Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 25, no. 618: January 17, 1880

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EAL Estate Record AND BUILDERS^ GUIDE. YoL. XXV. NEW YOEK, SATURDAY, JANUARY 17, 1880. No. 618 Published Weekly by TERMS. ONE YEAR, in advance... .$10.00. Communicationa should be addressed to C. AV. SWEET, Nos. 135 AND 137 BaoAnwAY \VH.1T THE LliGISLATURE SHOULD DO. Of course. New York City will be made the subject ot some new experiments by tlie legislature now in session. The Republicans have possession of the state government in all its branches and they will naturally seek to so arrange matters as to make it profitable to their partisans. New Tork needs, if not a new charter, yet such amendments to the pesent one as will fix responsibility and give us a better government. AU the many-headed com¬ missions should be replaced by single heads of departments. One Superintendent of Police, who should be subject to the orders of the Mayor, would simplify that important branch of the public service, and so through all tho departments of the city government. Nothing can be better or more per¬ fect than the organization of an army, with its Geueral-in-chief; its Major-Generals; its Brigadier- Generals, Colonels, Captains and so on down to the lowest officers. Everywhere, individual re¬ sponsibility coincident with individual authority. Councils of war never fight. No army could stand the control of three or four generals, each supreme and with equal authority. Then, our Mayors should have real power. He now has responsibility enough, but the lawyers and courts have managed to strip him of every power which the statutes clearly intended to give him. All the Slayor can do is to veto. He has a certain amount of negative authority, but the greater part of his time is taken up in signing warrants and in doing merely cleri¬ cal work. Then we should have civil service reform. That is to saj', all the minor ofSces of the city government should be chosen from the graduates of our ptiblic scliools or rather of the colleges in and near New York. Whenever there is a vacancy, let there be competition and let the most efficient and scholar¬ ly person secure the appointment. In time, our whole city government, in its minor departments, would be equal to the famous civil service iu Eng¬ land and India, and might compare perliaps with the British Post Office in its marvellous efficiency. Then, there should be a reduction of salaries. Our judges are paid altjgether too much. Om- courts cost three times more than is necessary. All the new policemen appointed should be paid only .$16 a week. There is no need of reducing the pay of those who are already in receipt of the present un¬ necessarily large wages, but let it be within the au¬ thority of the Chief Executive of the Police Board to punish or fine delinquent policemen by reduc ing their pay aud also give him the power to in¬ crease the pay of patrolmen who have deserved well of the city. Let the meritorious be rewarded. Every sinecure should be rigidly cut off. With proper laws, tliree to fotir millions per annum can be saved in the expense of our city government. There is one other suggestion which has repeat¬ edly been made in these columns. Why not make t tbe duty of the tax payers to investigate ^very bill or chaigeagains^t the eitj? Tjot those who pay the b Us audit them. Let there be no charge against the city iroaflury that ir^ not fully investi¬ gated by a togal rfprGrieTiiativ.' of the tax payers. We would not give this new [agency i)ower to say a bill shall or sliall not be paid, but let it be on file in the Comptroller's Department wliat the rep. resentatives of the tax payers think o ' e\ery bill that is tendered. This would induce caution on the partof the Comptroller, and wouhlbc a serious impediment in the way of the collection of fraudu¬ lent claims or overcharges. We believe that in tliis simple proposition there is more merit tlian in any of the pretentious schemes put forth to reform our city government. This duty of the tax payers in this matter should be the same as jury or military d ty. It would result, wo are sure, in saving the city large sums of money. Perhaps it is idle to make these suggestions. They may not be heeded and matters will probably go on in the old bad way We are probably entering up:)n a new era of local mis-government. Our people are busy just now. Trade is reviving and there is not enough imblic spirit in our merchants and'^ citizens to provide against the evils of municipal mis-government. It must be frankly confessed that our democratic theories, ae applied to the government of localities, especially of large cities, are a pronounced failure. People who travel abroad and see liow well policed and cleaned .are European cities; how much care is take 1 of the public welfare; how much honesty ia shown by autocratic and aristocratic oilicialy, are grieved and sh.amed at tlie spectacle wliicli is pre¬ sented when they return home. There is an effi¬ cient civil service; hero all is looseness aud waste. There are clean streets, and a creditaijle police; here—why pursue the p.arallel ? LOCAL MANUFACTURINCI. Oue of the most potenfc agencies which in the future will work for the advantage of this great city is that it will inevitably become the centre of large manufacturing industries. Heretofore, Philadelphia, Newark, Bridgeport and other towns in the Middle and Eastern States have had the advantage over ISTew York in cheap rents plenty of ground, accessibility to water and rail¬ roads v.?hich makes manufacturing cheap. But the elevated roads, utilizing as they will large sections of the unimproved property connecting as they do or will with wharves and the railroads which run out of New Yorlc, are to be important factors in giving this city large manufacturing establishments. At this point where goods can be readily bought and sold, where they can be shipped by rail to any part of the country, or put on board sailing or steam vessels for any port in the world, here will,be found the great manufac¬ tures of the country. We have this advantage over Philadelphia, tbat our harbor is never clo.«ed winter or summer, and we will have equal facilities with Philadelphia hereafter in having ground upon which to erect cheap houses for our working people. The i-oads which are in contem¬ plation on the other side of th^ Harlem River and which WUl soon be built will give abundant room for towns, villages and large settlements where our operatives can live who are employed iu manufactories yet to be built on our water fronts and adjacent to the stations of the East and West Side elevated roads. There is room for a million inhabitants in the Twenty-third and Tvventy-fonrth Wards and on the routes of the railways, elevated and surface, which are soou to traverse them. The new road from High Bridge to Brewster'.s Wt.atlon runs through a country eminently adopted for workinginen's homes and in.stead of the operatives in the manufactories j'et to be started in the Nineteenth and Twelfth Wards coming down to our tenement districts for homes, they will be accotnmodated in cottages adapted for them aud as cheap as any which can be found hx Philadelphia. New York, in other words, is des¬ tined in addition to being a great financial centie of tlie country and the great commercial entre¬ pot of two CDntinents, will also in time be the greatest manufacturing centre in the Union, be¬ cause of its unequaled and natural advantages for the cheap manufacturing, storage aud distribu¬ tion of domestic goods. CHOICE LOC-ITIONS. One of the puzzles of investors in realty is where to put the money where it will do the mo.st good. It is very evident tbat in every period of depres¬ sion there are certain portions of the city where the rise in values, when the rise comes, v/ill be greater than in certain other portions. Nay, it may even happen that in a general rise of values there will be some parts of the city where property is de¬ preciating or is likely to depreciate. It is not given to humtm sagacity to point out oil the places which are likely to improve greatly in value, but it woukl seem as if it were quite safe to indulge iu some speculation as to the probable erfect of improvement in certain special locations. . For an investment in business property proper it is evident there are many good chances down¬ town. In the immediate neighlioi-hood of the City Hall Park there is a probability of a sub¬ stantial rise in values; this particular location, apart from any special busine.ss, being the con¬ verging point of travel from several directions— from the East Side, the West Side and from the various streets leading to the Brooklj-n and Jersey City ferries. It is evident tbat the buildings around the Post Office and the City Hall Park are likely to be greatly enhanced in value. The im¬ mediate neighborhood of the Stock, Cotton, Pro¬ duce and Mining Exchanges are also certain to become higher priced. As New York growp, those who do business in its leading exclianges will need accommodations in the immediate neigh¬ borhood of tbeir places of business aud we will see a very decided advance in the value of property wherever merchaut.s and brokers most do congre¬ gate. Then those portions of the city where the importing and drygoods bitsiness have their centres are also pretty sure tc advantage by the improvement of the timei and the growth of the population of the city, and country. Even along those portions of the river front wliere the metal business is chieliy transacted, we may expect to see a substautial advance in values. Broadway has been under a cloud but it is evident that th& wholesale business of an attractive character is steadily creeping up beyond Canal street. Four¬ teenth street and Union square have, within the last ten years, increased very greatly in value be¬ cause that, too, is the centre of the tides of human.