to found a new city . This is a very important aspect because the common strategies of city expansion (suburbs) did not work because you always had to adapt to old structures and usually the suburbs were too close to the mother cities. The surrounding area of the Garden City is used for agriculture and recreation.

3. City Structure

The Garden City consists for different zones, street types and green.
The core in the centre is about 4 km² and contains a central park, surrounded by a commercial, cultural and administrative zone. Here, the idea of the shopping mal came up, as Howard wanted to develop a " Crystal palace" where goods such as hand craft produced by the inhabitants could be sold protected from weather. During the weekends the core was supposed to be the cultural and recreational centre.
Six magnificent boulevards connect the centre with the circumference, dividing the city into six parts.
A wide (Grand Avenue) and some smaller (First to Fifth Avenue) ring roads are arranged circular around the centre, and together with the radial roads, they form the wards - living area. Every family has a house of a minimum size of 6m x 30m with a shared or owned garden. Social infrastructure (i.e. schools) is located along the Grand Avenue .
The outer ring is supposed for small scale industries and manufactories to keep the inhabitants away from emission and a green belt and a circle railway mark the border to the countryside.

4. City Expansion

To avoid problems which occur in expanding cities, the concept limits the city maximum population up to 32,000 people.
Further growing of the Garden City is not possible. Therefore a new city has to be founded in a reasonable distance of about 7 km to the others to protect the countryside. The cities are well connected through a railway system to exchange goods.

Garden Cities of To-morrow
(c) Ebenezer Howard, 1902

Garden Cities of To-morrow
(c) Ebenezer Howard, 1902

Garden Cities of To-morrow
(c) Ebenezer Howard, 1902

Garden Cities of To-morrow
(c) Ebenezer Howard, 1902