third of the entire county and extending from the Hackensack to the Passaic River, has no public park or playground. The density of population in Harrison, Kearny and East Newark, and the fact. that its vacant lands are rapidly being built upon, caused the commission to give immediate attention to this section of the county.

The project of a county system of parks is comparatively new, and is being watched with great interest. While it is an excellent one, it has necessitated a campaign of education, and this campaign is still at its height. Hudson County is made up of a number of distinct local communities, each regarding its public affairs from an independent and isolated point of view, and generally in a spirit of competition and jealousy. The marked topographical divisions of the county have aggravated sectional feeling to an unusual degree. As a consequence there has been a disposition to look upon the county parks as of little value, except to the people of the district adjoining each park. This feeling, entertained by intelligent and generally well-informed citizens, presented a difficulty to be contended with; for, unquestionably, if it were maintained, it would nullify a large share of the value to the county of the properties proposed to be acquired for a park system.

A park standing by itself and little used, except by those living near it, would be very different from a park which is to stand as one of a system. In the latter case the fitness of a site will be found in its adaptation to supply some peculiar form of park refreshment that others of the system are ill-adapted to supply, or are naturally excluded from supplying. In a word, the design, under the policy which the commission is trying to establish, is to develop features in every locality which will give distinctive interest because of the development of altogether different attractions elsewhere.

If due advantage is taken of the particular capabilities of each section the result will be incomparably better than can possibly be gained under a policy, such as seems to be commonly entertained, of regarding each proposed park as an independent affair, deriving no interest from its relation to others, and imparting nothing of value. to the interest of others.

In a word, the commission is endeavoring to present the result. of a scientific plan to establish water and landscape views in situations either neglected, destroyed or condemned for such purposes by public opinion at least two generations previously. The park system

of Hudson County to-day presents to the people a clear indication of the ultimately beautiful and useful parks they will own. The foundation has been laid, so that the parks can be seen and enjoyed while their development into the complete and perfect system designed is being carried forward.

THE BOSTON METROPOLITAN PARK SYSTEM

BY WILLIAM B. DE LAS CASAS,

Chairman, Metropolitan Park Commission, Boston, Mass.

The original topography of Boston was ill suited for use by a great population. It was that of a peninsula, almost an island, rising abruptly from the harbor in three drumlin-shaped hills. Nearby were islands and peninsulas of similar formation, separated from each other and from the mainland by river and harbor, and by broad stretches of marsh reaching irregularly into the glacial slope from surrounding hills of almost solid rock. The panorama which they made was one of remarkable beauty and diversity, and there were many favorable spots along the rivers and upon the glacial slopes suitable for farming and fishing, which were soon sought out and occupied. Scattered villages grew up about these early settlements, and Boston came to be a city with many suburbs, each quite separate in local interest and government, yet all looking to it as their chief city. In 1880 the aggregate population within a radius of twelve miles was about eighty thousand; it is now almost one million four hundred thousand.

The development of these separate localities, and the many changes of topography required to accommodate a rapidly increasing population, gradually brought the community of interest in many ways, which, in other parts of the world, has usually led to combination into one great city. But Boston and its suburbs have sought union chiefly to provide for the general necessities, such as water, sewerage and parks, and in other respects have retained their local forms of government.

The method adopted has been that of creating, through the agency of the state, metropolitan districts and metropolitan commissions, with the specific authority to provide for these districts trunk lines or main features which could not, or would not be likely to be provided by the separate municipalities. These metropolitan works have in no wise interfered with the local autonomy of the several municipalities; and each has its local water system, fed by

the metropolitan main lines, its local sewerage, which discharges into the metropolitan main lines, and such local parks, wholly within the town or city lines, as were secured either in advance of the metropolitan system, or subsequently to provide for local uses not likely to be provided for by metropolitan parks.

tem.

In many cases the local parks alone make a very complete sysFor example, Boston has parks aggregating about five hundred acres, the larger part of which are included in Franklin Park, the Fenway, Jamaica way, the Arborway and Arboretum, and Columbia Road and Marine Park, all of which connect and form an encircling parkway through the midst of the southerly half or part of the city. In addition it has many small parks and playgrounds. All are highly developed city parks, and have cost approximately sixteen million dollars. The nearby city of Cambridge has acquired and partly developed its frontage on Charles River for about four miles, and provided a number of playgrounds at an aggregate cost of about two million five hundred thousand dollars. Other cities and towns within the district have provided for themselves similar playgrounds and parks, and the city of Lynn has acquired for mixed park and water purposes over two thousand acres of high, rocky, well-wooded land on its northern borders. Altogether these local parks aggregate about five thousand acres, and have cost about twenty million dollars.

The metropolitan park system resulted from public agitation by men who rightly believed, and with constant earnestness urged, that increasing population was destroying the beauty of scenery and the opportunities for recreation which nature had given so abundantly about Boston. In 1892 a metropolitan park commission of three was appointed to investigate the matter. Their report led to the active work which has resulted in the present metropolitan park system. The initial legislation, chapter 407 of the acts of 1893, authorized an unsalaried commission of five to name its own chairman and have jurisdiction within a metropolitan district made up of Boston and thirty-seven surrounding cities and towns. This jurisdiction was limited only by the statutory definition of its purposes, and by the amount of appropriations. The powers of the board have since been somewhat enlarged and more completely defined by many acts, giving authority to provide and build parkways, bath

houses and other park structures, and by appropriations which have increased the original appropriation of $1,000,000 to a present approximate appropriation of $14,000,000.

As a result of the discretion and powers thus delegated, metropolitan parks or reservations aggregating over 10,000 acres have been secured. Of these about seven thousand five hundred acres include the most notable rock and woodland of the district. Blue Hills Reservation, twelve miles from the state house, contains 4,700 acres of almost unbroken woodland rising into many hilltops, of which Great Blue Hill, at the westerly end, 640 feet above the ocean, is the highest. The reservation is five miles long, and its easterly end is within one-half mile of the harbor. It has but one large pond and but a few acres of open fields. Only a few miles of public highway cross it, but about twenty miles of woods roads. have been built within its limits, and three parkways, Neponset River to the westerly end, Blue Hills to the center and Furnace Brook to the easterly end, are planned to give convenient approaches and connection from Stony Brook Woods, Neponset River, Quincy Shore and outside parkways, and some of the more important highways which run through the denser population and gradually converge into the Boston park system. The reservation is easily reached by electric cars.

Middlesex Fells, five miles from the state house, contains 2,200 acres of rocky woodland, while immediately adjoining is a metropolitan water reservation of 1,000 acres, which together make in effect one reservation of 3,200 acres. It is bordered by five cities and towns with large populations, and is crossed by seven miles of public highway. The scenery and topography are diversified with 600 acres of water in many ponds and streams and numerous hilltops, of which Bear Hill, 350 feet above the ocean, is the highest. Over twenty miles of woods roads have been built since it was acquired, and three parkways give approach to it: Mystic Valley on the west, Fellsway in the center and Lynn Fells at the east.

Mystic Valley Parkway, of such size and amplitude as to be more a reservation than a parkway, runs along the Mystic Lakes and Mystic River, and will connect with Alewife Brook and Fresh Pond Parkways to Charles River, and at Fellsway with Revere Beach Parkway to Revere Beach and the east and north shores;