Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 49, no. 1254: March 26, 1892

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March 26, 1893 Record and Guide. 4fi5 ^' ^ w Dr/OTEŨ JO HeA.1- EsTME Bu1LDI|/g ARCrflTECTai^E .HoUSE^OLD DEOOfVMlOl). BasilJESS AfÍDĨHEMES Of GeSeI^I- ^m^í^l ESTABLISHED\V> N\ARpHÍI'-í^ 1868. PRICE, PER YEAR m ADVAIVCE, SIX DOLLARS. Published every Saturday. TKLBPHONK .... CORTLANDT 1370. CommiiTiicatioDs should be addressed to C. W. SWEET, 14 & 16 Vesey St. J. 1. LINDSEY, Business Manager. "Entered at ihe Post-o^ce at New York, N. T., as second-class matttr." VOL. XLIX, MARCH 26, 1892. So. 1,254 THE week has seen the marketing of a good deal of long stock, and the next may see the raarketing of u good deal more. In addition therearesomeother influences against prices at work in the stock market, the eiĩect of which has to be seen before any real and general improvement in prices can be hoped tor. The threat- ened continuance of the gold export movement which puzzles financiers at homeand abroad, and is only explained by the increas- ing sale of foreign lioldiugs of American securilies is one of these influences, and the indications are that the threat may be fulfilled. The condition of Northern racific and Union Pacific is very unsat- isfactory; the decline in the first being so rapid as to {>rove that there is something radically wrong with the Northern Pacific system, and the unofficial announce- ment of a new impending experiment in inanagement in the Union Pacific systera is taken as ,a confession that the prop- erty finds diflîcully in carrying its present burdens. In addition to these influences tliere are to be taken into account the people who wiUinsist on being scared by the phase the Behring Sea negotiatiou is now takingon. Reports of the failure of theRichmond Terminal plan have been and will be unfairly used to depress prices, although the time has not yet arrived when any one can say whether the plan is a failure or a success. The decliue in the price of the securities is not conclusive evidence of failure, because a decline is a featiu'e peculiar to the secnrities of all properiies in process of reorganization and only suggests the opinion of s,ome holders. Such influences as these, let them be important or not, have to como from time to time, and when they do couie the sooner tliey do iheir work and make way fursuch as have a more cheerful countenance the better. One of these which will come into play soon—with the permission of the diplomatic game cocks of course—is Eiigland's dependence on this country for her gold supply. While so much has been said of foreign realizings here, it should not be left out of sight that the great investment iũstitutions in London have in large part replaced their holdings of continental securities by the best classes of American railioad bonds. The jealousy with which the great European flnancial powers without exception guard their gold supply, will compel Threadneedle Street to rely mainly, and notwitlistanding tliat ihey are eight days apart, upon this market for its supply of gold. If this wiU depress prices while the demand is on this side from time to time, the advaiicesconsequent on secur- ing necessary credits at ottier times wiU more than offset the depressions. It is not uufair to assume, too, that the enlarged acreage under cereals this year will continue the good business to the railroads even if natiire should not be so generous to the tarmer as last year, and in addition there is to be anticipated a movement and a life in the whole country next year which cannot fail to be benetícial to trade. These things keep the market from disorgani- zation even imder the most depressing news aud suspicions of evil, and when once the latter fail any longer to be of elîect, the influ- ence of the better aspects oí the situalion must be very powerful. AN interesting incident has recently happened in Great Britain which goes to show that this is not the only country in which railway combinations are surrounded with di.i cullies. Two Scolch companies, the Caledonian and North British, have formany years been competing in a way that was most disastrous to the sliare- holders. Matters fiiially came to such a pass that in the interests of the owners of the two companies some agreement became impera- tive, and flnally such an agreemeut was entered into. Although this agreement bas now been in effect m ^re Ihan three monihs, aud it is admitted that the public have not been injurod in any way, yet the leading tradera of Glasgow and the west of ScotUnd have resolved to express their disapproval ia a manner that seems likely to be effectual. The Glasgow warehousemeu have agreed to divert the whole of their through traflSc betweea England and Scotland from the Caledonian and the North British to the Glasgow and Southwestem and Midland. Such local trafiic as can will be similarly diverted. The Midland, which is strongly opposed to the Scotch Raihvay agreement, is prepared to give every facility to the objecting traders. Besides the large warehousemen, several large manufacturers have intimated their inteniion of foUowing a like policy. How the companies will act in this emeigency is natur- ally uncerlain. It is open to them to attempt to disarm opposition by conceasions of some kind or another ; but if the traders remain in their present temper, nothing will satisfy them but h return to the old order of things. This is certainly a more effectual method of preventing consolidations than by any appeals to State Legisla- tures or railway commissions ; but manifestly it is possible, only the combination does not include all the competing companies. CERTAINLY one of the most encouraging signs of the times is that many builders of houses in this and other prominent cities of tho country are workirg perseveringly and intelligently on progressive lines. The standard of achievement is so far raised that these builders are no longer content to make a city which is simply a conglomeration of houses; they are trying more and more to design, group and construct buildings, so that the result will be pleasant to look at, as wellas comfortable to livein. This effort haa fortunately received the support of the buying and owning public; and consequently it is not probablo that this raising of the standard wiU stop at any one point. On the contrary, the improvement is likely to be continuous, and while the army of the unregenerate wiU always be large and their work predominant in the matter of quantity, yet we may expect that twenty-five years from now the alliance between building and architecture will be even more firmly rooted and more widely exemplified than it is at present. More room for improvement, we believe, exists in small dwellings than in the larger ofíice buildings. Probably in the majority of cases a th'ee or four hundred thousand dollar improvement is given to an intelligent or skiUful, if not an infallible designer, but the dwell- ings |in rows of the speculative builder are but too fre- quently planned by architects selected for anytliing but artistic reasons. Yet it is these dwellings that give char- acter and distinction to a city, and it is very important if the greater New York of the future is to be a more attractively appearing place than the restrictcd New York of the past that the artistic leaven should thoroughly pervade them that buy and them that build thisclass of structures. Consequently any single row of buildings, the construction of which has been pccom- panied by a real effort to improve the standard of the past, deserves the sincere thanks and hearty good wishes of all those interested in the artistic advancement of New York. Such an effort has recently beeu made by a prominent builder, in upper Harlem; and the results are such a marked advance upon the products of current methods that one feels inclined to regret that the houses in question are not as accessible as they might be. A good cxample has been put before the building and buy- ing public of New York of what can be done to make a block of dwellings in the middle of a city both pieasant to look at and habitable. Many other such examples have been set, but lackin^ the magnitude and completeness of this attempt they have not attracted attention. This present instance, however, cannut fail to do so. It shows excellently well that dwelliags designed by the best architects in the profession can be built, in such a way and at such a piice as to make them very acceptable to the ordinary buyer. THAT this example wUl be very extensively followed it íb scarcely reasonable to suppose. There are very fpw builders in New York aiid still fewer outside who could afford to undtrtake operations on such a scale, for it is necessary they should be con- ducted on a large scale in order to obtain the results which have been obtained in this case. Usually a buildpr puts up a row of fram half a dozen to a dozen houses. Tbe desigu of each of these dwellings may be in isolation not unattractive, but it is very seldom any attempt is made to subordinate each individual house to a composition that includes them all, Furthermore, even when this is done, the general effect of tlie whole street is spoiled because the contiguous rotv will be built upon some totally differeut, and it may be some ridiculously incongruous plan. For the purposeof obtaining themost harmonious and compleiest artistic results the unit of build- ingshould not be one lot or twelve lots, but the whole block. In the case mentioned such a unit has been used. The merits of the treatment iu this patticular instance it is not our purpose to pass upon just now, but everyone will admit that the general effect gains enormously from the subordioation of every uivision to a single design. The des'gnitself might not be so happy as that of individual rows on another block, but the latter must ahvays fall tmder the condemnation of being a part utterly unrelated to its natural artistic whole. Present conditions, as we have already said, forbid any general imitation of the exaniple set in this caae, but verj certainly a closely-built city. can never be made artistically satisíactory until this practioe is