Csepely-Knorr Luca: Barren Places to Public Spaces. A History of Publick Park Design in Budapest 1867-1914 (Budapest, 2016)
The Beginnings - The Urban Development of Pest-Buda and their Public Green Spaces Prior to the unification
The embellishment of the capital - The role of the green spaces in the writings of Count István Széchenyi “Everything seethes from the heart - Hungary's heart is Pest and Buda. The poor heart is certainly dusty and dirty, and we cannot change this, but we can help. I cannot place the heart elsewhere, buti can beautify it.”62 Count István Széchenyi (1791-1861), a political leader and author of great importance in the reform era, dealt with the questions of how to improve the “gracefulness and beauty of Pest” in various writings.63 With the development of the city his main goal was to create a real capital where “those who aim to do things for the common good will come together".64 Therefore his main goals were political, and he wanted to achieve this through locating the important amenities there. This was one of the reasons he fought for the setting up of the Scientific Academy. He was one of the first who stood up for the unification of the two cities, Buda and Pest, and he wanted to call it ‘Honderű’ (patriotic serenity).65 City unification was his goal when he started to campaign for a permanent bridge between the two sides of the Danube. His ideas about fighting against the "dust and mud of Pest-Buda” are less well-known.66 In his opinion, the key to improving the standard of the environment lay in the creation of green spaces in the city, and he soon recognised the role parks play in health, social and tourist issues as well. Further, he described an early plan for creating a green system: besides the planting of trees, he recommended a semi-circular green ring around the city. This was proposed in order to strengthen the link between the rural and urban areas, as well as cleaning the air from dust. Among his suggestions the creation of new, suburban-style villa districts appeared; he also proposed the creation of an area for a summer resort in the valleys above Óbuda for the middle classes and for tradesmen. And he also suggested building further villa districts in the area of Kamaraerdő (in the southern part of the Buda side) and close to Városliget Park as well. The idea of circular green systems first appeared in the writings of John Claudius Loudon at the beginning of the 19th century, who also discussed public parks.67 It is an extremely important aspect of Loudon’s work that his progressive ideas about the role green spaces play in cities went far beyond his contemporaries. In 1829 he published his essay 'Hints on Breathing Places for the Metropolis, and for Country Towns and Villages, on fixed Principles' in which he discussed his ideas about city planning and development.68 His ideal green layout for London combined a circular and a radial system, and was planned on the balance between the built up and green areas of a city; this became famous more than sixty years later through the writings of Ebenezer Howard. Starting from the city centre of London, he wanted to create alternating, concentric built-up and open-space rings. His goal was that no citizen would live more than half a mile away from a green area, which also provided facilities for leisure. He intended the central zone to be a centre for politics and business; this was to be divided from the residential areas by a green ring. This green ring accommodated gardens with both educational and leisure roles, also giving space for libraries and museums. The combination of radial avenue- and a circular ring road system leading to and from the city was also a progressive idea, which is still valid today. Although the first complex city renovation was only realised later in the French capital (which will be examined later), solutions similar to Loudon’s ideas about a systematic green ring around the city and his road system became key urban design elements in many European cities. In his writings Széchenyi discussed the creation of individual parks as well as the larger-scale systematic green areas. Most probably as a result of his experiences during his travels in Britain, he recommended the opening of private gardens to the public, and the development of these into pleasure gardens, for example Margaret Island.69 In these ideas both English and German models - such as the writings of Hirschfeld and Nebbien - played a crucial role. In terms of German examples, it is important to mention the role Prince Hermann von Piickler-Muskau played in the development of Széchenyi’s ideas, which he knew personally. Piickler Muskau’s theoretical writing, ‘Andeutungen über Landschaftsgärtnerei' and his own private garden, which was also open to the public, most probably served as an important precedent for Széchenyi.70 Among his ideas he also mentioned the creation of a game park in the woodlands of Buda and a pheasantry on Csepel Island.71 He wanted to create a new ‘Promenade’ next to the bridge he proposed (the Chain Bridge today), parallel to the one Hild proposed in his previously-discussed Embellishment Plan. Sadly, his plan was only partly realised later, due to the sale of the land for property development. Széchenyi also worked for the creation of a new public park. On 15 th March 1842 he recommended the creation of a small ‘Promenadesquare’ (Sétatér) to the general assembly of the city of Pest. He asserted the social importance of a space like this, arguing that: “I could say that I want to create a promenade for political reasons. The people have to gather closer together! But the strong ones, who were born to be leaders, and who feel talented to do so, don’t want to gather together with others, and the meek ones always hide and turn inwards. They need to be brought together! A Promenade-square is the best tool to create this gathering, where people from all classes can come together. (...) I ask the honourable orders to support me in the creation of a Promenade-square, as I already said, for political reasons.”72Széchenyi’s argument about the role public parks should play in the social life of cities derives from Hirschfeld’s theories. However, as the next chapter will investigate, this became crucial by the mid- 19th century throughout Europe, and not just in the German-speaking countries. Széchenyi founded the so-called ‘Promenade-square Society’, and he administered its incomes in his diary He chose the empty plot next to the so-called ‘New Building’, which belonged to the military.73 After long debates in 1845, first the Austrian and later the Hungarian commanders-in-chief gave permission for the transformation of the area into a promenade. On 3rd March 1846 Széchenyi’s wife, Countess Crescence Seilern, planted the first plane tree, coming from Archduke Joseph’s nursery on Margaret Island and in Alcsút.74 A ‘Limonadenhütte’was built in the newly-founded park in 1847, and the area had its own gardener as well.7S To make maintenance easier, horses, dogs and wagons were not allowed into the park, and it was surrounded by an iron fence. According to the inventory of 1848, there were 1113 trees planted, and the paths were covered with gravel.76 In the 1850s live music performances were also held, which gives a hint about the use of the space and about the importance it played in the social life of Pest. It is not known if there was a separate Bandstand in this park. This type of structure, which had already appeared in Hirschfeld’s writings, became highly esteemed elements in public 25
