Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 85, no. 2193: March 26, 1910

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Iviarch 26, 1910 RECORD AND GUIDE 641 ETABUSHED-^ tf^ftRT-H 2l«> 1S6 8. ,DB6TCl)pf^LE^Alt.BmLDlKG%cKlTEeTUKE,KoliSElIOlI)DEeal^TK»f, BiTsb/ess Alto Themes OF Ge]4er&1 Wtovest.^ PRICE PER YEAR IN ADVANCE EIGHT DOLLARS Communications should be addressed tO C. W. SWEET Published EVers Saturdap By THE RECORD AND GUTDE CO. President, CLINTON W. SWEET ** Treasurer, F. W. DODGE VlCB-Pres. Sc Genl. Mgr.. H. IV.. DESMOND Secretary. F. T. MILLER NoH. 11 io 15 Hast 24tli Street, New York Cltr (Telephone, Madison Square, 4430 to 4433.) "Entered at ihc Post Off 'ee at New York , N. y.. as second-class matter." Copyrighted, 1010 by The Recorii Sc Guide Co Vol. LXXXV. MARCH 26, 1910. No, 2193 THE recent conference held at the City Hal] between the Tenement House Commissioner land the representa¬ tives of the several organizations interested in tenement houses and their sufficient sanitation brought out clearly one consideration of dominant importance. The tenement house problem in the City of Kew York is really dependent upon conditions which are not beiug reached by any existing sanitary legislation; and, what is still more serious, it is difficult to see in what way any practicable method of us¬ ing the police powers of the State will avail to improve the domestic surroundings of the great majority of tenement- house, inhabitants. There can be no doubt that up to the present time the Tenement-House Law in its administrative aspect has been a failure. The 123,000 violations are a plain and irrefutable proof of the truth of this statement. The Record and Guide will not go so far as to say that this failure was inevitable, and that the law is unenforc- ible; but its enforcement will constitute a very costly and extremely difficult work. That it has been unenforcible hitherto has, doubtless, been in part the fault of the prop- .erty-owners; yet it has also been in part the fault of the framers of the law, in that they failed to allow sufflciently for the difflculties of its admiJiistratiou. But, however, the blame is to he apportioned. The fact that it has proved to be unenforcible in respect to the alterations prescribed in old-law tenements is merely symptomatic of the stubborn economic conditions which underly the New York tenement house problem. It is also symptomatic of the far more serious fact that the Tenement-House Law has failed in its salient purpose of improving the domestic surroundings of the poorer people. And it has failed iu this salient pur¬ pose because it cotild not have any effect upon the econom¬ ic conditions which determine the congestion of popula¬ tion. Everybody admits that congestion ik increasing in Manhattan and is spreading to Brooklyn aud the Bronx. That many of the inhabitants of the poorer districts live in houses built under the new law and provided with an ap¬ parent sufficiency of light and air is surely a good thing, hut the excellence of the result is attenuated by the circum¬ stance that these presumably well aired rooms are inhab¬ ited by a steadily increasing numher of people. The number of lodgers is constantly increasing, because rents and the cost of living are increasing. The TENEMENT-HOUSE LAW, SO FAR FROM DOING ANYTHING TO DIMINISH THIS OVERCROWDING. HAS PROBABLY DONE SOME¬ THING TO INCREASE IT, because it has increased the cost of tenement-house construction; and it will be as power¬ less in this respect hereafter as it has been heretofore. THE Record and Guide is wel! aware of course that the Tenement Law is supposed to forbid the crowding of lodgers into the rooms of a tenement house, but it is also aware that the Sunday closing law for saloons would be easy of enforcement compared to such a prohibition. Even the tenement house reformers do not press at present the policy of seeking by inspection to prevent the congestion; and it i's safe to say that no matter who is made respon¬ sible for prohibiting the over-crowding, the prohibition will be ineffective. It the property-owner is made responsible we shall have a repetition in a far more acute form of the organized illegality of the structural violations. No proper- ,.ty-owner could be sure that over-crowding did not exist in a building he owned without living in the building him¬ self and inspecting the several tenements every night. Any delegation of the duty would be evaded and would be made the excuse for petty graft. And what the property-owner could not accomplish could not conceivably be accomplished by any practicable amount or kind of direct mnnicipal in¬ spection. People take in lodgers, not because they want to do so, but because it is the only way of reducing the in¬ tolerable burdens imposed upon the poor by the increas¬ ing (Jost of every necessity of life. No legislation along the lines of the existing tenement-house law can do any¬ thing effectual to diminish this grave evil of congestion—- an evil which is bound to increase rather than diminish. So far as Manhattan is concerned, the construction of tenement houses intended for the occupation of the poor has ceaser" The only type of tenement now being erected in the cen¬ tral borough in any considerable numbers is an elevator building, intended for comparatively well-to-do people. How, then, is the normal increase in the poorer population .of Manhattan finding habitations? For the most part, they are migrating slowly to other boroughs, and carrying with them their habits of congested living; hut the necessity of residing near their work prevents many from so doing. Hence the overcrowding, and there is no way in which it can be diminished save hy attacking the economic conditions which make it inevitable. IT is by no means obvious in what way the problem can be effectively attacked, even on the side of its economic conditions. Undoubtedly improved methods of rapid transit will do something to alleviate the congestion, but the diffi¬ culty is that improved means of communication are not of much use to that part of the population, who are most in need of help. It is the really poor among whom congestion is most rife( and the really poor are not free to make use of new subways. They are forced to live where they do live, chiefly hy the necessity of remaining near to their places of work, and while new centers of work will be developed in the other boroughs and assist in the distribution of popu¬ lation, an enormous numher of people will necessarily de¬ pend upon the work-rooms of Manhattan. If this popula¬ tion is to be distributed it must be by artificial means, and a commission should be appointed to consider what artificial means, if any, will he likely to be effective. Would it be of any help, for instance,- to run workingmen's trains at reduced rates over all the new subway routes? If so, what practicable measures could he taken to secure the operation of these trains. The value of any such measure as a means of inducing poor families to live on cheaper land would de¬ pend upon the habits of these people, and their economic situation; and the facts as to these matters could be obtained only after full and careful investigation. Inquiry should he made also into the question as to how far any future amelioration could be obtained by the diversion of husiness, now carried on in Manhattan, to the other boroughs. Pos¬ sible remedial measures even along the foregoing lines do not, it must he admitted, look very promising. They would take many years to accomplish. They could at best be only partial in their effects. They would in one way or another be very costly, and while they were being accomplished con¬ gestion would increase, and with it an ever larger number of people would become habituated to unwholesome and depraved habits of living. But if any better means of at¬ tacking the problem exist, they have not yet been suggested, and in any event the situation will be cleared up as soon as it is realized that the cost of congestion cannot he fastened upon the property owners alone. It is a collective responsibility, due to conditions which individuals cannot change, and redeemable only at a huge cost by the whole city. THE protest made by Mr. Allan Robinson, of the Allied Real Estate Interests, against the immediate abolition of the persona! property tax seems to the Record and Guide to be well-founded. Mr. Robinson points out that next Fall the tax rate is likely to increase as much as thirteen points, which would bring it up to the high figure of 1.80. If in addition to this increase, the city surrendered the $G,000,- 000 in income now derived from the personal property tax, a further increase of six points would be the inevitable result. In one year, consequently, the tax rate would be enlarged by no less than 19. points. This would mean that the tax bills of every real property owner in New York, would be increased by something over one-ninth, aud that this staggering- increase would have succeeded others of the same kind. It would mean that within four years the taxes