South Bend's 1961 Comprehensive Plan

Executive Summary

(The full version of the 1961 Comprehensive Plan is now available in the St. Joseph County Public Library, Local History Section, downtown South Bend)

The 1961 Comprehensive Plan for South Bend was produced by the South Bend Planning Commission. The Planning Commission's legislative authority was to make recommendations to the Common Council regarding the City's Capital Improvement Program. The South Bend Planning Commission was dissolved in 1966 when the City and the County agreed to form the Area Plan Commission.

The Plan itself consists of four detailed studies:
• "Major Thoroughfares"
• "Government Buildings Site Location for St. Joseph County and South Bend, IN"
• "A Long Range Plan for Recreation Areas"
• "Land Use Analysis"

These documents are summarized in a 175-page document called "The Comprehensive Plan: A Condensation." In the introduction to the "Condensation", the planners state that its purpose is to provide information on the Comprehensive Plan to interested citizens: "through an informed public, aware of the facts, the recommendations of the Comprehensive Plan can be achieved."

The Condensation begins with a brief explanation of what city planning is, why planning is useful and how local planning is "hampered" by the absence of coordination between local units of government and between government departments within the same jurisdiction. Next comes a survey of physical features and population, including trends and projections. An extensive land use analysis follows the population survey with a projection of future land use needs. A "current crisis" is identified: the absence of developable sites suitable for industry. A future land use plan is presented. The last section of the Plan is called "Implementation of the Comprehensive Plan."

Some of the problems the Plan wants to address:
• The inadequate amount and distribution of existing park land;
• The need to correct the serious problems associated with combined sewer overflow;
• A transportation system considered inadequate to handle modern traffic.

The section called "Implementation of the Comprehensive Plan" is divided according to the tools the City will use to put the Plan into effect: 1. Zoning; 2. Land use subdivision; 3. The Capital improvement program; and 4. Urban renewal.

No specific time frame is mentioned. Future dates routinely referred to are 1975 and 2000, usually in terms of projected population growth. There is no time table nor are there goals established in the implementation plan. There are specific recommendations but the Implementation Plan is essentially a planner's argument in favor of the recommendations made throughout the document.

Recommendations in the Plan eventually implemented:
• Reserving land for an industrial district along the bypass and between the toll road and the airport for future industrial development (Blackthorn);
• Create light industrial sites in dilapidated residential areas (Sample Redevelopment Area)
• Develop a convention center in the downtown (Century Center);
• Construct a new building to house local government (County-City Building).

Accurate projections made in the Plan:
• Residential growth northwest of the city out Portage and northeast of the city out State Road 23;
• City must begin substantial annexation of developable residential areas, or most new development will occur outside city limits;
• Must preserve land for recreation before it's swallowed up by development in collaboration with County; need to pursue an acquisition program for new park land over the next 15 years.

Recommendations not fully implemented or rejected:
• Creation of two inner beltways around downtown;
• An expressway with 300ft ROW connecting State Road 2 west of Mayflower and Indiana 123, to skirt the downtown between Monroe and South and proceed east and north to connect with US20 to the east.

Miscued projection:
• South Bend's population projected to be 168,000 by 1975 (Actual population in 1975: approximately 117,000).