March 7, 1908





RECORD  AND   GUIDE





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Vol.  LXXXl.





MARCH 7,  1008.





No. 208(3.





INDEX TO DEPARTMENTS.
Advertising  Section.

Page.                                                Page.

Cement   ......................zil Lumber   .....................xiii

Ciay   Products    ...............xiv  Metal    Work    .................ix

Consulting  E'ngineers   ...........x   Quick   Job    Directory..........vii

Contractors   and   Builders   ___iii   Real   Estate    ...................v

El::ctrical   Interests    ..........vii   Roofers  &   Roofiug  Materials, .xii

Fireprooflng    ..................ii   Stone    .......................xv

Granite    .....................xv  Wood  Products   ..............xiii

Iron   and   Steei................xi





THERE cannot be too many ways of escape from a burn¬
ing school house. Circumstances arise in such a crisis
which no architect and no buildiug laws can forsee, to defeat
all the usual precautions. Danger lurks at every doorway
through which a large number of children are expected to
find safety—at the foot of every flight of stairs, and at every
turn in a crooked hallway. Double doors that should swing
open are sometimes immovable, or only one side wil! open,
and that is not enough. How many school doors in this
country are locked during school hours? Tbe flre drill is
sounded ancl the children are hurried down to their death,
as at CoUinwood this week—piled six and eight deep in the
vestibule, and there suffocated and burned. The exit was
jammed by too many trying to pass out at once. These chil¬
dren had been exercised in a "flre drill" which ordinarily
took them out by two divisions, for there were but two exits,
and in this case the fire drill proved fatal, as it may in others
where ample flre escapes are not provided. In New York it
is proposed to construct no more exterior fire escapes, but
rely on incombustible stairways. The authorities should be
very sure that these are not only absolutely flreproof, but
also smoke-proof and panic-proof, and that there are twice
as many provided as ordinarily there is need for. Most of
the school houses in New York are unburnable, their doors
swing outward and in none could such a holocaust as this
happen. But there are other cities which have reason
to fear that they have been taking too many chances with
crooked halls, unprotected stairways and locked exits, and
putting too much dependence on the efficacy of fire drills
when there is no fire. Rapid dismissal exercises are well
enough when children see no smoke and flames, are not
frightened, nor tripped and thrown down or otherwise con¬
fused. What may happen when one of the regular exits is
blocked was terribly illustrated at CoUinwood, where the
classes were marched into a trap. In cases of serious fire
one or more of the regular outways is nearly always shut off.
Therefore numerous emergency exits should be provided, so
that the smallest possible number of children will be sent to
any one door.





MUCH was heard last year concerning the increase in
the cost of building and contract work over the pre¬
vailing rates of ten years previously and occasionally some
one paused to attempt a mathematical comparison, which
was scarcely ever decisive. For the reason that methods of
planning work, of handling materials and of directing work¬
ing forces had changed, the totals, quotients and products
of such computations rarely if ever gave a true answer.
Building practice had so changed the relative standing of
materials and their proportions in the building that even the
best knowledge of price lists was of little assistance in mak¬
ing the comparison. Five years ago building costs had ap¬
parently advanced thirty per cent, for average work, yet first-





class offlce buildings were actually being erected at that time
at a cost only ten per cent, greater, which proved that there
are elements and forces contributing to the construction of
a building which cannot be represented in price lists and
wage schedules. We cannot express in figures the higher
t;kill with which engineers and architects now draw their
plans and speciflcations, so as to produce equal or as good
results for the same money; the time saved by builders
through more expeditious methods of handling structural
materials, or the interest money saved by the avoidance or
labor strikes. The only place where one can discover what
the actual per cent, of increase has been in the cost of build¬
ing in the last decade is in the cost books of owners and
genera! contractors, and even there account is not taken of all
the elements and factors. The average taste is not satisfied
to-day with what was passable in architecture and fittings
awhile ago, and almost unconsciously requires costlier habi¬
tations. The prices of materials, metals and tools used in
building and public works reached their highest level in De¬
cember of 1906, since which time there has been a gradual
decline; and except in the item of wages, building costs
have returned to near the level of the year 1904, when con¬
ditions were considered very favorable for building after the
long labor war of the previous year. In a group of twenty-
seven building materials there was an average increase in
1906 as determined by government statistics of 9.6 per cent,
over the preceding year, the largest advances being in lum¬
ber. Considering the large demand for materials, and the
exceedingly prosperous condition of business, this was not
then unreasonable and would have received no consideration
if building money had continued easy. Conditions in the
material market now resemble those which were prevailing
at the opening of the year 1904, and the general expectations
are still for a similar course o'f business during the current
year.





THE Public Service Commissioners have asked the
New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad Company
for definite information as to why the work of constructing
the Westchester four-track electric railroad has been dis¬
continued, when the construction will be resumed, and when
the sections will be completed and operated. It is scarcely
expected that there will be much satisfaction either to the
Commissioners or the property owuers along the projected
line from the answer that will be received. President Mellen
recently stated that until there shall come a final decision of
the Court of Appeals sustaining the validity of the West¬
chester charter, or an approval of the Portcbester Company's
plan to build on the Westchester's route, "little progress can
be made." So far as known, the decisions of the courts on
the legal points involved in both cases have been adverse to
the company, and the Board of Estimate is still under an
injunction against giving its consent to the Portchester to
change its route. The franchise which the City gave the
Westchester company in 1904, to construct and operate its
railway over certain streets in the Bronx, will expire on July
26th of next year, unless the road is then completed from
the city line as far south as^ the Southern Boulevard and
Westchester av. If Mr. Mellen set his forces right to work
they could scarcely finish in time, and altogether tbe twin
enterprises which promised to be the motive for a great real
estate development in the Bronx seem to have almost faded
out.





THE business interests of New Jersey are assured by Mr.
Calvin Tomkins that their opportunity will not always
be so pronounced as at present. Up to the opening of the
Hudson River tunnel, New York did not, he says, appreciate
the danger of the future competition of New Jersey, but now,
with its better political organization, it will endeavor to
create conditions in the outlying boroughs that will make
residence and occupation there comparatively more desirable
than in New Jersey. But as a number of years must elapse
before these improvements can be made, Mr, Tomkins points
out that the interim constitutes the opportunity of New
Jersey for obtaining its initial advantage; and he therefore
advises in a public letter, appearing in a Newark paper, a
comprehensive development plan—with a view to its subse¬
quent evolution—which would include the deepening of New¬
ark Bay and the Hackensack and Passaic rivers for steam¬
ship terminals, these to be equipped with ample warehouse
service and connected by rail with each other and witb the
general railroad  lines;   also to  include  boulevards,  streets,