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Show CITY ENGINEERING. The City Council passes upon the recommendation recommen-dation of the City Engineer. In passing some discretion dis-cretion should be used. Engineers as a rule are one idead men. That is, they have fixed ideas upon anything pertaining to their profession and they hug those ideas to their bosoms, believing that according to all mathematical rules there is not a flaw in their position. They regard neither expense on one hand nor the harmony of the landscape on the other. The lower half of the city Of St. Louis was ruined and turned over to factories and second-hand dealers by an exactly scientific, one idead engineer. This city has generally gen-erally been dominated by railroad engineers from the beginning. The work has destroyed the harmony, har-mony, the rhythm so to speak, of a hundred sections sec-tions of the cjty, caused the destruction of hundreds hun-dreds of shade trees and brought untold expense to the city and property owners. "We call the attention of the council to one special piece of work. Between Twelfth and Thirteenth East on First South street, the grade B was established some years ago, as-is, evident B by the car tracks and paved sidewalks up to B Twelfth Bast. B Now a new grade has been established and a B fine cement sidewalk laid on that grade all the fl Way from Twelfth to Thirteenth East on the south B side of First South. It will cost the stret car fl company, the residents and the city certainly a B very large sum to reduce the street to that grade. fl We ask the Mayor and council to go and ex- B amine that situation and then to see if they can fl find any reason fur the programme marked out B by the City Engineer. If they can find a land- B scape gardener in the city we ask them to take H him along and without giving away what they B have in mind, ask him which, to his eye, would B make the more beautiful street, to follow the old fl grade or conform to the new one. B The Council recently visited Seattle and saw B the streets where the engineer has conformed B as nearly as possible to the natural undulations B of the site. Which plan strikes the Council-as B tho best? B The truth is this. There are railroad engineers, B city engineers, mining engineers and many others B all distinct branches, of thp same profession, H and a man trained in one branch is not much H more competent to take charge of another branch B than a physician is always prepared to perform B a difficult surgical operation. We think it would B be economy to send the city engineer east or B west, paying his expenses sad salary, that he B may seen city engineering from new standpoints. B There is nothing in the foregoing intended to H x be either malicious or harsh: It is written with B none but kindly feelings for oither the engineer H or council, but with the hope that it may result IB in saving much expense by stopping unnecessary H changes and heart-burning. |