Real  Estate   Record





AND BUILDERS^ GUIDE.





Vol. XX.





NEW YOBK, SATURDAY, DEOEMBEB 1, 1877.





No.  507.





Published Weekly by

TERMS.

OIVE YEAR, in advance... .$10.00.

Oommunicafcions should be addressed to

C. W.  SIVEET,

Nos. 345 AND 347 Broadway.

MOVEMENTS OF  TRADE CENTRES.
The peregrinations of trade centres furnish an
interesting and instructive study, as they also
serve to distinguish New York from any other
modern city.   This ceaseless um-est, the rotation
of localities, the constant overtui*ning of busmess
centres, gives New York its bristling and ever
fresh external appearance, while at the same
time it renders the ownership of its real estate at
times an inestimable boon, and at others an intol¬
erable burden.   It is superfluous at this late day
to inquire into the causes underlying this pecu-
liai* feature of municipal growth.   It may be re¬
ferable in part to the mercurial and restless tem¬
perament of our people, but chiefly and largely to
the exigencies of the oblong shape of om* island.
The ever lengthening radius of its commercial
prestige, which entitles it to the distinction of the
great trade centre of the Union, also occasions a
periodical redistribution and transposition of its
various centres of special business.   The history
of the city reveals this migratory chai-acter of its.
trade growth so plainly and strikingly, that no
calculations of real estate values could be consid¬
ered sound or reliable which fail to take it into
account.   There was a time when the trade of
the city, both wholesale and retail, was so incon¬
siderable that these two elements could be con¬
veniently interwoven and intermixed within a
comparatively small circumference, embracing
what was then considered the business section of
the city.   Probably the greatest mutation of trade
locality that our city has ever known was when,
through sheer force of necessity, the two elements
of wholesale and retail were permsuiently divorced
and dislocated in their respective fields of action.
At a comparatively recent period Canal street was
the recognized centre of retail trade, and many
shrewd owners supposed that that broad and ac¬
cessible avenue would continue to retain, for all
itime, its special distinction as the retail mart of
;this city.   The invasion of it by wholesale busi¬
ness was slow and gradual, and attended at first
■with many drawbacks and failures.   At length,
with the upward stride of population, retail trade
-obeyed the natural instinct of following closely
upon its heels, and Canal street ceased to be a
prominent retail avenue, relapsing into its pres-
,ent moribund or transitional state.   The-retail
centres of the future are becoming clearly de¬
fined, and are likely to take, in time, permanent
shape and form.   In its nature the retail trade is
so diffusive, relies so directly upon proximity to
resident population and is apt to distribute itself
so obsequiously on the accepted lines of residence
.occupation,'that it is difficult to claim for it the
pre-emption of central localities.   The ancient re¬
tail stores of Canal street have expanded andmul-
.^piied almost uj^e^itel^.s^rea^jng tb?P??ly?®.





on those great shopping thoroughfares, to vsdt:
the Third, Sixth and Eighth avenues.   It is only
in the higher and more luxurious branches of re¬
tail trade that any attempt is made to establish
what may be called distinct centres.    Such a
focusing of business has already commenced at
Union square, destined to rival the famed shop¬
ping localities of European cities.   In all likeli¬
hood the successive squares which are formed by
the intersection of Broadway with the longitud¬
inal avenues will afford the occasions and oppor¬
tunities for similar distinctive centres of the near
f utm-e.   The e-yidences are altogether convincing
that the squares at Thirty-second street, at Forty-
third street and at Fifty-ninth street will,in after
years,assert an importance corresponding to that
of Union and Madison squares of the present time.
The wholesale branches of business, however,
present a more ctrcvunscribed but no less marked
exhibition of this nomadic instinct.   In all other
cities that we know of, localities once selected for
special business purposes,are fixed and immovable,
and retain their distinctive character through
many generations.   In our 'own city wholesale
business, with few exceptions, manifests no qual¬
ity of babitativeness, or attachment to permanent
localities.   The dry goods trade, that champion
of change and expositor of fabulous rents, has
been marked by a total absence of such predilec¬
tions.   In all past experience, the dry goods dis¬
trict has sustained to business locations the same
relation that the fashionable residence district has
borne to residence quai-ters at large.   It is fastid¬
ious and capricious almost to the extent of femi¬
nine whimsicality and volatility, ever claiming and
ready to assert its pre-emptive rights to the choic¬
est and most eligible sections that the city affords.
It seems to possess, too, the abflity to pay maxi¬
mum rentals, and in this respect has gained an
easy superiority over all other lines of business in
the indulgence of its expensive tastes.   Its migra¬
tion from lower Pearl street, of which it once held
the exclusive monopoly, to the westerly side of
Broadway, extending far into the region bounded
by Park place and Warren street, is compara¬
tively a matter of ancient history.   At a later
date it forsook its then chosen locality and estab¬
lished itself in the higher district which it now
occupies, bounded by Duane and White streets,
Broadway and West Broadway.   So fixed and
permanent has its present occupation seemed in
comparison with former vagaries, that it might
appear foolhardy to suggest the possibility of any
eai'ly change.   And yet events of so recent an
occurrence as -within the present year, indicate
veryplainly a growing restlessness of this hyper¬
critical and peripatetic trade with its present sur¬
roundings.   The exodus of a few prominent firms
connected with the woolen and silk trade from
the present accepted quarter to a district north of
Canal street, having for its centre the comer of
Broome and Greene streets,.is full of suggestion
as to the direction which any future movement of
the general trade may take, and marks the prob¬
able site or oasis of its new occupation.

Probably^ before the lapse, of many years or
months, we.may witness a complete hegira of the
trade to this newly chosen locality. The -reason
oomi|io»ly assigned for the obangableness of tWs





trade, with regard to location, is the necessity of
maintaining proximity to the leading commer¬
cial hotels. We suspect that motives of economy
also prevail to some extent in determining these
changes. It is characteristic of the typical land¬
lord to forget the fable of the goose and the golden
egg, and to seek to extract, from a willing and
prosperous tenant, a greater rental than even the
best business is capable of affording, under the
delusion that a good location is necessary to the
successfid prosecution of a special business. This
consideration may hold good up to a certain
point; but as the dry goods trade has shown a
prompt disposition to follow, albeit at a respect¬
ful distance, the upward growth of the city, too
strict enforcement of it is apt to overreach the
mark. The discussions which are now going on,
and have firequently occurred during the past
thi-ee years, between landlords and tenants in the
dry goods district, unless quickly and promptly
settled to the satisfaction of the tenants, -wfll be
likely to precipitate this foreshadowed migration.
A large section of unprofitable real estate lying
west of Broadway between Canal street and
Clinton place will afford a fine field for the ex¬
patiation and expansion of this, the pioneer
wholesale business of the metropolis.

The grocery trade has partaken, in a modified
degree, of this nomadic instinct. After having
occupied Front street as a settled and established
home for a long time, it has become an accepted
fact that the present chief tocaZe of this business
is along West Broadway, extending westerly tb
the river, and having its focus at a point som©^
where between Reade and Franklin. This mi¬
gration may be assigned to the necessity which
seems to be almost imperative for this business to
maintain a close proximity to the great dry goods
district.

The hardware business has wandered from up¬
per Pearl street to Chambers andthe streets run¬
ning parallel to it.

The drug business, which once maintained its
pre-eminence on Water street, has of late years
been transported to William street, north of
Cedar, and the iron business, which held the
lower end of Broad street formerly, as its re¬
cognized locality, is now distributed at points
adjacent to the North River, principally upon
Washington and Wesfc streets. In a greater or
less degree this system of migration is charac¬
teristic of all the leading trades of the city,
though seldom with such marked and united re-
sxilts as those already referred to. The occupa¬
tions of the most prominent stores in Broadway,
from Chambers street to Fourteenth street, has
within the past two years, imdergone a very
noticable change. The clothing business which
once foimd its congenial headquarters on Chat¬
ham and Catherine streets, is now occupyiqg
some of the most sightly stores on oqr great
thoroughfare, and many kindred classes of bnsir
ness such as Trimimings, White Goods, and Fancy
Goods are also conspicuously invading eligible
localities on Broadway.

We can now recall, but two instances of an
imperturbable and persistent adUerenceto old lo¬
cations. WaU street has beooine sfynonymous
-VTxth finance, ancl envoys such a world-wide repu^