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February 26, 1910
RECORD AND GUIDE
427
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C. W. SWEET
Published Every Saturdap
By THE RECORD AND GUIDE CO,
President, CLINTON W. SWEET Treasurer, F. W. DODGE
Vice-Pres. & Genl. Mgr,, H. W. DESMOND Secretary, F. T. MILLER
Nos. 11 to 15 East 24tli Street, New York City
(Telephone, Madison Sqtiare, 4430 fo 4433.)
"Entered at the Post Office at New York, N. Y., as srcond-class matter."
• Copyrighted, 1910, by The Record Se Guide Co.
Vol. LXXXV.
FEBRUARY 26, 1910.
No. 21S9.
THE Twenty-third Street Improvement Association has
requested the Public Service Commissi ou to change
the route of tbe Broadway-Lexington Avenue Subway, so that
it will take the line of the Bowery instead of Broadway
south of Fourteenth Street, but there is not the remotest
chance tliat the Commission will seriously consider the ap¬
plication. The change in plans would mean a delay in sub¬
way construction for an indefinite period; and the laying out
of a new route would have to be of indisputable advantage
in order to justify such a delay. It cannot be reasonably
claimed that the proposed change would be sufficiently ad¬
vantageous to compensate the city for any further postpone¬
ment in new subway construction. Doubtless the idea of the
Association, that a continuous route along Broadway would
constitute the most useful and popular subway which could
be constructed in Manhattan, is a sound idea; hut that idea
has already been rejected by the Commission, and this re¬
jection has become final. The Commission in laying out
the Broadway-Lexington Avenue route has proceeded on the
theory that the new subway should compete with the exist¬
ing subway instead of supplementing it. The only possible
tenant of a continuous Broadway line would he the Inter¬
borough Co., and the Commission has decided that it is more
advantageous for the city to quarrel with that corporation
than to co-operate with it. Assuming then that the new
subway is to be independent, it is far better to lay out the
independent route along the line of densest traffic—which is
assuredly that of lower Broadway, Moreover, inasmuch as
the Bowery forms an essential part of one of the four longi¬
tudinal thoroughfares contained in the street plan of Man¬
hattan, it should be reserved for a subway, whose upper
portion would continue along Third Avenue. The other sug¬
gestions of the Association, namely, that an express statioii
should be established at Twenty-third Street, is, however,
both sound and practicable. To change the existing plans in
this respect would mean little or no delay and would be of
the utmost convenience to the travelling puhlic. In refus¬
ing to establish an express station anywhere between Canal
and Forty-second Street the Commission is proceeding on a
false principle. Express stations should he distributed, not
concentrated. The one at Forty-second Street should be
abandoned, and be replaced by new ones both at Twenty-
third and Fifty-ninth Streets. Considering the rapid and
prodigious increase of the business population in and around
Madison Square, the failure to provide that central point with
the convenience of an express station is wholly inexcusable,
and will cause exasperating and unnecessary delays to
hundreds of thousands of people as long as the Broadway-
Lexington Avenue route continues to be used.
existing subway south of Fourteenth Street with the new-
subway north thereof, the whole system could be operated
with a minimum of expense to the company and a maximum
of advantage to the public. Why then, have not the incon¬
testable and considerable advantages of such an arrangement
appealed to the management of the Belmont Co.? There is
only one explanation which seems adequate. The manage¬
ment of the Interborough Co. must have been warned off the
premises by more powerful financial interests. The Broad¬
way-Lexington Avenue route is to all appearances being re¬
served to provide the New Haven Railroad Co. with an en¬
trance into Manhattan and competition is heing suppressed
for that purpose. Messrs. J. P. Morgan & Co. are dominant
in the management of the New Haven Railroad Co. They
are also the bankers of the Interborough company. Without
their assistance the Interborough Co. is powerless to raise
the money needed for subway extensions, and it is being com¬
pelled to stand aside and to allc)w the New Haven Co. an
entrance into Manhattan. Such is the explanation, which
appears to account most satisfactorily for the peculiarities of
the existing situation, and if it is true, it is certainly a great
pity. The Broadway-Lexington Avenue subway forms by no
means a perfect supplement to the existing subway, but the
two routes could he operated together with much greater
convenience to the travelling public than they could be oper¬
ated independently. Independent operation means substan¬
tially that the interest of the inhabitants of Manhattan in a
well-articulated rapid transit system will he subordinated to
the interest of Long Island in a tri-borough system. For
it is very probable that the so-called tri-borough route as
planned at present constitutes at bottom a development of
the joint plans of the New Haven and Pennsylvania Railroad
Companies to develop Long Island both for manufactur¬
ing and domestic purposes at the expense of Manhattan.
IN SPITE of the fact that the Broadway-Lexington Avenue
route is planned to compete with the present subway
instead of supplementing it, the Record and Guide has never
been able to understand why the management of the Inter¬
borough Co. has apparently rejected the idea of bidding upon
it. Whatever its defects, this proposed new subway should
develop a traffic as dense as that now carried on the existing
subway, and if it can .be operated profitably by an indepen¬
dent company, it can assuredly be made equally remunera¬
tive by the Interborough. Indeed, it ought to be even more
remunerative, because in that case by means of a connecting
link along Broadway, from Fourteenth Street and Forty-
second Street, and hy means of another link connecting the
IF it is true, as reported, that the Board of Estimate has
decided to build future subways on the city's credit,
it is at least conceivable that the Interborough Co. would be
thereby enabled to become a bidder on the Broadway-Lexing¬
ton Avenue route. In that case the operating company, in¬
stead of being obliged to raise over $100,000,000, both for
construction and equipment, would not be obliged to supply
more than the cost of equipment, and it is conceivable at
least that the Interborough Co. could raise this compara¬
tively modest sum, as it did before, without the assistance
of J. P. Morgan & Co. The Record and Guide sincerely
hopes that such will be the case, not because it has any
preference for the Interborough Co., but because it would
like to see the inhabitants of Manhattan 6btain the utmost
possible local benefit from local subway construction. What
is wholly wrong about the existing situation is the unmistak¬
able evidence it affords of the operation of powerful subter¬
ranean interests; and the crying need of the immediate fu¬
ture is the disclosure of the real nature and intentions of
these underhand influences behind the so-called Gaffney
syndicate. Is it or is it not the New Haven Company?
If so, is it in the interest of New York City that a powerful
firm of bankers should dictate the policy both of the Inter¬
borough Co. and the one possible competitor? All these
questions will be answered by the events of the next six
months. When the time comes to hid on the Broadway-Lex¬
ington Avenue route the plans of the New Haven Co. wiU
have to be disclosed, but it is certainly most unfortunate
that during the whole period of preparation public opinion
has been left in the dark as to the forces which are actually
determining the future of New York City in relation to the
essential matter of rapid transit. The Broadway-Lexington
Avenue route as a transit improvement depends for its pecu¬
liar effect wholly upon the nature of its control. If leased
to the Interborough Co, its influence upon the future of the
city would he very different than if it were leased to the
New Haven Co. In the former case it would be operated
for the beneflt chiefly of Manhattan. In the second case it
would he operated chiefiy for the benefit of the outlying bor¬
oughs, and this distinction should be thoroughly understood
before public opinion approves or disapproves of any par¬
ticular contract.
IT is an interesting piece of news in relation to the de¬
velopment of loft-construction in Manhattan that a
sixteen-story building is to he erected in Twenty-second
Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. When loft-build¬
ings began to be built north of 14th Street over ten years
ago, six-story structures, were being put up on the side