Real Estate Record
AND BUILDERS' GUIDE.
Vol. XXIX.
NEW YORK, SATURDAY/MAT 13, 1882
No. 739
Published Weekly by The
Real Estate Record Association
TERMS:
ONE YEAR, in advance - - - - - $6.00
Communications should be addressed to
e. W. SWEET, 191 Broadway.
J. T. LINDSEY, Business Manager.
While not so many new ^dwellings are
being put up this May, there is, after all, a
great deal of activity in altering old houses,
in providing accommodations for new busi¬
ness enterprises, and in starting or com¬
pleting large apartment houses. Times may
be bad in general trade, but it is evident
that our mechanics will have all they can
do for tlie year to come. Plumbers, masons,
house painters, plasterers, all are busy, while
the house furnishers and decorators are
pretty well assured of constant work until
the winter season. Still there will be not so
many new private houses as were erected
last summer, but the increase in the num¬
ber of apartment houses will doubtless make
up for the lack of increased accommodia-
tious. Despite the croakers the country is
growing, while the percentage of increase is
greater in New York than in the country at
lai'ge.
All who have watched the transactions in
vacant lots on this island, will have noticed
many changes in ownership on "the West
Side, above Fifty-ninth street, between
Eighth and Ninth avenues. It 13 the unani¬
mous opinion of experts that the next build¬
ing movement of any magnitude will be in
that locality. Brokers say that the majority
of the new owners are people who intend to
build within the next three years. There
would be more signs of it to-day, were it
not for the advance in the prices of labor
and material. The activity at present, so far
a5 dwelling houses is concerned, is more mani¬
fest on the central zone above the park, be¬
tween Second and St. Nicholas avenues; but
the class of houses going up in that quarter
are not of a choice variety. They are in¬
tended for people of moderate means, and
some are apartment houses'of a rather cheap
kind. There are as yet no signs of any
building movement on the heights, west of
Morningside Park. Brokers report a quiet
movement going on to absorb West Side
property by persons who are intent upon
speculation. While the houses on the flat
land immediately north and south of One
Hundred and Twenty-fifth streec are not of
a costly character, the contemplated struc¬
tures west of the Central Park are fine
apartment houses. • On Ninth avenue it is
believed that large structures will be erected
for families above, with stores below.
The outlook in the general markets is not
particularly brilliant, indeed, it may be said
to be blue. Gold is beginning to leave our
shores in large quantities, and there does not
seeni to be any likelihood of a stoppage of
the drain until September next, and not
then unless we have very heavy crops.
Then the banks are contracting their curren¬
cy; wheat holds its own in Chicago, and corn
is working higher. Production continues
unabated, while consumption", is falling off.
The demand for iron has ceased, which
shows a stoppage of construction and a ces¬
sation of the demand for new tools, always
a bad sign. Everything depends on the
crops, ana there will be nothing certain
about them until July. We will probably
have less cotton than last year ; wheat does
not xjromise more than an average crop, but
if the weather is favorable more oats and
corn will be grown than in any other year
in the history of the country. The falling
off in the demand for coal and iron must in
time have its effect upon the price of the coal
stocks; in short, the immediate future, ex¬
cept in real estate, looks dubious. The in¬
vesting public are not in the stock market,
but there is still a great deal of money in the
country, and in times like these it is seeking
real estate for an investment, Governments
giving.too small an interest for the average
investor.
A NEW BUSINESS CENTRE, PERHAPS.
A short tine since we published the opin¬
ion of a real estate expert that the time
would come when Reservoir square, from
Fortieth to Forty-second street, and from
Fifth to Sixth avenue, would become a great
business centre. At that time it was sup¬
posed that the reservoir would be removed
and a iDark created of the whole two blocks.
It is now very doubtful whether the reser¬
voir will ever be removed. Open spaces at¬
tractive to pleasure seekers, build up in time
a lucrative retail business, as witness the
City Hall park, Union squ.ire and partially
Madison square. This must have been the
view of ^Pottier^& Stymus, as they have pur¬
chased a portion of the ground now occu¬
pied by Rutgers Female College on which to
erect a splendid warehouse to exhibit their
furniture to those who wish to purchase.
This movement is significant, especially in
view of the presence of Brewster's .carriage
warehouse on the corner of Fifth avenue
and Forty-second street. Some years since
there was a general impression that Fifth
avenue, between Madison square andThirty-
foiu'th street would become the seat of a
certain retail trade. It was supposed that
jewelers, art and bric-a-bi-ac dealers, confec¬
tioners and other departments of what is
known as the carriage trade, might grow up
in that portion of our fashionable avenue,
aud there are certain such establishments
there which seem to do a profitable business.
But it is evident that dealers of that kmd
think that for the present there is more
money to be made in ^Twenty-third street.
Sixth avenue or even Fourteenth street. But
Pottier & Stymus and Brewster may create
a new break upon this fashionable quarter.
The opening of a few similar establishments
below Forty-second street would soon make
that section of Fifth avenue as unfashionable
^ns is the portion which .now/extends from
Madison to Washington square. The mar¬
ket value of the property would increase for,
although fashionable private houses would
no longer be looked for in that quarter. Fifth
avenue from Forty-second street down
would be a headquarters for clubs, first-class
apartment houses as well as great ware¬
houses for the sale of substantial and fancy
goods of an artistic character. The Grand
Central Depot is an argument for the devel¬
opment of a great retail trade centre around
Reservoir square. In view of the travel be¬
tween the elevated station on Forty-second
street and the depot, it is surprising that be¬
fore this private houses have not been con¬
verted into stores. ' A horsecar track on
Forty-second street is very much needed,
while an elevated railw.ay from river to river
along that street, would be a real accommo¬
dation. It would improve the value of
the property, but the private houses would
rapidly disappear to give place to the store
and the warehouse.
THE NEW TRUNK RAILROAD.
Referring to our article on the New York,
West Shore & Buffalo Railway in the last
number of The Record a correspondent
asks whether tlie business of building new
railroads, and especially additional trunk
lines, is not 'being overdone. The Record
was one of the first journals to warn people
against the speculative railroad fever, but it
seems to us that in reference to certain rail¬
road enterprises the general indiscriminate
cry against. too much railroad building is
unjustified. It has been shown, for instance,
that in the case of the New York, West
Shore & Buffalo Railway, an entire new
country, one of the richest and most fertile
regions of the state, lying immediately along
the west shore of the Hudson River, will
obtain the first direct railway communica¬
tion with New York it has ever had. The
New York Herald, in its financial article of
last Monday, very correctly prognosticated
that the development of the west shore of
the Hudson would even be more wonderful
than that of the east shore was, as soon as
the New York, West Shore & Buffalo Rail¬
way would be running. This it is to be
rejnembered is a growing country. Between
'Gland '81 the three trunk lines, the Central,
Erie aud Pennsylvania, increased their earn¬
ings from 130,000.01)0 to $80,000,000, to use
round figures, or SCO per cent. This is a
yearly increase of 17 percent., and the West¬
bound freight business, from New York
City, which is much the most remunerative,
increased from 715,000 tons in '78 to 1,198,000
tons in '81, or 67 per cent, in three years,
although the rates from Boston and via
Canada w ere less than the New York, rates.
People forget that the existing trunk lines
were all opened nearly 30 years ago, and
chat since that time the population west of
Buffalo and Pittsburg has already increased
from 5,782,400 to.1.9,132,800 or nearly 300 per
cent, up to 18S0, while the miles of railroad
which arc the feeders of the trunk lines have
giwyn from 6,000 to 53,583 or over 700 per