Melbourne As It Is and As It Ought to Be
Few in early Melbourne seemed to give much thought to the planning of their city, but the anonymous author of this pamphlet, written in 1849–50, indicates that the citizenry were not entirely without sentiment on this front.
Whatever is done now in planning towns, laying down lines of road, selecting sites for townships, &c, receives augmented importance from the impress it must give to the future. The main streets and approaches of a new town are, so to speak, the skeleton to which everything done subsequently must be referred and adapted. Collectively they form the rough sketch of the future city. If your first sketch is defective or deformed, not all the depth of Rembrandt, nor the splendour of Titian’s colouring, can hide or compensate for the original blunder: and so, if your first plan for a new city is defective, you may adorn, and alter, and contrive, and patch, but you cannot rectify the fundamental error…
Surveyors and systematic improvers have ever been as devotedly attached to straight lines and right angles as artists have detested them. They seem not to have been daunted by the fact— or more probably never thought of it—that throughout the whole range of nature, amid her unnumbered and matchless beauties, you can extremely rarely find a straight line—never a right angle.
What then are the true principles of which a town should be planned? What are the requirements to be fulfilled? Those requirements will be modified somewhat by climate and the national habit of the people, yet are they to a great extent the same in all ages and among all nations. Thus in all the western nations, convenience has dictated, the desirableness of forming an open space in the centre of the town, for public resort and traffic—whether called a Forum, a Piazza, a Platz or a Market Square…During the heats of summer and the rains of winter they equally offer an agreeable promenade, a pleasant rendezvous for the purposes of business and pleasure, a kind of public exchange for commerce, politics and news.
On one side of the square should rise the ‘local habitation’ of municipal dignity—the town hall—mixed up with, and recalling all the historic associations of the place, and throwing its long shadows over the paved square; its clock being the public timekeeper, and its great bell commemorating every occasion of public rejoicing and public sorrow. On another side of the square should be an establishment more closely identified with our own times— the post office, the focus of international and provincial intercourse, the colonial centre of a system extending its ramifications over the globe. In the midst of the square a fountain should throw up its sparkling column, cooling the air and refreshing the ear with the music of its falling splash; or if a fountain should be impossible, an equestrian statue or monumental column, or monolithic obelisk, might supply its place; though far inferior in beauty, as indeed everything must be, to a fountain, with its silvery jet, and its shower of falling brilliants, and its melodious murmur.
The public buildings next claim attention. Their sites should be determined by the natural levels of the town, by their respective uses, and by the public convenience. Elevated positions, easily accessible on all sides, are the most proper. Wherever placed, they should be united with each other by broad streets, twice the width of ordinary ways; and access should be given to them from all parts of the town, by means of similar great arterial streets, capacious enough to receive the living tide of men that will occasionally roll along them, to witness imposing spectacles and solemn ceremonials. Other similar main streets, diverging from the heart of the town, like the rays of the spider’s web, should give ready approach to the city from the suburbs and the surrounding country. The intersection of these principal streets will form open spaces of irregular form, which may be enlarged at pleasure by cutting off the corners of the converging masses of buildings. Whoever has seen such spots, when the slant rays of the rising or setting sun just catch the summits of the buildings, must have been struck with the magic effect of lengthening vistas and strongly contrasted light and shade. Such places or squares, in conjunction with the main arterial streets opening upon them, serve to ventilate and purify the most crowded quarters; the broad streets acting as tubes to convey the fresh air from the country into the heart of the town.
Our ideal town should have a noble river, margined with massive quays and public and private buildings, which, sweeping round with the windings of the stream, should charm the eye with all the beauty of evanescent lines and ever-shifting perspectives; while the massive stone bridge, contrasting with the gossamer delicacy of the suspension, should unite the opposite banks. Finally, Boulevards, or wide open roads, with rows of trees here and there, and broad footways, should encircle the town, and separate it from the suburbs, serving at once as streets and promenades.
Such is our ideal of a city. Now turn to Melbourne; look on this picture and on that! It may be objected that it was impossible to do all this in a new country; that we had neither money nor labour to do it. Very true: but have we done what we could? Have we laid out a noble plan which might hereafter be worthily filled up? Have we drawn our rough sketch aright, leaving it to time to complete the picture? Have we laid the foundations of a great edifice which might hereafter grow into an august pile? Alas, we have done nothing of all this. Melbourne boasts no large central square, possesses no main arterial streets, conducting to the heart of the town, ventilating its back lanes, and carrying health to its crowded quarters; has no broad suburban roads, giving easy access to the country, no boulevards, no great lines of communication uniting the public buildings. It has its river; but the lines of the houses on the banks, instead of gracefully sweeping round with the stream, run off at a tangent from it. In short, the only skill exhibited in the plan of Melbourne is that involved in the use of square and compass. We have planned our metropolis as we should plan a coal pit.