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DECEMBER 6, 1912
LOWER FULTON STREET IN BROOKLYN
Once the Premier Business Section, from Borough Hall to
Fulton Ferry, It Has Lost Caste—Hopes for Improvement
A PROMINENT man of the West
once asked Henry Ward Beecher
how to get to Plymouth Church, as he
wished to hear Beecher preach, and the
famous pulpit orator answered, "Take
Fulton Ferry from New York to Ful¬
ton street, Brooklyn, and follow the
crowd up Fulton street." Beecher's
church is in Orange street, which inter¬
sects Fulton street a few blocks above
the ferry. Fulton street, from the ferry
to Borough Hall, Brookyn, was in
Beecher's time a great thoroughfare.
The stores that lined it between the
points mentioned did a heavy business,
and they embraced all kinds of estab¬
lishments from large retail dry goods
firms to cigar stores and saloons.
captured the rest of the traffic. The
writer crossed the East River on a
boat of Fulton Ferry at mid-day recent¬
ly and there were only seven passengers
on the boat and two trucks. The dam¬
age to traffic in Fulton street extends
from the ferry to Pierrepont street, but
the few blocks from Clark street to
Pierrepont street show more traffic and
better property conditions than does
Fulton street north and west ot Clark
street to the ferry.
When the bridge cars only were op¬
erated on the Brooklyn Bridge, there
was more traffic on Fulton street north
and west of the Borough Hall because
there were many persons who walked
to the bridge and took a car across it
lyn has been discussing in the last year,
it is proposed to remove the elevated
railroad from the part of Fulton street
in discussion and build an elevated rail¬
road in Adams street, from Fulton street
to Myrtle avenue, thereby joining the
part of the Fulton street elevated above
Boerum place to the line running
through Adams street north of Myrtle
avenue to Brooklyn Bridge. If this plan
is carried out, then Fulton street, from
Clark street to the ferry, may come in¬
to favor as a manufacturing center.
With a subway station at Clark street
eventually, the part of Fulton street be¬
low that point would be easily acces¬
sible. But as a matter of fact it is just
as accessible now, if not more so, from
FULTON STREET—FULTON FERRY HOUSE IN BACKGROUND.
FULTON STREET, AT CLINTON STREET, BROOKLTN.
The street and car traffic to and from
Fulton Ferry was dense. The bronze
statue of Robert Fulton that surmounts
the entrance to the ferry house looked
down on a steadily moving crowd of
passengers who crossed the' river for
one cent each. Now the fare is five
cents each and there are very feW pas¬
sengers, because traffic no longer goes
to lower Fulton street. Property there
is at a standstill, and the statue of Ful¬
ton looks down on a thoroughfare as
still as a country road. The first set¬
tlement of Brooklyn was in the neigh¬
borhood of Fulton Ferry, and there is
not as much traffic there now as there
was in the days of that part of Brooklyn
portrayed in a famous painting of its
earliest period.
The Knell of Lower Fulton Street.
When the Brooklyn Bridge was
opened in May, 1883, the doom of lower
Fulton street was sealed, because the
use of that structure diverted two-thirds
of the traffic from Fulton Ferry; and
the subway under the East River has
to Manhattan and walked home from the
Brooklyn end of the bridge in the eve¬
ning. Now these people can take a
trolley car for five cents, almost from
their door and ride to and across the
bridge as well.
The proposed subway route through
Fulton street to Clark street may tend
to tone up property values in the part
of Fulton street from Pierrepont to
Clark street, but that will be some time
in the future; but Fulton street from
Clark street to the ferry has no pros¬
pects of betterment, unless the Brook¬
lyn Rapid Transit Company takes down
its elevated railroad structure, as has
been proposed, from Borough Hall to
Fulton Ferry. The elevated trains now
run across Brooklyn Bridge; there is
little or no traffic to the ferry, and the
part of the elevated structure from, the
Borough Hall to the river is now a neg¬
ative quantity.
Possibly a Manufacturing Center.
In connection with the contemplated
plan of the City Beautiful, which Brookr
the Brooklyn Bridge elevated station,
as it ever will be by a Clark street sub¬
way station. The elevated railroad
structure in lower Fulton street, it is
claimed by real estate men, hurts the
chances of renting many buildings there
for manufacturing purposes because it
impairs the light, and that it does is un¬
disputed. On the other hand, it is
argued that before lower Fulton street
can attain prestige as a manufacturing
center modern factory buildings will
have to be erected there. These might
be built if the elevated railroad was re¬
moved.
It is very probable that the operation
of Fulton Ferry will be discontinued
altogether, unless the city takes it over
as a municipal mode of travel. Wall
street ferry has ceased to operate alto¬
gether and Catharine street ferry is op¬
erated only in the morning and eve¬
ning.
Fulton street from Clark street to
the ferry is a motley aggregation of old
brick buildings. They served the pur:.