January 10, 1914





RECORD  AND  GUIDE





67





BING & BING'S PROJECT.





Is   Expected   to   Start   Big    Building
Movement on Columbia Heights.

The mere fact that one of the most
active firms of merchant builders in the
central section of the city has deter¬
mined to make a try of the market for
high-class apartment houses in the Co¬
lumbia Heights section of Brooklyn is
significant to real estate experts. If the
experiment succeeds and they find
prompt purchasers for their product,
that will be more significant still.

Messrs. Bing & Bing have selected a
house of the height of eight stories for
their first operation. It will fit in well
architecturally in the neighborhood
where it is now to be placed. There
will be two houses, one fronting on Liv¬
ingston street and the other abutting on
Schermerhorn street eighty feet from
Clinton. This is almost classic ground,
the Mars Hill of Brooklyn, with St.
Ann's Church and Packer Institute on
the   opposite   side   of   Livingston   street





ousted. The court house site is now
looked upon as settled, the probable de¬
cision being to use the present site with
additional land.

The builders and the Realty Asso¬
ciates have no doubt about the success
of the building project and are of the
opinion, as others are, fhat it will be
followed by the most important real es¬
tate movement that the Heights section
has ever seen.





Changes in Brooklyn's Hill Section.

It is the general opinion of men
posted on realty conditions in the Hill
section of Brooklyn that many of the
old dwellings near the new Elks Club¬
house will eventually be razed to make
way for large apartment structures. An
old coal yard, which has been an eye¬
sore to the neighborhood has been re¬
moved to make way for a modern
moving-picture theater, which is now
under way at the southeast corner of
Greene  avenue  and  Cumberland  street.





Furthering  Brooklyn  Subway  Work.

The Public Service Commission has
taken another important step in the fur¬
therance of the construction work in
Brooklyn under the Dual System sub¬
way contracts. This was the conclusion
of an agreement with the New York
Municipal Railway Corporation for the
acquisition of an easement by the city
in the property of the South Brooklyn
Railway Company in the right of way
of that company along 38th street,
Brooklyn, from Fourth avenue to Tenth
avenue. This right of way is to be used
by the city for the construction of a
depressed railroad to connect the Fourth
avenue subway with the proposed ele¬
vated lines to Coney Island, through
New Utrecht and Gravesend avenues
over the routes now known as the West
End and  Culver lines.

The city agrees to pay $1,000,000 for
this easement, and to credit the New
York Municipal Railway Corporation
with  that  amount  against  its  promised







SCHER.MEHHORN   STREET,   NEAR   CLINTON,   SHOWING   VACANT
SITE PURCHASED  BY  BING &  BING.





LIVINGSTON  STREET,





OPPOSITE   SITE PURCHASED BY
BING & BING.





and the private dwellings of Brooklyn's
most conservative society everywhere
else.

This particular operation is likely to
be revolutionary, not for the reason that
it means the first modern apartment
house on the Heights—for there are a
few new ones there and some that are
old—but because the operation is cer¬
tain to be repeated and improved upon
if it proves to be a successful experi¬
ment. This is inferred from the career
and ability of the operators, who are
certain to be followed by others.

Columbia Heights society is old
enough to have acquired a desire for a
partial change from old-fashioned
housekeeping. There must be many
small families of means who are weary
of watching their own furnaces, and of
doing or having done a lot of work that
the apartment house janitor's force does
for tenants; or families that have a
summer home in the country and merely
need an apartment in town instead of a
large house. Presuming that the houses
will be readily tenanted, the principal
question to be decided is, will the build¬
ers find investors as promptly?

The Realty Associates had held the
plot for a considerable period to see if
it would be needed as a site in part for
the new court house which Kings
County is to build, and only recently
they commissioned Howard C. Pyle
& Co. to dispose of the lots, which are
vacant and partly excavated. The un¬
certainty about the court house has
worked hardships and even money
losses in the neighborhood because
owners have been unable to give leases
for any considerable tenure and tenants
have lived in fear of being summarily





The plot being improved has been
taken over by the Sheffield Construc¬
tion Company on an exchange nego¬
tiated by the Allee Realty Company.
The new owners have begun the erec¬
tion of a theater on plans made by
Architect William J. Dilthey of Man¬
hattan. The architecture of the theater
is a modern treatment of the Spanish
mission style. The walls are to be of
pearl-gray stucco with red tile covering
the roof and canopies on the two street
fronts.







contribution of $13,500,000 toward the
cost of construction of the new lines.
.\t the same time the commission
adopted the form of two agreements
with the New York Municipal Railway
Corporation modifying the Dual System
operating contract, and these will be
executed as soon as the deed for the
easement is signed. The modifying
agrgjements authorize the New Y'ork
Municipal Railway Corporation to un¬
dertake and complete the construction
of the depressed railroad through the
38th street cut and the reconstruction
of the Centre street loop so as to fit
it for permanent operation.





NEW BROOKLYN  THEATRE.

The theater has been leased through
the realty company and William H.
Allen for a long term to the Beacon
Photoplay Corporation, an operating
company, at an aggregate rental of
about $84,000.

---------*———^—

—Elmer Dean Coulter, representative
of the Astor estates in the Bronx, ex¬
pressed the opinion that the Bronx real
estate market will show marked im¬
provement this year.





—Spear & Company, on Wednesday
evening, celebrated the ninth anniversary
of the organization of the firm with a
theatre party, followed by a supper at
the Cafe Boulevard. The president of
the company, Mr. Aaron Rabinowitz,
who acted as the host for the entire
office force, was able to announce that
the past year, in spite of the stagnant
condition of the realty market, and the
depression generally prevailing, was the
most successful in the firm's existence.
While the financial progress of the firm
was gratifying, the president declared
that what pleased him most was the
fact that its opportunities for usefulness
in the community were considerably ex¬
tended; that the conception of the Real
Estate calling had in the past few years
risen from the level of a business to that
of a profession; and he urged upon the
men the duty of carrying on their work
in such fashion as to dignify their chosen
profession.