How DC got so planned

DC is one of the most planned cities in the world. Purpose built as a national capital, the network of parks and grids conceptualized by Peter Charles L'Enfant embeds a symbolic system into the city itself. But as timeless as the monumental core of DC wants to look, the majority of it dates to a much later period. The iconic axis between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial was only envisioned as we know it in 1902, and not completed until 1937. That period of time, between the Spanish American War and World War II is essential to understanding the design review processes in DC. The agencies that are reviewing Trump's projects were created in order to build the Washington, DC you know. This is actually what my book is about.

In the late 1890s, the United States was becoming a world power, through massive economic growth and imperial expansion throughout the Western Hemisphere. Among American elites, there was a growing sense that the Nation's Capital was too dinky for this kind of powerhouse. The White House, which contained the President's offices as well as his residence, had been too small for a long time. Government officials and local businessmen floated a number of different schemes, all of which horrified leading cultural thinkers. The president of the American Institute of Architects, Glenn Brown, saw in this rudderless desire for a grand capital to position architects as expert professionals, educated in science and cultivated in taste. Acting as what political scientists call a "political entrepreneur," he staged a conference in 1900 that solidified the AIA's reputation and set two pivotal events in motion. 

First, it stopped a plan to expand the White House by attaching full height wings to James Hoban's fairly modest mansion. In its place, Brown and allied architects like Charles McKim convinced Theodore Roosevelt to adopt the scheme that defined the White House until October 2025. The original residence would be connected by discreet colonnades to wings that were lower, smaller, and hidden behind trees. The second event Brown initiated was the development of a new plan for the capital, known as the McMillan Plan. Recruiting the most celebrated designers of the day, they led a pop-up office to produce a vision that was a fusion of European grandeur and American technology. It was particularly influenced by the gardens of the French royal palace at Versailles, the modifications to Paris done under Emperor Napoleon III, and the 1893 World's Fair. The last of these was an exuberant display of American wealth and technology, wrapped in very French buildings. The prosperity and prestige of the design caught the attention of the wealthy and powerful in America, leading to a run of efforts known as the City Beautiful Movement. 

However magnificent intentions require magnificent appropriations, and Congress simply was not interested in spending those sums on people who did not vote for them. Development proceeded piecemeal, largely informally. Members of the McMillan Commission, particularly Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr., intervened repeatedly in building projects to make them comply with the spatial layout and aesthetics of the McMillan Plan. Ultimately, this led to the creation of a Commission of Fine Arts in 1910. This commission, consisted of expert members appointed by the president who would then advise the President as he conducted projects. Brown later formed informal coalition of DC elites to get the Lincoln Memorial built at its current site, as the McMillan Plan prescribed. However, this left every project as an exhausting fight. Far from being a model for American cities, it was a cautionary tale. 

Consequently, in 1922, an organization called the American Civic Association was looking to prove the value of urban planning, which had expanded in scope since the McMillan Plan. They saw in DC the potential to prove the discipline's value. It had nationwide attention, it had an inspiring plan that had never been implemented, rapid growth, and most importantly it did not have its own representative government. It was governed directly by Congressional committees and administered by three presidential appointees. That may seem like a negative to you, but the ACA saw this as a way to elevate supposed professional expertise and avoid corrupt local politics. They were big proponents of the city manager model of government. The ACA's director, a woman named Harlean James, then developed a three-pronged strategy to persuade Congress. Interested professional groups like the AIA would form one arm. For the second, she recruited a patrician Progressive named Frederic Delano to organize a new local elite coalition. She herself would organize a mass movement outside of DC that would lobby their representatives in Congress. She even personally drove around the country with her mother to organize local chapters. This last element was decisive. 

Over three basic campaigns, they created planning board called the National Capital Park and Planning Commission (NCPPC) and funded it. They staffed the commission with their members and folded DC's independent parks agency into the National Park Service, to which they had deep ties. With the AIA, they expanded the powers of the Commission of Fine Arts to cover private property. On the side, they created DC's public housing authority and began to dabble in urban renewal. When the New Deal began, steered a large amount of public works money towards implementing a modernized version of McMillan Plan that reflected a bigger government, more social concern, and accommodated the automobile above all else. They also segregated DC in a way that had not been since the Civil War. Rather than eliminating corruption, elite management of DC simply allowed the wealthy have closed-door influence and exclude everyone else. 

NCPPC's role in segregation made them a major villain. Black activists flipped the script, making them commission a target of nationwide campaign. In turn the Truman Administration stripped them of their park powers and reconstituted the agency as the National Capital Planning Commission. The National Association of Realtors likewise took urban renewal powers away from the agency, just in time for Southwest DC to become a prototype for national redevelopment of "blighted" areas. 

NCPC and the CFA persisted in their capacities until Civil Rights activists secured the passage of the Home Rule Act, which created a local representative government for DC's residents. NCPC was reconstituted to include representatives from DC and its government, while some of its planning powers were handed over to DC's government. Meanwhile, the historic preservation movement had kicked off, leading to the passage of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966. This created a national register of historic properties, codified standards, and created a process in Section 106 of that law. The White House, Capitol, and Supreme Court were all specifically excluded from this law. Instead, the residence (the original mansion) was declared a museum, an informal Committee for the Preservation of the White House was created, and a White House Historical Association was founded. Simultaneously, the environmental movement led to the passage of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1970. The principal effect of this on DC has been the requirement for the assessment of environmental impacts. Finally, a public-purpose authority called the Pennsylvania Avenue Development Corporation was created to revitalize that street, and then dissolved by Newt Gingrich. 

The last major change to the planning procedures came through the Commemorative Works Act of 1986. This act was a response to controversies around the Vietnam Veterans and FDR memorials. It set out a specific procedure for the planning anything that memorializes anyone or anything in DC. It created a sort of super-commission called the National Capital Memorial Advisory Commission (NCMAC), set specific procedures, and added a level of Congressional approval for projects that are built in the monumental core laid out in the McMillan Plan. This was revised in 2003, after the construction of the World War II Memorial, to forbid new monuments and memorials on the strip between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial, the White House, the Ellipse, and around the Tidal Basin. A few projects have received direct exceptions through Congress.