Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 46, no. 1167: July 26, 1890

Text version:

110 Record and Guide. July 26, 1890, afforded the opportunity to present any desired ideas to a competent tribunal. For instance, it is quite proper for any one to come before an engineering board and suggest, if he pleases, that a third track be added to the elevated roads ; but it is hardly sensible that he, who does not understand the science of bridge building, who does not even know whether the structure if strong enough to carry the proposed load, should pose before the public as competent to decide this question. And it is quite proper for the elevated roads to come before the expert board with any technical proposition whatever, but altogether improper that these roads should them¬ selves have power to decide, independently of veto by representa¬ tives of public interest, that this, that or the other changes in the roads should be made. A DISPATCH from Washington, said to have been authorized by Superintendent Porter himself, places the population of this city at some 1,513,000. an increase of only 25 per cent, over the population ten years ago. If this estimate is strictly cor¬ rect New York is increasing in inhabitants far less rapidly than has been generally supposed. Some enthusiastic people thought our population would very nearly reach the 1,700,000 limit, while the least sanguine did not put it below 1,600,000, and for various reasons we are inclined to believe, assuming the number given to represent, or nearly to represent, the actual count, that like very many other figures the census estimate requires a great deal of elucidation. A prominent Italian was once on a visit to England and the advantage of marrying him to an English woman was eagerly discussed. There always is a something, however, to pre¬ vent such arrangements, and the objector thought that the fact that the Italian already had a wife :n Italy would serve as a bar to the alliance. " Oh ! that is all right," said Lord Palmerston ; " we will get Gladstone to explain her away." Without pretending to the dialectical subtlety of Mr. Gladstone, we do not think that it will be difficult to discredit the census estimate as representing the increase in population in this city, and it certainly affords no clue towards discovering the increase in business and wealth. Indeed, if the estimate could not be explained things would look bad for the future premiership of New York. Chicago, by a dint of extending her city lines over country districts, as well as by a large legitimate increase, has succeeded in nearly doubling her population : and Brooklyn is making merry over an augmentation that is fa I larger than that of New York, as shown by the census estimate. The normal increase in population of the whole country is between 30 and 33 per cent., and it would be most singular, as well as most unfortunate, if the increase of the metropolis was not as large, relatively, as that of the rest of the country. ON general grounds the estimate is more likely to be too small than too large, and this is more true of New York than else¬ where. An enumerator may easily miss counting a man, either from negligence or false information, but it is scarcely likely that he will create fictitious individuals. As there lias been a laudable absence of booming the census estimates in this city, the enumerators were not filled with the responsibility of their task. Tbey probably did not feel, as their prototypes in Chicago and elsewhere must have felt, that the results were part of the stock-in-trade of the city. The foolish eagerness of the Western cities to pile up figures, as if the well-being and prosperity of the city .depended upon and was represented by a lot of numerals is petty in the extreme, but it has the good effect of making the enumerators careful about their work. The New York "inquisitors" were animated by no such local fervor; the prolonged and bsrassing detail of their work might easily make them careless, and as a matter of fact a good many complaints have been received by the newspapers from people who were not counted. Aside, h'.»wever, from any such problematical causes which may or may not have materially affected the result, there are peculiarities about the situation in this city which must have influenced the enumeration. A large and increasing propor¬ tion of the population are out of town when the estimate is made. A great number of families that live cooped up during winter in flats and small houses naturally wish to breathe country air dur¬ ing the summer, ana tbey are generally sufficiently well-to-do to take advantage of the numerous summer resorts near the metropo¬ lis. The proportion of p(>ople so situated has not only increased during the past ten years, but it is larger than in any other city either in this or iv other countries. And as it is a good general rule in estimating the value of censtis enumerations that their accuracy will vary proportionately as the information is mediate or is reported by the person himself, it may be seen that facts based on tbe talk of janitors and servants is scarcely likely to be reliable. Furthermore, as we all know, no estimate of the people who have a residence or room within the city limits at all represents the people who contribute to New York's pros¬ perity and wealth. In this respect, again, the trend of population during the past decade has served to alter the proportion between those who both live and work in the city and those who work here and lir« elMwhere. Last WMk we showed that over 58,000 men daily commuted on the various railways leading out of the city, a number that stands for a population of fuHy 250,000. If to these could be added the residents of Brooklyn, Long Island City, Jersey City and Hoboken, who work in New York and find some of their amusements here, it can scarcely be doubted that the above esti¬ mate would be more than doubled. It must be remembered that despite the disadvantages which New York has suffered under, the assessed valuation of her real and personal property has increased 48 per cent, between 1880 and 1890. While it is true that this increase in wealth has always been more rapid than the increase in population, yet, if the census figures (as reported) prove true, never has there been such a disproportion between tbe enlargemept of population and that of the value of property. For these reasons it would seem that the figure, 1,513,000 though it may stand for the population within the city lines, is scarcely an estimate on which aspiring cities can base calculations that in such and such a number of years New York will have to take second place in the list of the cities of the country. Long before that time will come it is most likely that the metropolis will tnake such just and substantial annexations as will keep her in the van, until conditions greatly change, or until the world is resolved into its original chaos. The Western Union Fire. rriHE recent fire in the Western Union Telegraph building at -A- Broadway and Dey street affords an instructive lesson to architects, builders and law makers. It has revealed the merits and tbe defects, the strength and the weakness of fire-proof build¬ ings of great height. The Western Union building was erected about seventeen years ago, and was one of the first of the series of high buildings that, commencing with the Post-office building, have been erected since 1870. The Western Union structure was well and solidly built, and represented the highest of the art of building at that period. Its floors were constructed of rolled wrought iron beams with segmental brick arches between the same, leaving the underside of the lower flanges of the iron b'^ams exposed to the effect of flame and heat. In most of the stories level ceilings were obtained by snspended plaster plates fastened to and covering the underside of the iron beams. The system of hollow'tile flat arches forming a level ceiling direct and entirely covering in the bottom flanges of iron beams and thus protecting the latter from the heat which is at its greatest intensity at the ceiling line in a room whose contents is on fire, was a novelty in constructing floors at the time this building was erected, and only came into common use a few years later. Prior to the passage of the amended building law in 1885 wood-stud and lath and plaster partitions were not infre- quentiy used in fire-proof buildings to divide up the stories into rooms; but since that date woodwork or other inflammable material in partitions are prohibited, and also wooden furrings in any fire¬ proof building; and the only woodwork allowed under the law at present in force are the doors and windows, and their frames, the trims, casings, the interior finish, and the floor boards and sleepers directly thereunder. Under the amended building law all build¬ ings exceeding 80 feet in height are required to be fire-proof. Tbe new building law which failed to get through the last Legislature proposed to extend the limit of height 5 feet more—to 85 feet—not, however, for the purpose of adding another story within that height, but to allow a little better height of stories. In buildings exceeding that height new requirements were provided for safety from fire. The Fire Department claim that above a height of 85 feet a fire cannot be effectively handled. Mar y of our modern buildings are twice that height, the World building as one of the latest examples being nearly 300 feet from the sidewalk to the top of the dome. When buildings are erected to such enormous heights, or to any height exceeding the limit of 80 or 85 feet, they should be con¬ structed in every respect in such a manner as to be able to with¬ stand any fire that may arise within them, and all requirements to that end should be provided for in our building law and strictly enforced in the interests of common public safety. And no matter how fire-proof any such building may be in itself, ample exits by direct staircases on the inside, and fire-escape balconies and ladders on the outside of the building, should in each and every case be exacted, and to the same extent as if the building was not fire¬ proof, for it is smoke and not flame that destroys life in a burning building. The Western Union building was particularly defective in its means of escape for the occupants, and, although built to defy the elements, it proved a trap for those persons who happened to be iu the extreme upper portion at the time of the fire, and the rescue of the imperilled lives was entirely due to the firemen. Here was a building that was intended to remain in its integrity without any call on the Fire Department; no insurance was carried, so that requirements that the Board of Fire Underwriters might have imposed, looking to just such an emergency as did arise, found no placo in tbe calculations of the owners. Without let or hindrance ?^