Union Terminal

Abstract

Early city plans situated railroads to clear slums, linking the long-standing infrastructure interests of businessmen to the agendas of Progressive reformers. In Cincinnati, nineteenth-century business leaders advocated railroad construction and reorganization to institute reasonable freight rates. In the twentieth century, they achieved their desires by establishing a mandate in municipal government for the new profession of urban planning, with its political power to shape the physical city and the use of private property within it.