chapter 3 . the home in its setting . 159 . as a consequence of the social and economic changes referred to in the opening chapter problems are making themselves felt in relating homes to their setting because practice has not caught up with the changes that have taken place . car ownership and traffic dangers have made the old pattern of housing estates out of date . the streets may have been a safe place for children when the baker and the milkman came by horse and cart and everyone walked to work . with one family in three owning a car now , and with delivery and public transport and service vehicles often all using the residential street , new arrangements are required . similarly , the garden , once highly important as a means of growing vegetables and fruit to supplement the diet of the large families of people who , by today &apos;s standards , were poorly paid and insecure , no longer serves that purpose . again the pressure on land and the need to rebuild in city centres is compelling the building of a larger proportion of flats , which increases the need to provide somewhere for children to play . 160 . we have been to a number of estates where new forms of layout attempt to meet present day needs , and we wish there were more of them . in the years to come it is essential that there should be , for housing can become obsolete in its layout just as surely as in its internal design and facilities ; and most of the present work is obsolete from this point of view when it is built . layout is not within our terms of reference , but we have been obliged to formulate views upon it in our consideration of the provision which should be made for cars , and the play space which should be provided in relation to blocks of flats . 161 . in addition to these two subjects , on which we were given to understand that advice on standards would be welcome , and on the access requirements of terrace houses , which markedly influence their internal arrangement , we propose to comment on two others - gardens and the general appearance of domestic building . 1 . external appearance . 162 . after inspecting so many developments in all parts of the country , we feel bound to record our concern that there should be such a vast gap between the best housing schemes in the country and many of the others . control of development by town planning can not by itself produce good layout and appearance - the onus to achieve this lies with the developer himself , whether he is a private individual or a local authority . it can not be achieved without using qualified professional people , architects and landscape architects , to design not only the individual house and house group but , every bit as important , the layout as a whole , and the landscaping . with the numerous examples in the local authority field and the best examples in the private sector there is no longer any reason why our town and countryside should continue to be spoilt by unimaginative buildings . good layout and landscaping , together with the use of good and well chosen external materials and colours throughout an estate , go nine-tenths of the way towards creating beauty instead of ugliness , and it is in these broad and not necessarily costly ways , rather than in the laboured detailing of the individual dwelling , that housing development can be made pleasing and attractive to the eye . 163 . this is applicable to local authorities and private enterprise alike , but it may be that those private developers who remain wedded to old plans grown dusty with the years , who are content with amateur layout , and who provide no landscaping but the good subsoil of the site , often do so because they fear conservatism on the part of the buyer and the building society . whether or not some building societies are conservative , buyers are much less so ; and it is a fact worth recording that many builders have been surprised to find that houses catering for the present way of life and conformable with the modern eye for good design displace from their order books older and more conventional plans which they had previously been offering . we therefore urge those developers who do not already do so to turn increasingly to qualified people for the difficult and indispensable work of designing the buildings , the layout and the landscaping . for design now sells , and , if other considerations do not appeal , that alone should provide the incentive . 164 . it is essential that the landscaping should be designed for ease of maintenance as well as that funds should be provided for the maintenance both of the dwellings themselves and the spaces between them , including the landscaping . by ensuring that newly created property and its environment is properly looked after , its fresh appearance actually improves with the years as the lawns , trees and shrubs grow to maturity . 165 . with notable exceptions , most private development displays no co-ordination of painting and planting , and lags far behind that of many local authorities , who as landlords can maintain the whole of the estate . it must be admitted that many other European countries reach a far higher standard in their private estate layout than do we , very largely through the use of housing associations , which take full responsibility for both the initial landscaping and its maintenance . there are already in this country established ways of keeping owner occupied property in good and tasteful repair and the landscaping in good condition , by the use of restrictive covenants governing repainting and the maintenance of the landscaping . non-profit-making companies , run by the occupiers , can see that the work is carried out , and these are proving successful . television aerials . 166 . the forest of roof top aerials brought into being by the growth of television and VHF radio stirs many people to strong condemnation , and we for our part share these feelings . since television was introduced the increase in the power of the stations and the improved sensitivity of receivers have made outdoor aerials less necessary in many locations . indoor or roof space aerials do not invariably give satisfactory performance even in strong signal areas , and there is therefore no easy or universal answer to this problem . but investigations , notably those of the Rowntree trust at Earswick ( York ) , where on a large estate it was found that almost all the houses could be satisfactorily served by indoor television aerials , have shown that people often think of buying expensive outdoor aerials when they need not do so . 167 . some local authorities building blocks of flats , and some new town corporations , are providing master aerial installations which amplify the signal received at one aerial installation and distribute it by wire to a number of dwellings . in many circumstances this is a necessary and sensible thing to do . in private enterprise housing there may be less scope for the use of master installations , except in blocks of flats , since there may not be an organisation to deal with its common ownership and maintenance , but in many areas there are relay companies which provide an aerial service on a commercial basis both to local authorities and to private premises . a broadcast relay station licence is required if a master aerial system , including a system provided by a local authority , serves two or more sets of premises , e.g houses or blocks of flats , and applications for such licences should be made to the post office . where it is not possible to provide a master aerial installation , and where a loft or indoor aerial is really inadequate , local authorities may consider standardising upon a suitable aerial , or requiring that tenants &apos; aerials should be sited where they can not be seen from the street or against the skyline , as has been done by a number of local authorities . in locations where an outside aerial is necessary a standardised aerial for each dwelling on an estate may perhaps be a practical possibility , and we commend it to the attention of developers . 168 . this is a continuing problem , for if new frequency bands should be brought into use for additional or colour programmes another crop of aerials can be expected , and although at the much higher frequencies likely to be concerned the rods of the aerials will be only about one foot long , outdoor aerials erected clear of buildings are likely to be necessary even quite near to powerful transmitters . it is therefore important for the appearance of estates that local authorities and other large property owners should bear in mind that , in conjunction with the local post office engineers , it is often possible to do a great deal to mitigate the nuisance ; and they should take every opportunity to do so . 2 . gardens . 169 . the post war improvements in the standard of living mean that few families now rely on the garden to keep them properly fed . it is now used for outdoor living , for children &apos;s play and the baby &apos;s sleep ; and it is cultivated either for the pleasure of gardening or only because it has to be kept tidy . with the tendency for densities to increase at the same time as space has to be provided for more cars to be kept , it will be a temptation to squeeze garden sizes to a point where they will no longer cater for these things . the evidence we received suggests that any call for large gardens is declining as other interests , such as the car , come to take up more of people &apos;s leisure time . where gardens are small , as they may well be when houses are built at densities which in the past have usually called for a proportion of flats , it will be important to plan for children &apos;s play space nearby . 170 . in all gardens arrangements are required which will ensure a reasonable degree of privacy for sitting out and having meals outside . present day gardens are often sadly lacking in this amenity . 3 . terrace houses - access . 171 . probably most of the terrace houses built since 1945 have been laid out in such a way that there is no garden gate giving direct access to the rear of the house , and various means have been adopted to provide for access from the front to the back - a tunnel between pairs of houses ; a through store ; a store leading through a utility room ; or a store leading through the kitchen . because of the need to provide pedestrian segregation and car storage , much future terrace housing will probably have access to both sides of the house , so meeting most of the requirements . the most important , to be met by house and layout taken together , are that there should be access , without entering hall , kitchen or any living room , for bicycles from road or public path to store ; for garden tools from store to place of use ; and for garden materials from place of delivery to place of use . there is also a requirement which we think should not be contravened in any circumstances - the refuse collector should be able to reach the dust-bin store , and the coalman the fuel store , without entering any part of the house ; this must of course be planned having due regard to the convenience of the householder . maintenance men also have to be able to get ladders to both sides of the house . 4 . play space . 172 . while the child &apos;s attendance at school is compulsory between the ages of five and fifteen , enjoyment of facilities for following his out-of-school interests is , and must remain , within the child &apos;s or parents &apos; choice . it should be of as much concern to the general public that he has the necessary facilities for these leisure-time activities as that there is a school for him to attend . 173 . we agree with this point of view , and also with the statement in the report of the flats sub-committee published as living in flats in 1952 that the provision of one or more playgrounds must be the first call on available space around flats , because it is on children that the inevitable restrictions of flat life press most hardly . 