Prague before 1870. Thus from 1830 onwards whole blocks of houses were built in the main streets, with elongated façades, on a plan made to pattern, so plain and bare of aspect that in popular parlance they were soon known as “barracks.” The only works of any value to be found in Prague during the first half of the nineteenth century are those connected with the linking up of the various quarters of the city, such as the Boulevard of the Moats (Příkopy) and that of the New or National Avenue (Národní třída), the parks on the fortifications, the attempt, unfortunately never completed, to shut in the Horse Market (the Wenceslaus Square, Václavské náměstí) by an Empire gate with a large sculptural subject, and, at the very middle of the century, the arrangement of the approach to the monument of King Francis. In the department of town-planning the laying out of the Prague suburb of Karlín is the only thing achieved after the great undertakings of the Josephian period, the fortresses of Terezin and Josefov, and after the completion of designs for the watering-places of North-West Bohemia at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Although it remained a torso, what was actually carried out in accordance with the plan of the Board of Works in Bohemia (1816) shows a modern conception of a town, both in plan and elevation, especially in regard to the main thoroughfares and squares. The spirit of modern theory is revealed with equal completeness in the plans of the insignificant community of Starý Tábor, laid out by A. Svateš in 1827.
The large English parks in Bohemia, such as those at Král. Obor, Veltrusi, Ratiborice, N. Hrady, Vlasin and Schönhof, are among the best examples of this type, while the Municipal Park on the ramparts of Prague and in the outskirts of Budějovice and Pilsen do not rise above the average. Although the situation of Prague was not favourable for carrying out extensive designs in the Empire style, nevertheless at the classical period of the English
