sitte and internal reserves

Five or six internal reserves appear in this design for Marienberg, c. 1903, by Camillo Sitte. A quick look at google map seems to suggest the plan was not followed at all, but perhaps I'm reading it wrongly.

Hypothetical Internal Reserves 1927

The following appears in the Melbourne Argus, 7 June 1927, in the papers 'Real Estate and Building' section. It is unattributed but is in fact by Saxil Tuxen, Melbourne's leading town planning advocate-practitioner of the 1920s.



Garden suburbs: square-cut plans condemned.
Land subdivisions or house sites on the "designed" or "garden suburb" plan is winning its way around Melbourne without any compelling legislation to support it. Several profitable sales of suburban estates have been made lately by subdividers, who have abandoned the common scheme of chequer-board partition of allotments and introduced curved roads, plantations, garden reserves, and other amenities advocated by the scientific town-planners.

It has generally been considered that the best way to subdivide land to make money is to take a paddock as near as possible to a railway or tram, and peg it out in rectangular plots, with straight streets, thus obtaining the utmost possible length of frontage by the rules of geometry, and ensuring that every available foot will return money in the retail sale. In the "designed" subdivision geometrical methods are also followed, but the estate is divided by curves, and the lines of the streets converge into a common centre, usually a place for shops, near the railway station. In departing from the chequer-board plan the surveyor not only produces allotments of irregular shape, but as a rule has fewer lots to a given area. He also parks out plots for tennis courts, playgrounds, and street gardens. But he puts character into every block, and with the help of the curves provides every resident with a view, or at least a "vista." In a garden subdivision backyards on one side of the street do not face the front doors of the houses opposite. The advantage of this planning is generally admitted, but the objection that lost lengths of frontage mean loss of money often proves fatal to its adoption. Some years ago a proposal that "Designed" subdivisions should be the only kind allowed by law resulted in strong protests, and the idea was not carried out, but to-day the demand for house allotments is not so keen as it was, and subdividers, to attract buyers, are beginning to have garden suburb "lay outs" made for them. Two plans comparing a "chequer-board" and garden suburb layout are illustrated. The piece of land dealt with lies between a main road and a railway station.

On the chequer-board plan there are 155 lots of 50 ft frontage and 150 ft to 170 ft in depth. This is laid out by the ordinary parallel ruler method, without giving any thought to subdivisional design. The objections to it are that there is no direct access for traffic along the mian road wishing to proceed to the railway station, or vice-versa. This traffic would have to follow an erratic course through the subdivision with sharp corners difficult to negotiate, making all the roads in this subdivision of equal value, or rather, equally valueless for the purpose, and therefore all the roads would be required to be constructed to the same standardd. All the roads are of a width of 50 ft., which is insufficient if the traffic were at all heavy. Similarly no lots in the subdivision have direct access to both the main road and the railway station, and many of them have no direct access from either of these points; in other words, the whole lay-out gives a "round the corner" aeffect. The long straight streets are monontounous, and likely to form avenues for wind. The westerly vista on street D and southerly on street E are closed by the backyards of houses facing the railway station.

Sunless Houses

The lots on the north side of streets B, C and D have a southerly aspect and, therefore, if built close to houses on adjoining allotments, receive no sun except on the back of the house. These comprise 49 out of the total of 155 lots. The lozenge-shaped allotments facing the main road are very objectionable. Five of the lots are very bad shape and wasteful off land. There is no provision whatever for reserves in this subdivision. The lots on the western side of street E face a long line of paling side fences, which form the eastern side of the street. The lots on the western end of street D are facing the back yards of the houses on the opposite side of the street. The natural location for shops would be, of course, in the neighbourhood of the railway station, but there is no area on which all the traffic from the subdivision is concentrated and which would, therefore, be suitable for that purpose.

Experts can see no advantages whatever in this style of subdivision, except that the cost of surveys (which, anyhow, is a very trifling proportion of the value of the land) would be small; and that the work can be carried out by inexperienced men without giving any thought to the subject.

The "Designed" Plan.

In the "designed" plan a direct road 60 ft. in width has been designed between the railway sstation and the main road. This will be the main traffic route for the subdivision. the areas on both sides have been plotted with numerous turns, so that there are no long, monotonous lines of roads. Vistas are closed by front gardens. Side lines to streets have been avoided, except at the main road junctions, where they are hidden round the corner from most of the residences. The two small plantations marked "P" permit of a picturesque grouping of homes round them. One acre and a half has been set apart for children's playgrounds and tennis courts. Only a small proportion of the lots face south, and the majority of them are at an angle with the cardinal points, and so get sun on either side during part of the day. There is a natural , well-defined business area opposite the station.

Unnamed Reserve, Phillip, ACT

The reserve featured here is close to Swinger Hill (signposted above)in the Australian Capital Territory, or perhaps is in it (the boundaries of Swinger Hill are somewhat difficult to define; some locals suggest it is a geographical feature, rather than a suburb). More information on the origins of Swinger Hill here, and some parodic yet insightful information here.

Once again, I am presenting a space which is only arguably 'internal', as it does feature around 60 m of street frontage in addition to the two pathway entrances. That said, it is a most interesting space as it (1) features a childcare centre (and a playground), thus ascribing the space a particular use and (2) as you can see from the google map here, it is at the centre of a walkway network; see also in the pictures below the distinctive white bollards which indicate to drivers the presence of a walkway crossing streets.

Prospect Reserve, Avondale Heights

Why would anyone venture down this laneway in Avondale Heights?

This is one of the internal reserves success stories of Melbourne; a local community has been encouraged by local government to use their internal reserve for agricultural pursuits. It brings the residents together and has produced a valued space for passive recreation.

And this is Sam, long-term resident (be built his house in the early 1980s, the first on its site). He migrated to Australia from Macedonia in the early 60s. He is one of the most active gardeners in the reserve.


See the reserve at Google Maps here

Pictures of the reserve to the south of this one are here.

White Hart Lane Estate, Tottenham UK #2

My original post on White Hart Lane appears here. My colleague Robert Freestone has supplied some photographs he took of the internal spaces in 2002 (though the hand-coloured appearance of the middle picture in particular suggests something more like 1902). It appears that the space actually has locked gates and so is not accessible to the general public, a factor which may disqualify it for true Internal Reserve status. Any confirmation or further information would be welcome.

Taree Street Reserve, Chigwell, Tasmania 2002

Chigwell is a suburb of Hobart that has a bad reputation for no apparent reason (locals are witheringly referred to as 'Chiggers').

I visited this reserve in February 2002 and found it relatively featureless and unused.

See the Google Maps view here. It doesn't seem that much has changed in the last 9 years, aside from the entranceway (image at top) has apparently been cleared of trees and can now be accessed by cars.

Arcade Way Reserve, Avondale Heights 2011

Yesterday I visited two of the many internal reserves designed by Walter Burley and Marion Mahony Griffin at Avondale Heights, in Melbourne's west. In many respects I would suggest that this is an example of best practice approach to internal reserves, and Moonee Valley Council is to be commended on its proactive work here. Firstly, the reserve is labelled, and a path through it is clearly visible. I suspect that the Council or its predecessor at some time in the last 83 years has purchased a house lot-sized block at the two extant entrances (there were originally intended to be, and perhaps were, more) so as to create greater visibility to the Arcade Way Reserve.


Even more impressive, an explanatory notice has been provided to give information on local indigenous plants. Many IRs have contributed to the retention of local plant species (this was often the intention of the Griffins). Pity about the graffiti:

Active recreation is encouraged in the form of a basketball hoop and concreted area, and there is playground equipment with a seat nearby. The purpose of the mound behind the hoop is not immediately apparent but perhaps it was envisaged participants-spectators might use it as seating?

I realise I might give the impression here that I like to go to secluded areas and take photographs of women passing by, which is not the case. In the short time that I was in the reserve (a warm Saturday afternoon) with my two dogs, I observed three other users: a young man whose dog ran into the reserve and then ran out (I later saw them walking the streets); the woman below, who was walking a dog as well: both just walked right through the reserve; and another woman who had, I think, come out of her house when her dog was barking at mine going past, and then decided her dog needed a quick walk. If this is what happened I suppose it's a classic case of the impossibility of 'fly on the wall' research. Incidentally all dogs (except mine!) were 'off lead'.

At sporadic points around the edge of the reserve, residents have sectioned off small areas for agricultural purposes. It would appear many of these people are already doing extensive vegetable growing in their own backyards, and have taken the opportunity to spread out a little way. I believe this is actively encouraged by Moonee Valley council. The state of the planting areas are very varied, ranging from neglected to well-maintained. Ditto the occasional fruit trees.


There are a number of gateways from backyards into the reserve (I didn't do a systematic count, but I would guess about half of the yards have these gates). In some instances gates are well disguised: this one would barely be recognisable as a gate, except that for some strange reason there is a perspex shelter above it:
This is also a gate:

I will post about the second reserve visited (or, rather, revisited) - to the immediate north of this one, shortly. View them both on Google Maps here.