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MAY 4, 1912,
PROSPECT PARK WEST SHOWS MARKED IMPROVEMENT.
Numerous Fine Dwellings and Apartments Change the Sky Line — Bulk
of the Vacant Land Restricted to Dwellings and a New Mansion is Planned.
DROiSPECT Park West, in Brooklyn, has
* undergone considerable improvement
during the last two years through the
erection of two block fronts of fine apart¬
ment houses and the building of several
palatial dwellings. The latest dwelling to
be built is that of Peter Winchester Rouss.
the Manhattan drygoods merchant, at the
southwest corner of Garfield place, which
cost about $200,000. Abutting the Rouss
mansion, at the northwest corner of Pros¬
pect Park West and First slreet. Alfred
C. Feltman, a. prominent pavilion owner
at Coney Island, will build a costly home
for himself on a plot 100 x 125, which he
bought about one month ago for a price
approaching $70,000.
Prospect Park West is that part of
Ninth avenue that skirts the west side
of Prospect Park, from Union street to
Fifteenth street, a distance of about IVz
miles. Practically all of the land on this
thoroughfare originally belonged to the
Litchfield Estate whose holdings once em¬
braced all of Prospect Park as well. It
is only during the last decade that the
peet Park West and President street, on
a piot 100 X 100 feet. It was the first
elevator apartment house on the Park
Slope; and, its general features were cop¬
ied after the Astor Court apartments in
Manhattan. A number of fine elevator
apartment houses have since been erected
on Prospect Park West, north of Oth
street, but it is understood that future
improvements in this part of the thorough¬
fare will ibe mostly private dwellings inas¬
much as all of the- land except the block
front from 3d to 4th streets is restricted
to such structures. There are a few large
vacant plots and a few lots yet unim.
proved in this section of Prospeet Park
West, where front foot values are higher
than in the section of it south of Oth
street, which is mostly improved with four
story non-elevator apartment houses.
From 4th to oth streets is a block from
of flne new apartment houses, while two
vacant corner plots, one at 3d street and
the other at 4th street, are the only re¬
maining unrestricted parcels north of 9th
street.
Court apartment house and between Presi¬
dent and Carroll slreets, is a vacant plot
of two lots, which is held at $25,000. The
practically vacant block front at the be¬
ginning of Prospect Park "Vi'est, from
Union to President streets, is understood
to be in the market at ."^TOO a front foot.
Inasmuch as this parcel overlooks the Park
Plaza it wiil probably be improved with a
large apartment house. The vacant plot,
about 100 by 100 feet in size, at the north¬
west corner of Prospect Park "West and
Sth street recently changed hands, it hav¬
ing been held at about .$40,000. The ad¬
joining north half of this block to Tth
street is improved with fine four-story
stone front dwellings; while a row of three-
story stone front dwellings covers the
block from Gth to Tth streets and a row
of four-story stone front dwellings extends
from 5th to Gth streets. Number 94, at
the southwest corner of 5th street, is a
massive four-story brownstone house
which is now on the market at $4<),000.
A notable circumstance in connection with
these large houses is that they are all oc-
PROSPECT PARIv WEST AT THIRD STREET.
HAMPTON COURT APARTMENTS AT PROSPECT PARK
WEST AND PRESIDENT STREET.
estate disposed of most of its holdings on
Prospect Park West and in intersecting
streets. Much of the property was given
in payment for apartment houses and
other improved property in Manhattan,
while the remainder was sold to builders
for improvement.
The flrst improvements on Prospect Park
West were begun twenty years ago, when
Jacob G. Dettmer and Henry C. Hulbert
bought land and erected costly homes for
their own occupancy. There was no gen¬
eral building movement in the street until
about ten years ago because the Litch¬
field estate until that time would not
sell its holdings and would not im¬
prove them. Charles G. Peterson and
Charles Hart, two speculative builders,
were the first to make extensive improve¬
ments in the street, each buying half a
block front and erecting a row of slone
front four-story dwellings that were held
at from $2S,000 to $40,000 each, the latter
price 'being asked for the corner houses.
The building ^'orkl admired the initiative
of these men, but the houses were carried
a long time before they were sold. How¬
ever, the structures gave character to the
neighborhood and tended to cause the in¬
tersecting streets to be built up with fine
dwellings. As a result the Park Slope sec¬
tion is the largest fine area of urban
Brookiyn. Louis Bonert was another
builder whose flne private houses gavii
character to â– the north half of Prospect
Parlv West. He erected houses of rich de¬
sign which were sold at from $18,000 to
-$25,000 or more each.
After' these operations the thorough¬
fare remained dormant for a few years,
or until 1902 when a Manhattan builder
erected the six-story limestone elevator
apartment house, known as Hampton
Court, at the southwest corner of Pros-
The 3d street corner, which comprises a
plot about 100 by 100 feet, is held at
$G5,00U; while the northwest corner of 4th
slreet, 95 by 97.4V. feet, is held at $57,-
000, or a little less than $600 a front foot.
The last vacant plot on the private resi¬
dence block between Montgomery place
and Garfield place is 47 by 100 feet in size,
is owned by Otto Singer, a builder, and is
held at $28,000. A vacant lot. 24.8 by 89
feet at 20 Prospect Park West, between
Carroll street and Montgomery place, is
held at $10,000 and it is the only vacant
parcel on an otherwise finely improved
dwelling block. Adjoining the Hampton
cupied except one and that is vacant be¬
cause of the death of the owner. A flne
detached three-story brick and stone
dwelling at the southwest corner of 2d
street and Prospect Park West was com¬
pleted about one year ago by Ernest G.
Draper, wlio occupies it. Three fine private
mansions occupy the block of Prospect
Park West from 1st to 2d street. A row
of six-story elevator apartment houses ex¬
tend from 8th to Oth street.
South of Oth street there are not sn
many vacant plots on Prospect Park
West, rows of four-slory non-elevator
apartment houses predominating^. Apart-
PETER W. ROUSS' RESIDENCE AT PROSPECT PARK WBST AND GARFIELD PLACE.