REAL ESTATE
AND
Copyright, 1917, by The Record and Guide Co,)
NEW YORK, DECEMBER 1, 1917
AMERICAN CITY PLANNING INSTITUTE MEETS
TO DISCUSS BUILDING ZONE PLAN
THE recent meeting of the American
City Planning Institute in this city
discloses that the zoning movement
started by New York City is fast spread¬
ing to the other cities of the country.
This session of the Institute was held
in New York City for the special pur¬
pose of permitting those interested in
zoning in other cities to study at first
hand the actual operation of the New
York law. Commissions to prepare zon¬
ing plans have been appointed in Phila¬
delphia, St. Louis, Newark and other
cities. Members and representatives of
these zoning and city planning commis¬
sions and committees to the number of
about one hundred attended the con¬
ference.
The morning session was held in the
office of the Committee on the City Plan
of the Board of Estimate, in the
Municipal Building. Edward M. Bassett,
former chairman of the New York Dis¬
tricting Commission, presided. The de¬
tailed methods and results of zoning
were discussed by Robert H. Whitten,
secretary of the Committee on the City
Plan ; Rudolph Miller, chairman of the
Board of Appeals; H. H. Murdock, archi¬
tect, and Francis P. Schiavone, of the
staff of the Committee on the City Plan.
After this session the members of the
conference took an automobile trip
through lower Manhattan and Brooklyn.
They were specially interested in the
preservation of residential districts and
in the detached house sections of Flat¬
bush. where, under the "E District"
regulations, the erection of apartment
houses has been stopped.
Groups of visiting planners were con¬
ducted through the Washington Square
section, where certain residential areas
are to be preserved under the zone plan ;
also through 14th street, 23d street and
Sixth avenue, old retail and department
store centers. They were also shown
recent interesting examples of the use
of the set-back principle in the con¬
struction of buildings in order to comply
with the height provisions of the zone
law.
In the evening the visitors held a
meeting in the Engineering Societies
Building, Lawson Purdy presiding. Ad¬
dresses were made by John P. Fox, con¬
sultant to the Committee on the City
Plan; B. A. Haldeman, engineering ad¬
visor to the Philadelphia Zoning Com¬
mission ; Harland Bartholomew, engi¬
neer of the St. Louis Zoning Commis¬
sion, and others.
This meeting in New York was the
first held by the Institute. The National
City Planning Conference has been
meeting annually for several years. At
the last meeting, at Kansas City, the
American City Plan Institute was organ¬
ized as a section of the conference to
include the technical members. It was
organized for the purpose of permitting
more detailed discussion of city planning
problems than would be appropriate at
the general meeting of the conference.
H. H. Murdock. of Jardine. Hill &
Murdock. architects, spoke on how the
law has actually worked out in thc
sixteen months since its passage. He
said, in part:
"This zoning resolution has been in
effect less than a year and a half, and
during that time there has been less
building than normal. This condition
has. of course, had considerable bearing
on this subject, because, had there been
more activity during this period, more
questions would probably have been
raised and defects not yet shown
brought out.
"The law is divided into three main
parts—first, regulation as to use; second,
regulation as to height, and third, regu¬
lation as to area to be covered.
"Of these, the first is the most im¬
portant, that is, regulation as to use,
because it has the most effect on the
whole city and tends toward stabilizing
conditions. The height regulation is im¬
portant, but it applies in practice to a
few, although very important sections.
The area requirements are also im¬
portant, but they are not so widely
different from what the existing laws
permitted, and what we had become
used to to have an important bearing on
this subject.
Development of New York City,
"To understand the working out of
this law one must study the develop¬
ment of New York City. New York has
grown from the small trading post of
the Dutch East India Company, at
Bowling Green, steadily eastward and
northward. Business has driven the
resident centers before it as the prairie
fire is driven before the wind, so that
literally what was a resident district a
few years ago is almost abruptly trans¬
formed into a mercantile center of to¬
day. And in this overtaking movement,
which has been going on from the
earliest days of New Amsterdam, there
have been left in the path of progress
little cases of residences here and
there, for example Washington Square
and Murray Hill, and these have been,
and still are, problems in themselves.
"Beginning with the outlying sections
let us see what the law has done. It
has striven to fix things as they have
naturally worked themselves out,
namely, that streets and avenues already
committed to business shall be business
streets and residence streets shall be
restricted to residence uses. There are,
of course, numerous sections left un¬
restricted where the development is un¬
settled or already given over to mis¬
cellaneous and manufacturing uses.
Under the law. houses can go anywhere,
but factories, garages and stores must
keep within the streets and avenues
given over to them. The law is, how¬
ever, not retroactive.
The Same Principles Apply.
"Take, for example, the upper West
Side known as Washington Heights.
Here the law fixes present conditions.
Broadway, Amsterdam and other im¬
portant avenues and business cross
streets, like 145th street, are committed
to business uses. Riverside drive and
the cross streets generally are com¬
mitted to residence purposes. The law
recognizes this natural development and
permits it to continue.
"This same principle can be applied to
other sections all over the city. The law
does not disturb their present status, but
for the protection of this section, and
the owners of property makes permanent
this established condition.
"The question of garages has perhaps
caused more discussion than any other
occupancy. The law seeks to place these
in the unrestricted districts, but at the
same time permits them in business
streets where public garages or public
stables already exist. There have been
mnny petitions to the Board of Stand¬
ards and Appeals for additional garage
permits and these have almost uni¬
formly, I believe, been granted after
proper hearings, investigations and con¬
sents. An amendment to the law to
establish just what is meant by a public
garage and a public stable has been
introduced, to establish these as build¬
ings for five automobiles and for five
horses, respectively. There has also
been an amendment proposed to open
up for garages certain streets on the
lower West Side now designated as busi¬
ness streets. These proposed amend¬
ments tend to show that in respect to
garages, modifications of the law are to
be expected, because people want public
garages conveniently located.
"The most important section of the
city affected by the Zoning Resolution
is the Central Mercantile District. As
the New York Globe said editorially the
other day, the rehabilitation of Sixth
avenue near 23d street, which only a
decade ago was the great retail center
and which is now being redeveloped for
wholesalers and factories, is the best
endorsement that we could have of the
Zoning Law.
"This most recent vacating movement
followed fortunately by the coming in
of new tenants is typical of previous
experiences of other sections, although
some sections have not even yet recov¬
ered. The history of New York shows
a continuous changing of trade centers.
The retail center has, jump by jump, as
transportation has developed and other
causes have arisen, traveled from lower
Broadway to its present location be¬
tween 34th street and Central Park.
East and west it is now confined prac¬
tically between Sixth and Madison ave¬
nues. Without the Zoning Law no one
knows what the next leap would have
been, but that there would have been a
leap is almost a certainty, because the
factories were crowding up and into
the retail section, repeating the old
process and making it impossible, with
the hordes of workers filling up the
sidewalks at the noon hour.
"Now, thanks to the law and to the
'Save New York' movement, these
factories are returning to the sections
south of the retail center, where they
are permitted and where they are
learning that it is for their best in¬
terests to go. The retail district is
breathing more easily and is spread¬
ing out from the established center.
It is now logically located almost in
the center of Manhattan Island, be¬
tween the great New York Central
Station on the east and the great
Pennsylvania Station on the west,
reached, as it is also from all parts
of the city, by the subways, elevated
and surface lines. Manufacturing in
this section is, as you have learned,
permitted, but only to a limited ex¬
tent, and every one is apparently satis¬
fied.
"There have been several cases
where owners have plots bordering
partly on a business thoroughfare and
partly in a resident street. The most
interesting case where this condition
has presented a problem is the Stein¬
way Piano Company case. Before the
law was passed this concern con¬
tracted to buy a piece of ground in
57th street and 58th street, intended
for their new salesroom and repair
shops. After the law was passed they
discovered that the building they pro¬
posed to erect would not be permitted
on the entire plot for their type of
occupancy, and the company is now
being sued to enforce performance of
the purchase contract.
"It is also reported that Baron Astor
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