Steady as They Go: The Olmsted’s Legacy on Portland’s Parks

The City Beautiful Movement as a City Planning Guide for PDX

Portland has become known for a great many things of late. We are alternately the beer capital of North America (at least), the best place to get a cup of good coffee in the nation (don’t tell Seattle), and the donut capital of the world (if you believe in the pink box). But long before someone thought to skewer a man-shaped donut with a pretzel stick, Portland was known for other things, among them, our fantastic park system.

But a park system like we enjoy in Portland, with one of the largest urban forest reserves in the world, as well as the world’s smallest park, does not simply happen accidentally. It takes careful planning to enjoy the level of livability that Portland natives take for granted, while also being a prime reason why people are flocking to the city from across the globe.

Perhaps most important and a hidden secret of our vast and green outdoor spaces is the notion that Portland’s legacy of public parks is largely thanks to a family you may never have heard of: The Olmsted’s.   

The Olmsted Brothers

The Olmsted Brothers Company was one of the nation’s earliest landscape design and architecture firms. John Charles and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr., the sons of Frederick Law Olmsted, the head of the nation’s first landscape architecture firm, formed the company back in 1898. The brothers helped to found the American Society for Landscape Architects, and designed park systems for many cities in the U.S. as well as the portions of the National Park System.

There were many high profile projects undertaken by the Olmsted Brothers between 1898 and the 1940s, including the grounds of both Oregon State University and the University of Washington, the Portland Park system, the road systems in Yosemite National Park, and the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and a parks plan for the City of Los Angeles, which was largely ignored.

The Olmsted Plan for Portland

Portland commissioned the Olmsted Brothers to draw up an urban greenspace plan for the city in 1903, during the run-up to the 1905 Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition. Portland was a city of only 161,000 prior to the exposition, and grew to population of 270,000 in the five years that followed it. While this massive growth spurt was happening, the City of Portland was scrambling to implement the Olmsted Plan for the city's development, including its securing of neighborhood and regional parks, as well as the construction of scenic boulevards and pedestrian pathways.

Emanuel Tillman Mische, a former employee of the Olmsted Brothers, was hired by the city to manage the implementation of the Olmsted plan, but not until 1908, while the population explosion of the young city was already underway. Mische served as Parks Superintendent for the city until 1914, but struggled with putting the Olmsted plan into action as real estate prices were rising and development was running wild.  

In the century that has followed, however, Portland has continued to use the Olmsted Plan for the basis of its city planning.

The City Beautiful Movement’s Legacy in Portland

The City Beautiful Movement was a reform movement within architectural and urban circles that rose to popularity in North America during late 19th and early 20th centuries. Originally, the movement was associated with many of the larger cities of the East, including Detroit, Chicago, and Washington. But thanks to the Olmsted Brothers and other proponents, the movement came to be the governing philosophy of city planning in the young cities of the West, too.

In Portland, we have the movement and the Olmsted family to thank for the International Rose Test Garden and the rest of Washington and Forest Parks, Mount Tabor Park, and Willamette Park. On top of these landmarks, we also owe the Olmstead family a debt of gratitude for the forty-plus mile system of bike paths and pedestrian walks that connect many of the city’s original parks with many of the additional green spaces that have been set aside as Portland has continued to grow.