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CopyrightGd,   190T,   by  The  Record




&  Guide  Co.





Vol. LXXX.                                AUGUST 10, lílOT.




No. 20511.





INDEX TO DEPARTMENTS.
Advertisĩng Section.

Page,                                                    Page,

Cement ........................xiv   Lumber   .....................xx

Cousulting Engineers ..........xv   Macbinery   ...................vi

Ciay Products  ................xvii   Metal Work ..................xvi

Contractors and Builders .......iv   Quiek Job   Directory...........xx

Electrical Interests  ............ix   Reai Estate  ...................jx

Fireproofing...........■.........ii   Roofers & Roofing Materials. .vli

Granite   .....................xviii   Stone  ......................xviii

Irou and Steel  ...............viĩi   Wood Products  ...............xxi

THB ONE CLASS of improvement in which sonie signs
of overbuilding may develop in the near future is that
of the comparatively expensive apartment house. Incliiding
those which come under the head of Ijeing eoôperative, an
unusually large number of them are being cre^ted to tJie
east, south and west of Central Parlt, and they will be placed
on the market for reutai at a tiiiie of enforced economy on
the part of raany well-to-do people. There is a danger,
consequently. that they will not rent so easily as their pro-
jeecors anticipate, and in this event the losses will fall not
only 011 speculative buiĩders, but upon the people who are
inyesting their money in coiiperative apartment houses. The
financial success of all these coôperative plans depends upon
the success of the company in renting a certain proportion
of the apartments. These rentals are supposed to pay the
interest on the mortgage, -the taxes and the ruuning ex-
penses of the buildings; and if they should considerably di-
minish, the difCerence would be assessed on the stoclthoĩd-
ers, many of whom could ill afford to pay it. Those of the
eoôperative companies which were flrst in the fleld wiil be
able to pull through without any tronble, but it is an open
guestion whether it wouid not be safer to flnance these
schemes on a different basis. The realiy safe and conserva-
tive method of erecting a cooperative apartment house
would certainîy be to charge the stoclíholders for an apart-
ment a sum sufficient to pay a proportionate shareof the
whole cost of bnilding and land, so that the buiiding would
not be subject to a mortgage. Uuder such a plan the apart-
ments would eost their owners probably a third more. and
eacli- apartment would, in addition, be subjeet to an assess-
ment for taxes and running expenses; but the increased
seeurity of the stockholder's position woijld eompensate him
for the increased expense. Some of the newer enterprises
are, we believe, being organized on this basis, and if such is
the case, it will mean that these eompanies can regard with
îndifference the ups and downs of the renting market.
Furthermore the individual owner of each apartment would
be in a mucli better position to rent his apartment, if he so
desired, than he Is under the current method of flnancing.
He wilî not be eompeting with the large number of apart-
ments rented .by the eompany.





least must elapse before any more subways can be buílt or
completed, and in the meantime the traffic will inevitably
and enormously increase. The service of the company should
consequently not be stretched to the limit until definite ar-
rangements^ are made for the enlargement of the subway
system. If these conclusions are true, they bring with'
them eertain consetiuences which should be carefully con-
Eidered by everybody interested in the prosperity of New
York City and the well-being of its inhabitants. What is
realiy needed is not so much an investigation into the busi-
ness of the Interborough-Metropolitan Company. The Com-
mission was bound to undertaĩĩe the examination which is
now' under way; but the first inference from such an exam-
ination will be to show its own insufíiciency. The really
necessary anc! helpful investigation would be mueh more
comprehensive. It would include the whole problem of the
congestíon of traffle in the several boroughs of the city, and
the measnres necessary for relief. Its object would not be
to expcse and to injure the traetion eompany, for just in so
far as that company is injured its efflciency as a public ser-
vant is diminished, Its object would be to reach full in-
formation in respeet to every aspect of^the traffic problem,
and an equally comprehensJve poliey for the relief of the
existing congestion.





I







THE TESTIMONY which is being elicited by the investi-
gation of the Ĩnterborough-Metropolitan Co. is, on the
whole, justifying the conclusion in respect to the business
of that company recently advanced by the Reeord and
Guide. This conelusion was that, whatever improvements
may be made in the eompany's service through administra-
tive orders by the Commission, these improvements will ac-
complish very little by way of relieving the existing con-
gestion. The system of the company, at least in Manhattan,
is being operated very near to its limit at the present time;
and, in view of the necessary future increase in trafũe, it is
desirable to leave a certain  margin.     Four or five years at





WHILE the most important part of a comprehensive
metliod of relieving the existing congestion would
be the construction of new subways, and essenttal as it is
that sucli subways sliculd be built, other means of relief are
demanded which are almost equally important. New subways
would, for instauce, do very little to relieve the congestion
on the surface lines. Tliey would diminish the number of
long-distance passengers who now travel ou the surfaee; but
their plaees would scon be taken by an increase in the
short-distance passengsrs. Subways and surface lines com-
pete ouly within narrow limits. In a well regulated transit
system the respeetive services offered by the two kinds of
transit lines would not be competitive at all; they wouid
be made by means of liberal transfers supplementary one to
another. No matter liow many new subways are built, the
congestion of surface traffic wiĩl remain, and the efficiency
of the whole transit system will be very much diminished
thereby. The surface cars should really do the work now
performed by the local trains in the Subway; and they eould
do it most effleiently, provided trafíic on the surface could
move freely. A contiouation of the existing congestion on,
the surface lines will, consequently, not only cause incon-
venienee and loss of time to the passengers in those cars,
but it will stand in the way of the most economical and ser-
viceable method of tying together the different parts of the
transit system of New York. How, then, is the congestion
011 tlie stirîaco liiio.^ to be relieved? Perhaps the 'answer
will be made that the cure ís the operation of more and big-
ger cars, Doubtless something can be done by the operation
of bigger cars; but it can scarcely be claimed that the oper-
ation of more cars durlng the rush hours will be of any help.
One of the worse cau;:es of overcrowding and delays at the
present time is the cougestion at important intersecting
points in Thirty-fourth and Forty-second streets, while it
will not be long before a similar condition wilĩ develop at
Fifty-niulh aud Cnt: Ilundred and Twenty-flfth streets. Nor
is this all, The overcrowdiug and the slowness of the surface
cars is due, not merely to the fact that they interfere with
one another at intersacting points, but that they are con-
stantly delayed by the increasing number of vehicles whlch
use the streets. The President of the Interborough-Metropol-
itan Co, particularly emphasized this point in his testimony,
and it is, indeed, a matter of prime importanee. It is the chief
reason for the failure of the surface lines to obtain their
sliare during the past flve years of the inerease of passenger
fares in Manhattan. The number of trueks and delivery
wagons has increased enormously sinee 1900, and their area
of distribution is mucli larger. The surface cars have much
less room in which to move thau they had; and an increase
in the number and size of the ears would not enable the
company to move them more freely through the streets, The
streets themselves are eongested. It is not merely the tran-
sit system of i\lanhattau whieh is breaking down; it îs the
street system.







THIS failure of tho street system îs a serious thing for
the whole city, as well as for the Metropolitan Co.,
because it is destined to become even more serious iu the
future than it is at present. As the Record and Guide has
frequently pointed out of !ate, the future development of
Manhattan  will take the form   of an increase in buslness