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Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 10, no. 242: November 2, 1872

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Record ND BUILDERS' GUIDE. Vol. X. NEW YOliK, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 2, 1872. No. 242. Published Weekly by THE REAL ESTATE RECORD ASSOCIATION. TERMS. One year, in advance......................$6 00 All communications should be addressed to C. "W. S^W^KET. .'i\7 and 9 Wauken Streht. No receipt for money due the EKAti Estate Record will be acknowledged unless si.gued by one of our ro.gular collectors. Hunry D. S.mitii or Tiro.MAS F. CUiMmings. All bills for collection will be sent from the office on a regu¬ larly i)rinted form. Special Notice, ^Messrs, S. M, Styles h Sons, whose extensive moulding mill on Sixty-fir.-^t street, near Second avenue, takes in nearly half the block, are maldng all the various kinds of mouldings, and the most elaborate and difficult of scroll- sawing, hardwood, cabinet trim, and other work. The re¬ putation they have acquired for e.\ecutin.g orders in first- class style, and with undeviating punctuality, is weU es¬ tablished in the community. I'HE FUTUKS OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY. The great inconTeniences resulting from the Horse Epidemic will have the effect of pro-ving more conclusively than ever the absolute neces¬ sity of steam-transit through the citj"-, in lieu of the present unwieldy and. uncertain system of horse-cars. Although there is little yet to show for it, there can be no doubt that we seem at present nearer the desired consum¬ mation than we ever were previously. Since the positive assurances given by Mr, VanderbUt that the works on the Underground Railroad would be carried out without delay, public hope has been considerably revived, for it was uni¬ versally felt that the enterprise was in the hands of one who usually succeeds in whatever he undertakes to perform. But apart from this, there are other lines of speedy transit -which give fair promise of being shortly under weigh. One of these is "The Central Underground," which has its charter still intact and is only temporarily suspended by the selfish jealousies of interested speculators; the other is '' The New .York Elevated Railway," the only one which has hitherto given us even a foretaste of the good to be derived from a more rapid loco¬ motion than that to which we have been hither¬ to subjected. This road has really been doing essential service, noiselesisly and unostentatious¬ ly, while others have been engaged in oidy asking how it was to be done. It now forms con¬ nection with and transfers passengers regularly to the Hiidsoh River Railroad ; so that people living at Yoniers, in Westchester County, can reach the City Hall in one hour's time. This line can, .however, only be .looked upon at prseent as a sort of useful experiment. It was buUt so h-iirriedly, and much more lightly than it need have .beehy that'-^^ jusb now top frail for aiiythiiig like heavy and coflttmuo:H,s traffic; but there is no reason why it should not be so remodelled and reconstructed as to render it a permanent rapid-transit line of the city, as it has certainly been the boldest pioneer. Bub, -whether sooner or later, whenever one or more of these rapid modes of conveyance by steam shall become an established fact to our citizens, there can be no calculating the extent of the revolution that wUl be made among the dwellings of whole masses of our population, nor can any limit be put to the advantages that Westchester County- must necessarily derive from such a change. It is the natural outlet for our pent-up thousands, who cannot afford to hold property at the rates it has assumed in New York. Every square foot of unoccupied land on Manhattan Island is already so enhanced in value, owing to the improvements already consummated or known to be in contemplation, that investors have long since been holding it at prices beyond the reach of people of small means. Many of these, unable to find their natural relief north of Manhattan Island, owing to the lack of easy communication, have been driven to seek homes in New Jersey and on Long Island; preferring.all the incon¬ veniences and delays of depending on ferries— which in winter are often serious—to the daily annoyance and loss of time in going long dis¬ tances upon our inadequate horse-cars. Time was when they seemed to have no other alter¬ native, but that time has already changed, and the change is daily becoming more rapid. When the City Hall, or its immediate neighbor¬ hood, was the business centre of the city, our overflowing population was glad to avail itself of the cheap lands and easy transportation afforded them across our rivers, when they could, within a few minutes' walk from their places of business, reach the ferries. But now the centre of the retail business is above Union Square, and is gradually re.xching further northward, and those who have their daily occupations above Union Square find themselves cut off from the facilities of the down-town ferries. To many thousands employed above Union Square it is easier fco go to the (xrand Central Depot, and thence into Westchester County, than it is to take stages and cars down to the ferries to convey them across to their homes in New Jersey or Long Island, To this upper portion of our population Westchester County is therefore, even now, the most accessible ; but when steam transit is fairly estabhshed, when the blissful time arrives that a worker down town can take his sea.t -in a warm and well-appointed carriage and be whirled to his home in Yonkers or Tarrytown in about the same time that it now takes htm to reach his residenbe in Twentieth or Thirtieth street, half- frozen and fatigued by standing clinging to the i straps of a horse-car, he wiJl, together with the i thousands who now dwell in New Jersey and Long Island, in whatever part of the city they may be employed, naturally turn their eyes northward, and prefer homes in the equally accessible and more favored climate of West¬ chester County; especially when they can thus be altogether independent of ferries. The building of the East River bridge may modify this result on the Eastern shore, but to the dwellers of New Jersey the change seems in¬ evitable. Although this would appear the natural and certain movement of our population in future, the County lands in Westchester have hitherto not been largely dealt in by speculators. At the same time the utmost activity has been sho-wn in individual places, among towns and villages along the different lines of railroads, and in some instances the value of property has risen very rapidly. In Yonkers, for instance, there are lots of 25 feet by 100 feet which a very few years ago were not worth more than 500 dollars, which can now readily command from $3,000 to $3,500 each. Per¬ fectly aware of the future before it, West¬ chester County is already one net-work of railways, either actually completed or to be shortly constructed, opening up new and rich districts through to Connecticut and Massa¬ chusetts, and concentrating a flood of travel and trade into what will form not long hence the upper part of the City of New York, All public improvements there are also being carried out with this end in -view. Broad avenues and drives are' being laid out in every direction, which are destined to be but continuations or connections of the magnifieenb avenues and boulevards of New York City, when these little vdlages, now In their very infancy, *shaU be part and parcel of one great Metropolis. So rapidly does improvement march with us, -when fairly begun, that had we now but one or two lines of rapid transit in operation, it is not too much to say that many now living would yet live to see an entirely new city located beyond the northernmost point of Manhattan Island and connected with ifc; a city so large in extent that on the map it would look like the wide- spreading branches of some huge tree, of which Manhattan Island would represent the sturdy trunk. MECHANICS' LIENS. NEflir yonK. Oct. 23 Ajiittst. (No, 123), Wm, Langguth agt. G, M. Mittnacht,,............ §2,300 17 25 Ann st., s. w. cok, Nassau si, Dan- iel McGrath agt. Edward Hall..... 1,200 00 30 BOWEKY, w. s, (No, .208), G, W. Barnes agt, Jacob Brookman, (Con- tiauatioh.)..■..,........,,...,:.,,. 283 98