The Group Plan of 1903 was the brainchild of a commission composed of Daniel H. Burnham, John M. Carrere, and Arnold R. Brunner, three nationally respected architects. Burnham, the chairman of the commission, had been the guiding force of the Chicago World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893. The Exposition inaugurated a new and dynamic era in American urban planning and architecture, of which Cleveland was an early beneficiary. The carefully organized plan and classical design of the buildings were unlike anything Americans had seen before: individual buildings were designed to form a harmonious ensemble through the use of uniform cornice heights, repeated arcades, classical architectural motifs, and carefully controlled vistas through tree-lined avenues and parks. The Exposition heralded the beginning of the City Beautiful movement, which was intended to bring a measure of order and uniformity to America’s booming, but unplanned, industrial cities.

As Daniel Burnham related to Cleveland officials, “the jumble of buildings that surround us in our cities contributes nothing valuable to life; on the contrary, it sadly disturbs our peacefulness and destroys that repose within us which is the true basis of all contentment. Let the public authorities, therefore, set an example of simplicity and uniformity…resulting in beautiful designs entirely harmonious with each other.” Progressive Cleveland mayor Tom L. Johnson (term 1901-08), whose statue can be found on the northwest quadrant of Public Square, was quick to apply the City Beautiful aesthetic to Cleveland. Civic leaders were eager to eliminate the wide area of slums northeast of Public Square, which stretched from Superior Street to the lakeshore, transforming it into a new civic center for the city.

The plan called for monumental public buildings of similar scale, material, and cornice height to be designed in a classical architectural style. The centerpiece of the 1903 Group Plan was to be a 500-foot-wide Mall, running south to north from Rockwell Avenue to the lakefront, where a monumental railroad station was planned, but never built. The Group Plan embodied Burnham’s advice to “Make no little plans; they have no spirit to stir man’s blood…Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical plan once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing asserting itself with growing insistence.”

The Group Plan was enthusiastically endorsed by the mayor, the city council, the press, and the public. In 1904, Harper’s Weekly exclaimed, “No city in the country, outside Washington, has undertaken the systematic development of public architecture and package on so splendid a scale as has the city of Cleveland…it is the most significant forward step in the matter of municipal art taken in America.”

--- Marc Vincent, PhD, from Cleveland Public Library – The Art, Architecture, and Collections of the Main Library

“So, a space was going to symbolize the City of Cleveland, with this long low architecture. But that, of course, never happened,” says architectural historian Walter Leedy. The documentary Downtown Cleveland explains that Oris and Mantis Van Sweringen’s plan to build a new railroad terminal in Public Square helped torpedo the completion of the Group Plan, ensuring that the civic center would remain at the Square. But, consider the frustration of Cleveland Police Chief Fred Kohler, as the Group Plan buildings started to go up. The slums that were torn down were also known as Cleveland’s tenderloin district, featuring brothels and restaurants. Kohler argued against using that land because at least these operations of ill repute were self-contained and could be controlled. The building of the Group Plan caused these lascivious establishments to be scattered elsewhere throughout the city, making it harder for the police chief to keep an eye on them.