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AND   BUILDERS'   GUIDE





.ydL. L]





.SATURDAY, APRIL 11, 1868.





[No. 4.





, ■   ^     Published Weekly, by^.-,
C.  W.   SWEET  &  CO..,

Boou 81 WoELD BuiLniNO, No. 87 Park Row.

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THE   ASCADE  BAILEOAD.

The important riddle has at least been
solved, liow to avoid the overcrowded traffic
of our down-streets, and afford the people of
NeAV York safe and rapid transit from one
end of the island to the other. It has long
been manifest to everybody that it is as impos¬
sible for the city to remain as it is, as for a
full-grown man to wear the garments of his
childhood. Peculiarly located as New York
is, on a long and narrow slip of land, shut in
by a broad river on each side, and con¬
sequently unable to expand but in one direc¬
tion, the time has arrived at last when she
must increase the surface for traffic in her
main arteries, whether by suspending herself
in air or burrowing in the bowels of the
earth. The latter idea has hit the mark.
Among all the plans and schemes hitherto
suggested, there is not one wt ch so com¬
pletely covers the whole ground, and will
prove so useful, practicable, and grand as the
proposed Arcade Railroad, the bill for Avhich
has already unanimously passed the Assem¬
bly, and only awaits the decision of the Sen¬
ate to become a fixed fact.

This railroad scheme is entirely novel in
design, and far surpasses anything of the
kind ever yet attempted in any of the great
capitals of the world. It has nothing in com¬
mon with the tunnel roads under the streets
of London—^which, hoAvever, are perfectly
successful as far as they go—because this
scheme provides such an abundance of light,
air, and ventilation, as to be available as much
for commercial as for travelling purposes.
This scheme may be thus briefly described:
It is proposed to build a street mder the
whole Avidth of Broadway to Sixty-fourth
street, and along Ninth Avenue to near Fort
"W^ashington, for locomotion and trading, in
every respect as accessible and convenient as
the present thoroughfares. The upper street
will thus be a sort of continuous bridge, run-

3irig the whole length of the city, with con-
enient ramifications, supported, by a com-
pation of iron columns and groined brick
Iches, so powerful in construction as to do the
orkofthe solid earth itsel£ Those portions





of the buildings on each side Avhich are now
nothing but buried cellars, will be converted,
as if by magic, into handsome and well-light¬
ed store-fronts. The way light is obtained
for the lo"wer street is by leaving the usual area
of five feet, as no"w, to the upper street, pro¬
tected by railings, and all open except at
doors; Avhile the sideAvalks will be relaid Avith
four feet of patent lights next tte street.
This Avill give ample ventilation, ^and light
enough for people in the lo"wer street cars to
read comfortably. At each block, convenient
stairways Avill. lead from the upper to the
lower street. Here four tracks will be laid:
the two inner ones for rapid, trains, for
through travel, going from the Battery to
Harlem in about thirty minutes, and the out¬
side tracks, next the sidewalks, for slower
cars, stopping as often as passengers require.
The cars will be propelled by steam, air, or other
motive power; but, if by steam, in such a way
as to emit neither steam, smoke, nor sparks.

It needed but the locomotive horrors of the
past winter to convince our people of the
. splendid change when this plan is carried into
effect. The myriads of daily toilers down¬
town Avill be able to go to and from-their
homes, in the remotest suburbs, in all seasons,
without crowding and without loss of time.
Winter and summer alike will be shorn of
their terrors. People will fly the storms of
winter by taking refuge in the Arcade below,
and it Avill prove a delicious resort for shop¬
ping and promenade during the sweltering
days of midsummer. Upper Broadway thus
reheved of its crowds of carts and omnibuses,
with all its mud and slush running doAvn the
hollow columns into the sewers below the
loAver street, Avill be so clean and airy as to
surpass every other commercial thoroughfare
in beauty, and not require the humane efforts
even of Judge Whiting to give us a " salub¬
rious atmosphere;" and then at nightfall,
when this interminable perspective of columns
and arches is brilliantly lit up by gas, the
scene will be beautiful and tempting beyond
anything yet conceived in the construction of
cities—more like a picture in the " Arabian
Nights."

Vast and important as this scheme is, there
is nothing whatever in its execution that is
not easily within the range of modern art.
If the elder Brunei could tunnel under the
Thames, fighting quicksands and inundations
inch by inch, our engineers and architects
have a comparatively easy "way before them.
The plan is approved by our most eminent
engineers, architects, and builders; we have
the talent,  energy,  and capital necSssary'





property-owners in the thoroughfares thus
altered will be largely benefited, so will the
whole population: all it needs is the consent
of the Senate, and it is scarcely possible to
think they will check the grandest scheme
ever concocted for the improvement and
adornment of a great commercial city.





THE NEW POST-OFFICE.
There is much public curiosity and in¬
terest felt respecting the proposed new post-
office, and it is strange thai, in a matter of
such great and general importance, public in¬
formation should have been so long withheld.
Some months have now elapsed since an open
competition was invited among architects for
designs for the structure; in response to
which a large number were sent in, and the
whole exhibited for a brief period at the
Underwriters' Offices, on Broadway. Of these
designs there •were but few that could be
classed even above the most ordinary me¬
diocrity, and only two or three that could
really claim anything like distinct merit.
But the examiners Avere morally pledged to
award the money prizes according to the
terms of their offer—even if only to varying
grades of inferiority; and Ave presume this
portion of the programme has at least been
carried out. It turned out, however, that
no one plan embraced, in the view of the
judges, all the requirements of such a build¬
ing; and after the awards Avere made in their
ratio of merit, no one plan was determined
upon for actually carrying it into execution.
Postmaster Kelly made a journey to Europe,
during which, it is said, he obtained much
additional Ught as to the most improved
Avorkings of the system, and on his return an
entirely new arrangement was entered into
with the five most prominent architects in
the competition, and a new design formed
out of their accumulated ideas. We have
not much faith in this joint-stock conglom¬
eration of thoughts in preparing a plan, and
thi.nk it just as possible fur too many archi¬
tects to spoil a design as for too many cooks
to spoil a broth. But the purport of our
present remarks is that this last design—
whatever it may be—has never yet been in
any way made pubhc, and that consequently
the community have no means whatever of
knowing the merits or demerits of a structure,
for Avhich they must, nevertheless, be pre-:
pared to meet so enormous an expenditure.

The latest public intimatioD Avas that Coiit
gre.«s had appointed a cominittee to visit NeAV
York, to report upon the vahdity of the site,
etc.; and meanAvhile it is understood that the