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Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 77, no. 1981: March 3, 1906

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March 3, igo6 RECOKD AND GUIDE 363 ESTABUSHED'^ fW.CHSU:'^ 1958. Dev&teD p Re.\l Estate , Bl^LoI^''G %cKiTE(rrui\E .Household DESOftATioK. Bilsii^ESS Ail3Ti-::r,^nsoFGE^Rf.l Wtei^est. PRICE PER YEAR TN ADVANCE EIGHT DOLLARS Published el?eri/ Salurda.tt Communications .sbnulil It-i n(lilrfss"d U> C. W. SWEET, 14-10 Vesey Street, New York Telephone, Cortlnudt 3157 '-'Entered al the Post O.W-ce al Ario Yor!:. H. Y, as second-clas3 mailer.'' Vol. LXXVIL MARCH 3, 1906. No, 1981 INDEX TO DEPARTMENTS. Advertising Sectioo. Page. Pago. CeJsent......................xxiii Law.........................xl Clay Products.................xxll Lumber ..................xxvi Consulting Engineers.........vii Machinery .....................iv Contractors and Builders......vi Metal Work ................xv Electrical Interests...........viii Quick Job Directory.,........xxi Fireproofing ..................iii Real Estate..................xiv Granite.....................xxv Roolers Sc Rooflng Materials,,xiv Heating .......................xx Stone ......................xxiv Iron and Steel ..............xviii Wood Products ............xxvii MAYOR McClellan has nndoubtedty "scored" not only with his friends but also with a great number of his critics by the excellent letter that he addressed to the City Club relating to the Elsberg hill. It is a long time since any official in the Mayor's position has spoken so clearly and courageously upon a matter of high public Importance. A person must be strangely biased who does not frankly acknowledge that no mere politician could have penned that document. It strikes very boldly at a certain trend of our municipal affairs appar¬ ently quite popular at the present moment. This trend is popular largely because it is to-day almost entirely an affair of promises, and these promises are just now being shrieked into the popular ear by a parade of blatant demagogues. Municipal ownership is a serious matter. It merits every sort of careful consideration, but to malte a popular tune of it and then play it on a political hand-organ is not the proper method of securing for the principle involved any sort of care¬ ful consideration. We doubt not that municipal ownership has to be reckoned with much in the future, but no man of sane sense is at all likely to take the doctrine from the mouth of persons like Hearst. Methods and motives of his sort would almost damn the ten commandments. No one can take seri¬ ously a propaganda of brass bands and rant. Municipal owner¬ ship is in the main an economic question. In speaking com¬ mon sense to the city at large, the Mayor has distinctly be¬ friended the cause which just now suffers more at the hands of its friends, so-called, than it is ever likely to suffer from the acts of its enemies. Mayor McClellan can well affoi'd to let his opponents play to the galleries so long as he addresses the com¬ mon-sense of the community so directly as he did in his letter to the City Club. THERE is something of irony in the fact that the architect who has been most opposed to the extremely tall sky¬ scraper should be called upon professionally to desigji an office building that outtops even the Washington Monument. The architect of the new*Singer Building is in that position, but even those who have most admired his undoubted artistic abil¬ ity and have sympathized in the past with his moderate views will not charge him with inconsistency. It is not the business of the architect to limit his problems, but to meet them, and the demand for higher and higher structures in this city is not the result of conditions that are at all to be controlled by profes¬ sional ideas or practice. The jump that is to be made in the case of the Singer Building, however, is almost a leap out of sight, and it distinctly marks a new era in the history of the sky¬ scraper. Many plans have been talked of in the past for the ■erection of extremely high buildings. They were paper plans, however. The new Singer Building is of another category. The firm that proposes to erect the building is financially "capable," and the architect who has planned it possesses all the skill necessary for the task he has undertaken. The successful com¬ pletion of the structure is sure to provoke emulation, and thti question naturally arises—whether a city of Babel towers will be in all respects a sanitary and habitable living place? Buildings of sijcb magnitude involve unparalleled concentration of population, and obviously concentration begets very serious problems. Transportation is one of these. The disposal of sewage is another. The provision for sufficient air and light are others. Clearly, if we are to greatly increase the height of our buildings, the municipality should take steps to meet the prob¬ lems inherent iu the new conditions that will prevail. Euro¬ pean theory and practice are dead against the results which our architeets and builders are producing. It doesn't follow, of course, that Europe is right, 'The question has two sides and should be approached scientifically, A vast number of our peo¬ ple live and work to-day in buildings from which sunlight is almost completely excluded. Is the electric light a healthy sub¬ stitute for the solar rays? From time to time warnings have been.given that our sewer system is becoming inadequate for the service imposed upon it. The Rapid Transit problem in spite of the Subway is again reaching an acute state. Pneumonia and consumption are claiming an increasing number of vic¬ tims. Clearly, there are many matters that deserve serious con¬ sideration. It is foolish to stare approaching facts in the face and sit inactive. The Financial Outlook. WHILE the money situation is not as satisfactory as could be wished—mainly for technical reasons—or in homely phi'ase, because there is not enough money to go round—pros¬ perity generally prevails, and there is every prospect of its con¬ tinuance. Real estate is naturally favorably affected and the year 1906 in that business promises to be unprecedented in its numerous transactions and its appreciation in values. "Wall Street, which is the real business pulse of the country, may be said for the moment to be '"suffering a recovery" and the im¬ mediate outlook must be characterized as reassuring. While prices are higher than in 1904, they are still in the main much lower than in 1901. It seems not widely understood, and many people may be surprised to learn, that about three out of four stocks are lower than they were last spring and summer. The popular notion is that we have had an unreasonable boom in the past six months which it will be seen is fallacious. This impression of an inordinate advance has arisen from the fact that several groups of securities have risen greatly during the last winter, notably the metal stocks and the Hill iosues— and sympathetically Union Pacific, As a matter of fact the re¬ mainder of the list has been selling for much less than when last year's bumper crops were in doubt and when the war between Japan and Russia was still being waged with all the possibili¬ ties of a general war in which the principal and most powerful of the great commercial nations of the world would be involved. It is not, therefore, unreasonable to suppose that the prices at¬ tained a year ago and which were not then considered high with the then earnings anfl other favorable conditions may very wall be reached again or surpassed this spring with the greatly increased earnings being constantly shown and with the world at peace. Five years ago the steel production of this country was only about fifteen million tons, and then the United States Steel Com¬ mon soid above 50. This year the steel production will approxi¬ mate twenty-five million tons and yet Steel Common sells a lit¬ tle above 40. The gross earnings ot many roads have increased since 1901 about seventy per cent., and consequently the prices of shares should reflect this increase. Notwithstanding large numbers are selling for much less than five years ago. Each man knows in his own line of business that efficient labor is so fully employed that additional help is either difficult 01- impossible to obtain; that every spindle, forge and furnace of the country is being worked to its utmost capacity, and that peo¬ ple have money to spend as they never had before. That this has been going on for a long time has certainly been manifest in the real estate field and in the construction and building trades. During the entire period it has been a matter of constant men¬ tion that there has heen little public participation in Wall Street speculation, such as has hitherto accompanied all like periods in the past. The shrewdest and most conservative observers are of opinion that such participation is yet to come and that it will be followed as it always has been by greater speculation and activity in realty and building. Stock speculation invariably l)recedes a period of bi'isk advance in all departments of com¬ mercial activity, and there is no reason why such should not be the case in the immediate future, Thtis the outlook in every respect is decidedly favorable. In spite of some setbacks the stock market has shown no real sign of doubt or apprehension. With a striking absence of reck¬ less speculation the underlying strength has manifested Itself in many ways and there is repeated evidence of the absorption o* good investment stocks by powerful interests.