April 4, 1908
rJEtECORD AND GUIDE
591
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Copyrighted,
1908, by
Tbe
Record
fi
Guide
Co.
Vol. LXXXL
APRIL 4,
1908.
NO.
2090-
FOR the quarter ending with March the record of build¬
ing operations projected, as well as work under way,
was one of the lightest in a long period of years, but at
the same time one of the least discouragiiig of all'the dull
winters within easy recollection, owing to the good years
immediately preceding, and to a general expectation of ai\
early return of life and vigor. We would be obliged to
search back througli many years to find another winter of
like inactivity, but not very far to reach a twelvemonth
when building operations were no larger than in the twelve
months just past. The year 1903 as a whole was not equal
to last year in activity, mainly attributable to the labor war¬
fare which continued throughout tbe whole of that year
and left consequ'enees for its successor as well. According
to the official figures and proportion of population, the year
1898 corresponded closely with 1907 as to-the- degree of
activity in bu'ilding work, and the year ISSS was consid¬
ered a normal one, and typical of the time when the city
had fully recovered from the effects of the panic of 1893.
Previous to 1895 the estimated cost of "building operations
never equaled the total for 1907 except once. For tEirty-
three years, from 1S6S to 1900 inclusive, the average yearly
appropriation for new buildings in old New York was but
$48,500,000. From this it is apparent that the huge under¬
takings of 1905 and 1906, when the estimated cost of new
buildings approximated one hundred and sixty-two million
and one hundred and thirty-five million respectively in the
two boroughs, were the fruit of abnormal conditions rather
than standards to be regularly reached by the building op¬
erations of succeeding years. Yet things must be judged in
proportion, and the relative standing of one year with an¬
other must, in order to be just, be figured with respect to
growth of-population. Dull winters do not necessarily make
dull years in a builder's calendar, and the announcements
of several exceptionally important projects during the past
fortnight, which are to be undertaken at once, together with
a marked increase in real estate activity, indicate that the
current year's work" is likely to gatjier a very fair amount
of headway before long.
ished work and a road in profitable and satisfactory opera¬
tion are matters of much less importance to tbem. With
the chances thus favoring the beginning of actual construc¬
tion sometime this summer, and the absorption of the city's
surplus means therein, there is but one way left open to
Manhattan-Bronx of obtaining a similar line, and that is
by enlisting private capital, and this will be possible only
after adequate modifications Jn the existing rapid transit laws
have been secured. Mr, John D. Crimmins holds that under
the. Public Service law. in particular it will be difficult for
the city to obtain a responsible association of men to under¬
take the operation of new transit lines, as investors will not
readily be found to supply capital for an undertaking ""so
absolutely subject to such an administration." A fifty-year
period for a franchise would be none too long, he thinks, in
order to provide a sinking fund so that the city could pos¬
sess the property at the end of the period without any out¬
lay. While this may be regarded as an extreme view, it
suggests the prospect of the city having to make a larger
concession than has been generally reckoned on unless some
new financial elements and resources are about to come for¬
ward.
A CRITICISM rged upon the Aldrich bill in Congress
and which was found pertinent enough to necessi¬
tate an amendment in. that respect, was one made as fo
the issue-by savings banks of credit-money based on rail¬
road securities. "It may be the entering wedge for the
acceptance of undesirable bonds as securities for note issue,"
and "there are recent examples in the laws of New York
State legalizing such bonds for savings banks," was the
language of criticism used—decisive to kill the proposition
in the national councils, scathing in its satire of New York
local legislation. Again, a report of a New York savings
bank, quoted a few days afterward, that it was a loser to
the tirne of $200,000 by its investments in Alton or some
other similar railroad bonds, was a fitting climax to the
. criticism! And what, after all, has been the good of it
(for the patron or depositor of the local savings banks
â– throughout the State)? What used to be a system of
stimulating' home trade in realty, a strong arm for the
â– farmer, to lean' on when private necessity or greed "called
in the mortgage on the farm," and an always efiicient local
. real estate and financial, pulse, has now become a mere
feeder throughout the State for the grist mill of the "Street."
With no present purpose .to criticise WaU Street, or its
always urgent needs, or to inveigh against the much bela¬
bored System which has turned banks of note discount into
banks of collateral loan, turned private banking houses into
trust companies for the utilization in finance of both sides
of a dollar, converted the country banks into feeders, and
the savings banks into railroad bond investors, yet we do
think, if mortgage on realty is ever to have a futu're agaio,
and the charity settlements a rest, savings banks must be
. turned back to some form of investment of use to the local
- resident, and the growth of the immigrant census at Castle
Garden (for this year at least) cut back a few inches.
NEXT MONDAY the Public Service Commission will aC-
vertise for bids on the construction of the projected
Fourth Avenue Subway in Brooklyn as the next necessary
â– proceeding imder the resolution to build on this route at
- the expense oC the municipal corporation. While the case
is by no means closed and every chance of defeating the
â– project eliminated, yet the probabilities seem to favor tlie
prediction that the Board of Estimate will eventually ratify
the contracts when about to be awarded and will find a way
of meeting the cost of constructing some portion of the line,
and that the work will be actually started. Several con¬
trary things, including injunctions, may intervene, but
among men who have followed the proceedings closely the
weight of opinion favors the assumption that the Borough of
Brooklyn will have its way in this case through to the end,
as it has thus far. Private capital would not undertake to
build, but the prophecy is that it will be ready enough to
operate the road upon completion, as in the meantime a
very large development will arise in the attractive sections
of Bay Ridge, Fort Hamilton, Bath Beach and BensonhuTst,
through which the route is laid, as well as in old Brooklyn,—
in consequence of the new rapid transit conveniences. Mani¬
festly, the primal consideration with some of the interests
behind the scheme is a subway construction started. A fin-
TIME and again, when those who in a professional capacity
have sought to cash some country mortgage for a
client, have said in reply to oft-granted requests for further
time in which to replace the loan, "'why don't you go to your
local savings bank?" the reply has been, "Oh, our savings
bank don't loan any more on mortgages much; they buy
railroad boridsdown in New York." Now, we are of those
who believe the world wiil go all right in its appointed
course if let alone, and needs but little legislation or medi¬
cine to keep it straight; and that even whefl the axe is laid
at the foot of the tree, to change the metaphor, the tree
will ultimately even grow round the blade, and go on its
way upward to fruition,—but we regret to see all roads lead
to Rome—vernacular now for Wall Street—and would
gladly see the balance of investment restored. Thus would-
be rendered- unnecessary the protective union benevolent
loan associations which now seek to meet the want formerly
supplied by tbe local savings banks throughout the State.
As in early days when neighbors in small ruTal hamlets
joined shoulders to a barn-raising, impossible for one man,
so through these loan associations have neighborhoods sought
to pool their pennies month by month to enable each mem¬
ber in turn to build the home or addition, or pay off the
incumbrances, which in former times the local savings bank
was supposed to be there for, like the local bank of note-
discount. Both still survive, but one at least has survived
its usefulness, or a part thereof.