NATIONAL PARK SERVICE Park and Recreation Structures

AS HAS ALREADY BEEN STATED, administration and basic service facilities are considered to embrace park structural developments necessary for the control, supervision, and maintenance of an area together with those basic services which might be termed the park equivalents of the city's public utilities. Included are entrance and boundary structures, administration buildings as the seat of order and authority, signs as an instrument of control, equipment and maintenance buildings functioning to give continuity to desirable physical conditions attained, and structures for housing those persons charged with administering and maintaining the park preserve. Here also are those "first things" needed for safe use of an outdoor area by the public, namely, drinking water supply, toilets, rubbish disposal, and fire lookout structures, paralleling respectively the city's water, sanitation, rubbish disposal, and fire alarm systems. These are topped off with trail steps, crossings, culverts, and bridges— all of which seem somehow analogous to the accomplishments of the public roads agency of any governmental unit.

All the foregoing have highly practical functions to fulfil, to express and to aid which we do well to provide practical structures. Some are most properly located beyond the horizon of public view and such need carry no economic overburden of park-consciousness. No one of the several kinds of facilities here classified can be termed other than completely requisite in a park area of size, developed for a proper public use. Because so patently essential in a park, the most fitting conception of most of these will be without frills, which are better indulged in, if at all, in the less essential, but more importantly placed, public use structures that should follow only when the fundamental things have been provided.

What follows in this chapter has been said and written many times by the park-minded. It is something of a creed for construction environed by Nature and a pardonable repetition as preamble to any consideration of the many major and minor structures given place in natural parks. Because of their truly basic character, the points here recited may not be omitted, for all it is fully appreciated they will reach the ears of many readers as all too familiar echoes. They are the deep roots of a sound park construction, from which any new growth must stem.

The present discussion by no means applies solely to structures concerned with administration and basic facilities. In point of fact the fullest application of the principles will probably involve those structural items less committed to a stern practicability and more concerned with aesthetics by reason of greater contact by the public.

THE STYLE OF ARCHITECTURE which has been most widely used in our forested national parks, and in other wilderness parks, is generally referred to as "rustic." It is, or should be, something more than the worn and misused term implies. It is earnestly hoped that a more apt and expressive designation for the style may evolve, but until it appears, "rustic", in spite of its inaccuracy and inadequacy, must be resorted to in this discussion. Successfully handled, it is a style which, through the use of native materials in proper scale, and through the avoidance of severely straight lines and over-sophistication, gives the feeling of having been executed by pioneer craftsmen with limited hand tools. It thus achieves sympathy with natural surroundings and with the past.

In high, mountainous and forested regions the various structural elements of rustic construction—logs, timbers, rocks must be reasonably overscaled to the structure itself to avoid being unreasonably underscaled to surrounding large trees and rough terrain. In less rugged natural areas, the style may be employed with less emphasis on oversizing. For pleasing harmony, the scale of the structural elements must be reduced proportionately as the ruggedness and scale of the surroundings diminish. When this recession in scale reaches a point at which there is any hint of "twig" architecture masquerading under the term "rustic", the understanding designer will sense immediately its limitations and take refuge in some widely different style.

That the so-called rustic style offers, if anything, more pitfalls to failure than do the more sophisticated expressions, is not widely enough understood. And while generally speaking it lends itself to many semiwilderness regions perhaps better than the others, its use is by no means appropriate to all park areas. This is instantly demonstrated by recalling the wide range of dominant characteristics of our parks. Spectacular snow-covered mountain parks, dramatic primeval forests, open expanses of arid desert or limitless prairie, shifting sand dunes, gently rolling woodland and meadow, semitropical hammock are not to be served appropriately by a single structural expression. A range of architectural styles as varied as these backgrounds must be employed before our park architecture will have come of age.

Nothing is more indicative of lack of a proper sense of values in park technique than the frequently expressed determination to "make a feature" of a shelter or other park structure. The features to be emphasized and stressed for appreciation in parks with which we are here concerned are the natural features, not the man-made. After all, every structural undertaking in a natural park is only a part of a whole. The individual building or facility must bow deferentially before the broad park plan, which is the major objective, never to be lost sight of. The park plan determines the size, character, location, and use of each and every structure. Collectively, these should be properly interrelated; at the same time they must be closely and logically related to the park plan to insure its workability and harmony. Otherwise, there will result, as someone has expressed it, a costly but ineffectual collection of "spare parts."

Although a park structure exists solely for the use of the public, it is not required that it be seen from some distance. In its most satisfying expression, the park structure is designed with a view to subordinating it to its environment, and it is located so that it may profit from any natural screening that may exist. Suitable signs marking the way to a particular park building which has been appropriately retired are to be preferred to the shock of finding a building intruding at a focal point or visible for great distance.

THE SUBORDINATION OF A STRUCTURE to environment may be aided in several ways. One of these is to screen the building by locating it behind existing plant material or in some secluded spot in the terrain partly screened by some other natural feature. In the absence of such screening at a site otherwise well-suited for the function of the building, an adequate screen can be planted by repeating the same plant materials that exist nearby. Preferably, structures will be so located with reference to the natural features of the landscape that it is unnecessary to plant them out.

The color of the exteriors, particularly the wooden portions of park structures, is another most important factor in assimilation. Naturally such colors as occur in, and are commonest to, the immediate surroundings serve best. In general, warm browns will go far toward retiring a wooden building in a wooded or partly wooded setting. A light driftwood gray is another safe color. Where contrast is desired to give architectural accent to minor items, such as window muntins, a light buff or stone color may be sparingly used. Strangely enough, green is perhaps the hardest of all colors to handle, because it is so difficult to get just the correct shade in a given setting and because it almost invariably fades to some very different hue. A green roof might be expected to blend with the green of the surrounding trees, yet because a mass of foliage is an uneven surface, intermingling other colors, and broken up by patches of deep shadow and bright openings, and because a roof is a flat plane which reflects a solid continuous color, anything but harmony results. Brown or weathered gray roofs, on the other hand, blend with the colors of earth and tree trunks to much happier results.

While structures should be so designed and so located that it will not be necessary to plant them out, the proper introduction of vegetation along the foundations will gracefully obliterate the otherwise unhappy line of demarcation between building and ground. Rough rock footings artfully contrived to give the impression of natural rock outcroppings are a means of blending the structure to the site. A batter to a stone wall, with skillful buttressing of the corners, if done with true finesse, will often bring to the building that agreeable look of having sprung from the soil. Park structures giving that impression are of the elect.

Some park structures give hint of their designers' long dalliance in cities, where architectural design has become a matter of one façade. It should be remembered that park buildings will be viewed from all sides, and that design cannot be lavished on one elevation only. All four elevations will be virtually front elevations, and as such merit careful study. Admittedly, one side of major park buildings will always provide for service, and while enclosures on park areas are to be deplored and only installed where necessary, a palisade or some other suitable enclosure on this side of the building should completely screen all service operations.

As a rule, park structures are less conspicuous and more readily subordinated to their settings when horizontal lines predominate and the silhouette is low. Where snow conditions will permit, any feeling of verticality will be avoided by adopting a roof low in pitch, perhaps not more than one-third. Too frequently roofs needlessly dominate both structure and setting.

THE DEGREE OF PRIMITIVE CHARACTER in park structures that native materials can contribute depends entirely on intelligent use. Not alone the fact, but the quality of "nativeness" of materials is to be sought. Local stone, worked to the regularity in size and surface of cut stone or concrete block, and native logs, fashioned to the rigid counterpart of telephone poles or commercial timber, have sacrificed all the virtue of being native.

Rock work needs first of all to be in proper scale. The average size of the rocks employed must be sufficiently large to justify the use of masonry. Rocks should be placed on their natural beds, the stratification or bedding planes horizontal, never vertical. Variety of size lends interest and results in a pattern far more pleasing than that produced by units of common or nearly common size. Informality vanishes from rock work if the rocks are laid in courses like brick work, or if the horizontal joints are not broken. In walls the larger rocks should be used near the base, but by no means should smaller ones be used exclusively in the upper portions. Rather should a variety of sizes be common to the whole surface, the larger predominating at the base. Rock should be selected for its color and hardness.

Logs should never be selected because they are good poles. There is nothing aesthetically beautiful in a pole. Logs desirable in the park technician's viewpoint are pleasingly knotted. The knots are not completely sawed off. The textural surface of the log after removal of the bark is duly appreciated and preserved. Strong as may be the immediate appeal of structures built of logs on which the bark is left, we do well to renounce at once this transitory charm. If the bark is not intentionally stripped, not only will this process naturally and immediately set in, but the wood is subjected to aggravated deterioration through the ravages of insects and rot. It is in the best interests of the life of park structures, as well as in avoidance of a long period of litter from loosening bark, and of unsightliness during the process, that there has come about general agreement that the bark should be entirely sacrificed at the outset.

When the timber resources of the American frontier seemed limitless, it was usual to lay the sills of a log cabin directly on the ground, without supporting stone foundations. When after a time the logs in contact with the earth had rotted to a point where the cabin commenced to list and sag, another cabin was built, and the earlier one abandoned. This, it seems, in the economy of the frontier, was more reasonable than to have provided a foundation under the earlier cabin. Regardless of the pious respect a log cabin builder of the present must have for the traditions of the past, the changed economy of our day demands that his cabin be preserved against deterioration by the use of masonry or concrete supporting walls or posts that extend well above grade.

THIS OUTLINE OF THE FACTORS which make for the desirable and appropriately rugged, handcrafted character of park structures would be woefully incomplete if the matter of roof texture were left unconsidered. The heavy walls of rock and timber which are urged as fitting to a natural environment are assuredly created in vain unless crowned with roofs having related character. Surmounted with roofs trivial in aspect and thin in fact, the heavy walls appear robbed of justification. Verge members in gables should tend to be oversized, eave lines to be thick, and the roofing material to appear correspondingly heavy and durable. Where wood shingles or shakes are used on a roof, these should be fully an inch in thickness if possible, and the doubling of every fifth course or so, unless the building is quite small, will bring the roof texture into more appropriate scale with the structure itself and with the other materials that compose it. The primitive character we seek to create is furthered tremendously if we shun straight rigid eave and course lines in favor of properly irregular, wavering "freehand" lines. The straight edge as a precision tool has little or no place in the park artisan's equipment.

Since structures exist in parks through sufferance, it follows that it is highly desirable in every area to keep down the number of them. A small area can be ruined by a clutter of minor buildings which, however necessary their purpose, seem to have been forced into every vista to inflict a consciousness of the hand of man. Two functions, or even more, where closely related at a given location, should be combined under one roof. This is not in defense of excessively large buildings. It is sound practice only within reasonable limits. It is based on a belief that a localizing of infection is preferable to an irritating rash of trivial structures all over an area. The grouping of two or more facilities, under one roof tends to bring welcome variety to park structures generally. The limited range of expression of any simple, one-purpose building is vastly widened as other purposes are combined in it.

The structures necessary in a park are naturally less obtrusive if they are reasonably unified by a use of one style of architecture, limited construction methods, and not too great variety in materials. When a truly inappropriate style of architecture already exists in a park in which new work is contemplated, it is urged that the new buildings do not stubbornly carry on the old tradition. The best judgment available should be consulted to determine the style most appropriate to the area, and this then frankly and courageously launched. If the new style is the more appropriate one, it will prevail. Time will eliminate the earlier, inappropriately styled buildings for the disturbing contrasts they produce.

Bridge, Duchess County, New York