Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 79, no. 2028: January 26, 1907

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January 26, 1907 RECORD AND GUIDE 22a ESTABUSHEIl^iiyiRCK£LM,^l868, DdM) P RE\L ESTAJE.BuiLDlKo A,RCJ^ITECTUnE.KoUSElfOLD DfCQIi^ncii. BJsit/ESs a(Id Themes ofGEjJEi^ftL It/TEfiESi. PRICE PER YEAR IN ADVANCE EIGHT DOLLARS Published every Salurdap Communications should bo addressed to C. W. SWEET Downtown Oflice: 14-16 Vesey Street, New York Taluphinie, Cortlandt 31.^7 Uptown Ollice: 11-13 East 24th Street, New York Teleplionc, 4430 Mftdleon Sipmre '•Eidered at the Tost Office at .N'fw TnrJ.; if. I',, nn uprond-class mallei-." Vol. LXXIX. JANUARY 26. 1907, No. 202S. INDEX TO DEPARTMENTS. Advertising Section. Page Page Cement .....................svli Lumber ......................xxii Consulting Engineers .........viii Machinery .....................ix Clay Products ..................i Metal Work ..................xvl Contractors and Builders......iv Quick Jot) Directory........xxlll Electrical Interests ...........vl Real Estate ..................xl Fireprooflng ..................11 Roofers & Rooflng Materials.. .xx Granite ....................xvlli Stone.....................xvlii Iron and Steel..................xv Wood Products ...............xxii j The Index to Volume LXXVIII. of the Record and I Guide, covering the period between July 1 and De- I cember 31, 1900, is now ready for delivery. Price $1. I This Index in its enlarged form is now recognized as I indispensable to every one engaged or interested in real I estate and building operations. It covers all trans¬ actions—deeds, mortgages, leases, auction sales, building plans filed, etc. Orders for the Index should be sent at once to the offices of publication, 11-15 East 24th St,, and 14 and 16 Vesey St. IRREGULARITY and uncertainty continued in Wall Street this week. The market has been dull and weak by turns with an occasional spasm of strength. It is not an uncommon admission in large Stock Exchange offices these days that customers have not made any njoney during the past year either on the long or short side of the account. The violent swings up and down while theoretically constituting an ideal trading market have instead practically wiped out traders on both sides. The result is that operators are afraid of the market and one of the biggest of them made the remark this week that "an archangel couldn't beat it." Its natural tendency seems still to be upwards, but it goes down just the same. Money is getting very easy and plen¬ tiful and a good bank statement today is a fair expectation. On Wednesday President Schuster of the Union Bank of London, at a meeting of that institution in the British metropolis, said in speaking of the financial situation in this country, "signs are not wanting that your great activity is now nearing its end and a period of liquidation is at hand." He added, however, that the contraction of husiness would, in his opinion, be gradual and that over-speculation and over-trading would be checked without material harm re¬ sulting to the welfare of the community. An opinion from so high a source is worthy of note, but even British bankers are not infallible in their predictions regarding the develop¬ ment, the progress and the material prosperity of this coun¬ try, for it has broken all records and precedents and rendered former standards useless. Financially and commercially the United States is in a class by itself. The appointment of Chairman Theodore P. Shouts of the Isthmian Canal Com¬ mission to the presidency of the Interborough Railroad Company in place of .August Belmont was viewed with sat¬ isfaction by Wall Street. Mr, Shonts has resigned from the Canal Commission and his continued prominent connection with the Toledo, St. Louis & Western Railroad, better known as the Clover Leaf, is by his Interborough presidency looked upon as an argument in favor of an advance in that stock. In the transactions in the stock market this week much of the buying of the general list represented covering of the "shorts," of which there is undoubtedly a large number out¬ standing. - - . ■pROPERTY-OWNERS in the vicinity of Twenty-third A Street can certainly make a strong argument in favor of an express station at that street in the new East Side sub¬ way. There is no valid reason why the express stations should be situated at equal distances one from another, or that the express stations on the different underground routes should all'be at the same streets. The one consideration of dominant importance is the convenience of the public; and the public convenience will surely be promoted by the loca¬ tion of the express stations at different streets in different subways, so that a passenger can more quickly reach any particular destination by taking his choice of routes. Thus Fourteenth Street has au express station on the Fourth Ave¬ nue route; Twenty-third Street should have one on the Lex¬ ington-Fifth Avenue route, and Thirty-fourth Street on the West Side route, which passes near the Pennsylvania Ter¬ minal. An express station at Twenty-third Street would be of more use to more people than one at almost any other single street. The cross-town traffic on that street is the heaviest in the city. Madison Square is destined within ten years to be surrounded by sky-scrapers; and whatever it may lose by the shifting of retail trade to points further north it will gain in the number and population of its office- buildings. Moreover, at the end of ten years, it will be the centre of a wholesale section, including a multitude of tall buildings. Taking all these conditions into consideration the Record and Guide believes that it would be a grave mis¬ take not to situate the express station at Twenty-third Street. A very good distribution of these stations would be to locate one at Ninth Street, the point at which the subway would cross the Astor Place extension of the New Jersey tunnel;' one at Twenty-third Street and one at Fifty-ninth Street Assuming that the East Side subway will be constructed south of Forty-second Street, we fail to see any sufficient reason why there should be an express station at Forty-second Street. The existing subway contains a station at this point, and that subway should be for the time being sufficient for the needs of the people who wish to travel to and from Forty- second Street quickly. Everybody cannot be entirely satis¬ fied; and the object should be to give the best possible ser¬ vice to the largest possible number of people. Given the existing express stations at Fourteenth and Forty-second Streets, that object would be best attained by similar sta¬ tions at Ninth, Twenty-third and Fifty-ninth Streets in the new subway. The Condemnation of Land for Public Purposes. THE Record and Guide has received among others a letter from Mr. Lawson Purdy, President of the Tax Depart¬ ment, in reference to the proposed changes in the method of condemning land for public purposes which reads iu part as follows: "I am particularly interested iu your proposal that when the city condemns land for a public improvement it shall condemn a larger area than is required for the improve¬ ment, in order that it may reap the increased value given to the adjacent land by reason of the improvement. I am somewhat familiar with the experience of the City of Loudon, and that experience demonstrates that the city may gain so large a profit iu the enhanced value of the land condemned as to pay the entire cost of important improvements. We shall be* lacking, indeed, in a proper progressive spirit if we do not obtain the power necessary to follow this good example. I trust that the Record and Guide will keep the matter before the people until such power as may be neces¬ sary is gained for the City of New York." The Record and Guide has been preaching the necessity of such a reform, for a great many years, but until recently the responsible city officials, whose approval is necessary be¬ fore the matter can be carried to the Legislature, have ex¬ hibited little or no interest in it. Yet there can be no doubt that increased power in condemning land for public pur¬ poses is as necessary in its way to the future welfare of the City of New York as is increased rapid transit or an increased water-supply. The necessity is not so immediate, and the consequences of inaction would not be so distressing iu the near future; but most assuredly tbe extreme difiiculty with which new streets are laid out at present in the older parts of the city will, unless it is remedied, seriously and permanently impair the prosperity of the city. For reasons which have frequently been pointed out the existing lay-out of Manhattan makes in every way for congestion; for the concentration of business and traffic along certain lines and at certa.in points. The result is not only that thoroughfares