The story of the White House is the story of America. In its rooms and gardens and ceremonial spaces can be read the development of the nation, from the founding of Washington in 1791 to its sacking by the British in 1814, through the Civil War, two world wars, the Great Depression, and many other foreign and domestic crises. Within its walls Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation and Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivered his "Fireside Chats." Its gleaming facade has provided a symbolic backdrop for suffragettes, freedom riders and anti-war protesters; on its sloping south lawn children gather for Easter egg rolls and to watch the lighting of the National Christmas Tree.

In good times and bad, the White House is "America's House," the most potent symbol of the nation's democratic ideals. It is the only home of a head of state regularly open tree to the public, offering ordinary citizens a glimpse of how their leaders live and work. Instead of a remote architectural monument, it is a living symbol of government's accessibility, to the extent that we routinely speak of it as having moods, attitudes and distinguishing features. The White House is said to possess "dignity" and "stature" to appear "concerned" or "jubilant," to have a voice that "declares," "defends" or offers "no comment."

And yet for all its symbolic importance, the White House is also a 200-year-old building forced to play an extraordinary range of roles: home and office of the president, historic site, museum, tourist attraction, civic centerpiece, national symbol and world stage. The White House is the headquarters of the executive branch of government where the most critical political decisions are made, and the ceremonial center of the nation, which communicates America's values to the world. More than one million people visit it each year, and millions more would like to.

In accommodating this rush of competing demands, White House planning has often been piecemeal and ad hoc. Its utilities and other basic services are out of date. The pressroom, an international communications hub, resembles a set from a 1950s television program. Presidential staff and other participants must

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often stand two and three deep at meetings for lack of adequate space. There is little room to store furniture and equipment for official events, or to park cars for daily business.

For the most part, Americans are unaware of these problems. On the evening news or the front page of the morning paper the white columns still gleam, the chandeliers still sparkle and the lawns and shrubs remain impeccably groomed. What more could they ask for? Or more precisely, why should they spend hundreds of millions of dollars fixing something that doesn't appear broken?

The answer to this question, of course, is because it's the White House, our house, the most famous house in the world.

The Comprehensive Design Plan for the White House and President's Park preserves the historic integrity of both, while accommodating the needs of the presidency in the 21st century. If approved, the plan will make the White House work better by modernizing its infrastructure, expanding its meeting and storage space, and adding facilities for the press. It will create underground parking for White House staff, and indoor recreation space for the first family. It will make touring the White House safer, more enjoyable and more informative by providing a new visitor center featuring exhibits, films, interactive displays and special presentations.

The Comprehensive Design Plan has been prepared by the National Park Service, with the assistance of other federal agencies and numerous private organizations and consultants. It is the first comprehensive plan for the White House, distilled from dozens of technical reports and alternatives. It offers practical suggestions for maintaining the White House as both the home of the president and the seat of government in an era of political fragmentation and bewildering technological change. It reflects a broad consensus that preserving the historic integrity of the White House and its setting is above politics and party, and that careful long-range planning serves not a particular president but the institution of the presidency and the interests of the nation.

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Courtesy of the White House Historical Association

When George Washington and Pierre L'Enfant laid out President's Park in 1791, they envisioned it as the setting for the White House and the centerpiece of the new capital. Covering 82 acres from H Street to Constitution Avenue between 15th and 17th Streets, it was the first parcel acquired for the federal city, and is still listed as "Reservation Number 1" in the records of the District of Columbia. In addition to the White House, the park includes the Old Executive Building, Lafayette Park, the Treasury Building, the Ellipse and numerous smaller parks, monuments and memorials.

Preserving this priceless cultural and symbolic landscape, within the context of a modern city and a modern presidency is the broad goal of the Comprehensive Design Plan for the White House and President's Park.

As the first comprehensive plan, it replaces the piecemeal and reactive approach of the past with a coherent and integrated strategy for the future. No more quick fixes that turn out to be more costly and cumbersome than permanent ones.

The plan recommends that President's Park once again be a pedestrian precinct where visitors won't have to dodge cars and delivery trucks in order to reach the grounds. Whenever possible, new structures will be placed underground so as not to disturb the historic landscape.

The White House is also a priceless educational resource that should be accessible and inspiring to all. This goal can be achieved with better exhibits and public programs, located in a new visitor center that provides not only a ticket and a brochure, but also a compelling introduction to the White House and its place in American history.

Finally, the White House and President's Park are part of Washington, precious open space in the middle of a dense urban environment. They offer dramatic views of the Capitol, the Potomac River and the magnificent distances beyond. These views have inspired American presidents for 200 years, and they must be preserved as reminders of the White House's relationship to the other branches of government, to the city around it and to the nation as a whole.

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Every president since John Adams has left his personal mark on the White House. Some have redecorated rooms or acquired important paintings and sculptures; others have planted trees and shrubs or otherwise modified the landscape. Harry Truman added a balcony. Dwight Eisenhower installed a putting green. The Kennedy children had a stable for their ponies, and Amy Carter built a tree house in a spreading Atlas cedar. Each addition in its own way was an attempt to make the White House less like a museum and more like a home.

As a home, the White House has a number of shortcomings. Within its relentless formality, no indoor recreation space exists where members of the first family can relax at the end of a hectic day. Nor does the house have sufficient storage space to accommodate its innumerable state functions. Imagine hosting four or five diplomatic

receptions a week, and each time having to hire a moving company to transport the tables, chairs and stages to the house, set them up, then take them back to a warehouse until the next event. That's the way things work at the White House, and it is confused and costly. Closets, corridors and driveways overflow with furniture and equipment, as though the staff were having a tag sale. No modern hotel would put up with such chaos, yet the White House has been doing it for years because it has no choice.

For these reasons, the Comprehensive Design Plan is recommending modest changes within the White House, mainly the addition of indoor recreation space to make the house more livable. This new area, a combination den, gym and entertainment space, might be located in renovated space inside or underground, to the north of the executive residence.

The convoys of trucks and vans that regularly jam the White House grounds would be redirected to loading docks beneath the New Executive Office Building, with deliveries to the White House

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and adjacent buildings by small vehicles similar to golf carts. Additional storage space beneath Pennsylvania Avenue would relieve the pressure of the nonstop special events—from state dinners to Easter egg rolls—that comprise daily life at the White House. Greater efficiency would translate into substantial savings over time.

But the White House is also the quintessential home/office, with a large presidential apartment upstairs over the national shop. Like the residence, the business side of the White House needs to catch up with the late 20th century. The main problems are a shortage of meeting space, inadequate facilities for the White House press corps— now numbering in the thousands - and the glut of cars, trucks and delivery vans that take over President's Park.

The Comprehensive Design Plan recommends additional meeting rooms for the White House staff beneath West Executive Avenue. This new space would reduce the use of historic rooms in neighboring buildings, which are typically small, technologically inadequate and acoustically inferior. The U.S. Capitol recently solved its space problems in a similar way.

The news media would continue to occupy the first floor of the west colonnade, as well as a new facility beneath the adjacent West Wing Drive containing the presidential briefing room, interview rooms and additional space for television crews, photographers and White House correspondents. For the first time, space for visiting journalists would be available as well.

To reclaim President's Park from the automobile, the plan proposes two dramatic additions: a two-story, 290-car parking garage beneath Pennsylvania Avenue, and an 850-car garage under the Ellipse. The first would be for presidential motorcades, visiting dignitaries and senior White House staff, the second for staff during the week and possibly the public on weekends and holidays.

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Five days a week thousands of people line up along E Street and East Executive Park to tour the White House. In the spring and summer the lines start forming at 4 A.M, and many visitors wait for hours to walk through the Red Room, and the East Room, and the elegant State Dining Room, where the President entertains visiting heads of state.

For many of the 1.2 million people who cross the threshold each year, the White House tour is the highlight of their stay in Washington, the single most anticipated and most memorable event. "The real highlight of [my] trip was just to be allowed in the White House," wrote one visitor. "The [visit] gave me a great sense of history coming alive," noted another.

But some leave frustrated by the brevity of the tour, or the sketchiness of the information, or the lack of opportunity to pause and reflect on a partictuarly compelling object or view. Thousands more are turned away because the tours are full.

Although the White House can never accommodate everyone who wants to visit it, or satisfy the public's desire for a behind-the-scenes glimpse of its government in action, the public tours can clearly be more informative and inspiring than they are. For this reason, the Comprehensive Design Plan proposes major changes in the visitation program.

The most important change is expanding the existing White House Visitor Center in the Commerce Building to include a museum, four video theaters and new exhibits on the history of the White House and the American presidency. The current exhibits are static and disconnected, providing bits and pieces of information but no overall picture. The new ones will be computerized and interactive. Click on "Gilbert Stuart" and learn the fascinating story of his famous portrait of

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George Washington and its dramatic rescue by Dolley Madison's servants.

Click again to view the collection of White House china, or visit Monticello, the LBJ Ranch and other presidential sites around the country.

The exhibits will be supplemented by interpretive talks by National Park Service rangers and invited guests. A former chief of staff might reminisce about the presidents he's served, or the White House chef might re-create a menu for a state dinner. Public interest in the gardens, architecture and furnishings of the White House is extremely high, and could be the basis for seminars or a lecture series. Such presentations give history a human face while raising the general level of excitement about entering the home of the president.

The new visitor center will contain space for students to work on projects and hold discussions. The museum will expand its relationship with schools in the District of Columbia and, by satellite, with students in foreign countries, for whom the White House is perhaps the most recognizable American building.

For those who want more detailed information about the White House and its history, the visitor center will function as a miniature research library, providing books, tapes, maps, photographs and related materials. Selections from the White House's 40,000-piece collection of paintings, furniture and decorative arts will also be on exhibit.

All future White House tours will start from the new visitor center instead of outside in the heat or rain. After viewing the exhibits and watching a brief orientation film in one of the video theaters, visitors will proceed to a moving sidewalk that will carry them underneath 15th and E Streets to the White House fence. This connector will be illuminated by skylights and designed to recall the architecture of the White House. Visitors will proceed directly to the East Entrance to the White House, ready to see the real thing.

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A copy of the draft Comprehensive Design Plan and Draft Environmental Impact Statement, which analyzes the proposed plan and its alternatives may be obtained from:

OFFICE OF WHITE HOUSE LIAISON
NATIONAL PARK SERVICE
1100 OHIO DRIVE, SW
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20242

Comments on both documents must be received at this address by March 11, 1999. If you prefer e-mail, please send your comments to: White_House_Liaison@nps.gov.

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