“The only difficulty is to create such a city, but that is a small matter to Utopians,” said the Times newspaper in 1898 in a slightly dismissive review of a small book with the unremarkable title of “Tomorrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform.”
The author, Ebenezer Howard — who was then 48 and a parliamentary reporter and son of a London confectioner and farm girl — never regarded the book as more than “a sketch or outline of what I hoped to accomplish.” It was the seemingly naive proposition that there was a new way of forming wealth “in which the productive forces of science and nature may be used with far greater effectiveness than at present and in which the distribution of the wealth forms will take place on a far juster and more equitable basis” and “to find work at wages of a higher purchasing power” outside the grinding poverty and desolation of 19th century urban industrial life.
He intended to implement his vision by purchasing an estate of some 6,000 acres that would be “legally vested in the names of four gentlemen of responsible position and undoubted probity and honor” who would hold the whole in trust for the tenants. The rents paid would then be reinvested into the estate to maintain and improve it
What he actually accomplished in the early years of the twentieth century was to found a city that was to influence the design of urban dwelling and the lives of millions of people for the next hundred years. He planned and built the environment in which this ideal could be realized. Letchworth Garden City was the first and is still the only true garden city in the world, but its influence is global. Derivatives appeared outside Moscow in 1923, Paris in 1912 and the 1930s, Tokyo in 1918 and in Africa from 1908 to the 1920s.
London at the end of the 19th century was a smoky, industrialized and, except for the privileged, a crowded and unsanitary place to live, the essence of Dickensian squalor. Howard saw that the economic way to change the slums of London was to buy land where it was cheap and build a town in such a way that slums could not develop.
Ebenezer Howard supported his argument by developing the idea of three magnets that exerted attraction on people. One was the benefit of the town — but with its associated negative qualities of “closing out of nature, Fogs and Droughts, Foul Air and Slums.” The second was the country — but it too had the disadvantages of “Lack of Society, Long Hours (of work), no Public Spirit and Lack of Amusement.” The third magnet, and the one he was determined to see become a reality, combined the positive features of town and country life into a self-financing community, where income, security and the benefits of country life could combine into a decent lifestyle for the working man.
His original drawing of the three horseshoe magnets arranged in a circle around a central block labeled “The People. Where will they go?” today form the logo on the commemorative obelisk that welcomes visitors to the garden city.
His vision and determination, and probably his informal connections inside the Houses of Parliament, eventually resulted in the purchase and building of his dream. On September the 1st 1903, the First Garden City Ltd. was registered as a company at Somerset House in London and given the task of creating the city, using the master plan drawn up by Parker and Unwin, well-known architects of their day. The site Howard chose for the project appeared in the Domesday Book, the record of all lands and property made by William the Conqueror, as “that weorthe in the lycce’ — the farm inside the fence. Located two miles west of the Roman north road and about 50 miles north of London, it was surveyed in 1086 and valued at six pounds (SR36.)
Now modern Letchworth, the garden city, still retains much of its original “cheap” housing for workers of a different generation. It is also partly an expensive commuter suburb with a smattering of £1 million (SR6 million) houses serving industrial Luton to the east and London, 30 minutes by fast train, to the south. The cheapest return fare is about three times the value of the village at 1086 prices. Many visionary projects fade into obscurity or depart from the founding principle. The self-financing independence of Letchworth, its determination to reinvest into the community and the juxtaposing of the best of the countryside and industry is still very much alive. The Letchworth Heritage Foundation under directorship of Stuart Kenny, the current embodiment of the Garden City Company, is charged with the responsibility of running the city. The foundation delegated its interests to 17 autonomous companies, all accountable to the Board of Management. A self confessed “benevolent dictator,” Kenny’s experience of re-generation of urban environments in Liverpool and single-minded dedication to the Howard’s founding vision of the community ideally fits him to the task.
“Many pleasant communities developed over recent decades calling themselves Garden Cities, and they have got a lot of things right. But they don’t have the unique feature of Letchworth which is the re-investment of the profit back into the community,” he said. They look attractive but the “original idea of Howard’s founding company was very firmly linked to the retention of the value of the environment. It’s why he started everything as leasehold; the company would always control the freehold.” It was part of Howard’s dream to have every resident only five minutes from green open space. That has certainly been retained. The striking features of the city are that the vivid green of grass, mature trees and the color of flowers throughout. Recently, the Heritage Foundation developed the Greenway, a 14-mile circular route between the urban and the rural estate. In the area, 40 thousand trees and tens of miles of hedges were planted and presented even more opportunities for people to access the countryside. However, over the years, the pragmatics of demographics and technology bring pressure to bear on communities. Kenny has had to balance the character of the town and the change in demographics. “It’s not Letchworth in aspic — it’s a living community and we will always try and retain the important elements, certainly always the best,” said Kenny, “but we have to change with the times.” “There’s always tension, and there is total accountability. The 30 governors elected by the community — and everyone in Letchworth has a vote — choose a Board of Management. They pay me to run what is effectively 17 companies,” said Kenny. “I do not run it like a local authority and go running to committees for decisions all the time asking for permission.”
However, he has to listen to the people who want to live in the town; they want modern facilities. The last few years have seen the ingress of a major supermarket, shopping and entertainment facilities. The “old guard” frequently raised objections and protested — but the developments were kept in character with the traditional style of the community. Kenny said: “Ironically, they now accept that most of the things we have done were right. Democracy is fine as long as it gives you the answer you want. It’s a case of benevolent dictatorship.”
The 17 business elements are all accountable and all have to make profits. In the last the years the value of the Heritage Commission has risen 53 percent. “The resulting rent income, the life blood of the organization, allows us to do the pleasant things we do.” Kenny has the responsibility but also the power to go with it. He acknowledges that he is also vulnerable. “The Foundation runs a hospital, cinema, farms and many disparate businesses. I have to be able to take decisions. It works. The moment it doesn’t, I am out of a job.”The key to the continued growth and unique character of the Garden City is that the Heritage Foundation always takes the long-term view of change. Short-termism or commercial ownership would require rapid and regular profits and just wouldn’t allow the risks. “We make long-term judgments that otherwise would seem to be commercial suicide,” Kenny said. But then, the Heritage Foundation is in business for a unique kind of profit; the ability to provide a better, more pleasant environment and lifestyle in an increasingly commercial and industrial world.
It is the embodiment of Howard’s dream “in which all the advantages of the most energetic and active town life, with all the beauty and delight of the country, may be secured in perfect combination. Human society and the beauty of nature are meant to be enjoyed together.”
