Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 11, no. 263: March 29, 1873

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AND BUILDERS' GUIDE. Vol. XI. NEW SATURDAY, MARCH 29, 1873. No. 2()8. 'iPtibii.'ihed Weeklu bu THE REAL ESTATE RECORD ASSOCIATION. TEILMS. One year, in advance......................$6 00 AU communications should he .iddreaaed to C TV^. s%ve;et. ■7 ANU 9 WAllItEX STUKKT. No receipt for money due the Real Bst.vpe Recoud will be acknowled.Lîed nnless sistied by one of our regular coUector.s. He.nhy D. S.Mi'i'H or TiiO.MAS F. Cummixg.s. AU bills for coUection svill be sent from the office on a regu¬ larly printed form. CITY IMPROVEMENTS-UP-TOWN, DOWN- TOWN. TiiERE certainly is no organization iii this city that has done so mnch toward encouraging uptown improvements as the West Side Asso¬ ciation, coini)osed as it is of public-si^irited bitizens, who hâve by active counsel and timely suggestions aided so materially, first the De¬ partment of Parks, and now the Department of Public Works, which by Act of the Légis¬ lature now controls the streets and avenues north of Fifty-ninth street. This association, of which Mr. Wm. R. Martin is the leading spirit, publishes from time to time the reports of its opérations. The first document for the current year, containing in full the proceedings of a public meeting held at Lyric Hall on the 22d of January, is now before us, and the pamphlet, containing as it does ail the addresses delivered at said meeting, together with reports and correspondence, ail gotten up ia a neat form and illustrated by a map, shouid bein the hands of ail those interested in the vast im¬ provements now going on in the northern part of the island. The association, aside from its ordinary labors, has certainly rendered property- owners a real service by laying before them in¬ formation, communicated at a meeting which ail could not attend, and which the haste of sending morning pa[)ers to press prevented firom being published at the time the meeting was held. . We are hère for the first time made acquaint¬ ed with " the présent condition of west side im provements " on which Mr. H. B. Bacon re¬ ported at the time of the meeting (Jan. 23) in substance as follows:— "That the Boulevard from the circle at Fifty- ninth street to One Hundred and Fifty-fifth can be completed by July, 1873, except the planting, which cannot be done until the water pipes hâve been laid and the sewers con¬ structed. That the Seventh avenue from One Hundred and Tenth street to Harlem river can be com¬ pleted by June next. That no work has been done upon the Sixth avenue from One Hundred and Tenth street to One Hundred and Forty-sixth street since 17th June last. That the Tenth avenue from One Hundred and Fifty fifth to One Hundred and Ninety- fourth street can be completed on or before December-Ist, 1870. That the whole of the Avenue St. Nicholas can be completed on or before September 1 st. That the Morningside avenue, West, can be completed by the Ist of May if the work is prosecuted vigorously. And that the Morningside avenue, East, can easily be completed by the Ist of December." Aside of the addresses delivered by Mr. Martin on the Broadway Widening; and the Rapid Transit Question, by Wheeler H. Peck- haih ; on the Taxation of Bonds and Mortgages, by S. E. Church and by John W. Pirsson, the pamphlet contains the report on appropriate names for the new avenues on the west side, part of which has only been published hereto¬ fore, and to which JMr. Martin has added the following note :— " Sinco the présentation of the report, some attention has been given by lîroperty-owners and the public to the subject of thèse names, and to the sélections suggested. Some of them hâve been judicious, and the report, as now published, has been in two respects modified, with the hope of satisfying the claims of good taste." In other respects the criticisms hâve found fault with the sélections proposed, which it is not difficult to do, but hâve not passed to the useful point of proposing either any better or any other names. The task of selecting ac¬ ceptable names is not so easy as at first sight it may seem. '* Not so easy" at ail, every one acknowledges this, and the report of the West Side Associa¬ tion proposing names lilce " the Edgecombe Road " for the old Ninth avenue along the clifE over the Harlem river, " the Amabel avenue" for Upper Eighth avenue, " the IJndercliff ave¬ nue^ ' from Avenue St. Nicholas to One Hundred and Fifty-fifth street, and so forth for numer¬ ous other ï)laces, with the reasons for propos¬ ing those and other names, shows what a labor of study and research it has been for the gentle¬ men who prepared this report. Mr. Martin's letter on Street-openings down- town, addressed to Commissioner Van Nort, shows how thoroughly the gentlemen con¬ nected with the West Side Association under¬ .stand the requirements of this great metropolis to meet not only the tastes of a cultured com¬ munity in its avenues and parks up-town, but also the demands of a world-embracing and constantly accumulating commerce down-tovra. It is to be hoped that Mr. Van Nort's letter in reply to Mr. Martin's valuable suggestions will soon be made public, so that ail can see whether ideas so practically set forth will meet with oincial sanction on the part of him who now has the beautifying of New York in his entire keeping. It is admitted on ail sides that the Commis¬ sioners of Estimate and P. sessment in the matter of acquiring title for the city to ^the new Boulevard from lôôth street north to its point of intersection with the Kingsbridge road, hâve made as perfect a proceeding and as just a report as it is possible to make under the cir¬ cumstances, and this within a shorter time than any other of a like nature ever undertaken in this city. We congratulate the Commissioners on their fairness, honesty and ability, and the rapid and~economical manner in which they hâve so far performed their work. Women as Arciiitkcts.—The London Olobe thinks it certainly curious that the branch of Art which, above ail others, comes home to women is that from which women hâve hitherto kept clear. Architecture is as mnch the busi¬ ness of women as men, and yet, in ail the générations of female i^ainters, female musi¬ cians, and female poets, there hâve lieen no female architects. There may be many reasons, but the demand which architecture makes for masculine qualities cannot, in thèse dîiys of womanly ambition, be taken as one of them. The only type of female architect known to the world is that represented by Miss Brooke in "Middlemarch." But she did not draw her plans for improved cottages professionally, even though she probably avoided the error of that illustrious maie amateur, Balzac, who, when he planned a country house for himself, forgot the necessity of a staircase. A sugges¬ tion has been thrown out on the other side of the Atlantic to the effect thati women v/ould make excellent architects, with spécial référ¬ ence to interior décoration. Certainly the grandest of ail the arts does not flonrish so marvellously in maie hands that we should be justified in preventing women from trying to beat us in an open field. l'erhaps their ac¬ quaintance with domestic requirements and their instinctive good taste might give us buildings that would be fairly comfortable. It might be interesting, moreover, if some lady could be induced ' ' to give us her idea " as that eminent maie architect, Mr. Pecksniff would put it, of a design for the Law courts that we are to hâve one of thèse days. GOSSIP. The Board o£ Aldermen hâve sent to the As-sL^tant Al¬ dermen for their concnn-ence a resolution, reqiiesting the passage by the Législature of an act providing for the re¬ pavement of streets with stone pavements that hâve been paved with artificial pavements, where it proves that the cost of maintaining such streets in "repairs" exceeds or equals yearly one-qnarter of the original coat of lajâng tho artificial covering ; the Department of Public Parks to be référées. The law committee are acting npon it. Hon. Henry C. Murphy says that there has been no ir- regnlarity in the condiict of the Brooklyn Bridge''s affairs, that ail the work has been none according to contract at the most economical rates ; that the bridge vviU be completed at a cost of §11,500,000, of which amount .§5,000,000 haa been secured,