Commissioners' Plan of 1811
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Image:Grid 1811.jpg The Commissioners' Plan of 1811 was a proposal by the state legislature of New York adopted in 1811 for the orderly development and sale of the land of Manhattan between 14th Street and Washington Heights. The plan is arguably the most famous use of the grid plan and is considered by most historians to have been far-reaching and visionary. Some have criticized what they consider its prototypical monotony in comparison with irregular street patterns of older cities.
The plan was formulated by a three-member commission made up of Gouverneur Morris, the lawyer John Rutherford, and the surveyor Simeon De Witt.
The plan called for a regular grid of streets and property lines without regard to the topography of the island itself. The plan called for twelve numbered avenues running north and south roughly parallel to the shore of the Hudson River, as well as 155 orthogonal cross streets. The location of the cross streets was fixed as the boundaries of five-acre parcels that the land had previously been divided into.
Each avenue was to be one hundred feet (30 m) wide. The avenues in the center of the island were to be separated by 922 feet (281 m), and the avenues along the waterfront were to be slightly closer. The operating theory was that street frontage near the piers would be more valuable than the landlocked interior, the waterfront being the location of commerce and industry of the time, and so it would be to everyone's benefit to place avenues closer together at the island's edges.
The cross streets running east-west were to be only about 200 feet (61 m) apart, resulting in a grid of approximately 2000 long, narrow blocks. Taking the width of each street into account, there are exactly 20 blocks to a mile.
It should be noted that Central Park, the massive urban greenspace in Manhattan running from 8th to 5th Avenue and 59th to 110 St, is not a part of this plan, as Central Park was not envisioned until 1853.
External link
- The Commissioners' report of 1807, with a modern introduction and an 1811 map