crown CU Home > Libraries Home
[x] Close window

Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Use your browser's Print function to print these pages.

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 86, no. 2220: October 1, 1910

Real Estate Record page image for page ldpd_7031148_046_00000557

Text version:

Please note: this text may be incomplete. For more information about this OCR, view About OCR text.
October i, 1910. RECORD AND GUIDE 519 BiTsotess AttoThemes Of GeiJer^IIKtcrpsi.j PRICE PER YEAR IN ADVANCE BIGHT DOLLARS Communications should ba nMxeSKA tSt C. W. S-WEET Pabtlshed Everg Saturdag ' By THE RECORD AND GUIDE CO. PresWenl, CLINTON W. SWEET Treasurer, F. W. DODGB Vloe-Pres. & Qenl. Mgr., H. W. DESMOND Secretary, F. T. MILLBB Nos. 11 to 15 Kast S4tli Street, New York City (Telephone, Madison Equare, 4430 to 4433.) "Entered at the Post Office at New York, N. Y., as sccond-eiass matter." Copyrighted. 1010, by The Record & Guide Co, Vol. LXXXVl. OCTOBER 1, 1910. No. 2220. THE recent rise in price of the Interborough-Metropolitaii securities is now explained by the announcement that the Public Service Commission and the Company have prac¬ tically reached an agreement in respect to the Stein-way Tun¬ nel, the Queensboro Bridge and third tracks for three of the elevated roads. During many years the management of the company has been laboring to secure some, if not all. of these concessions. It has shown much more interest in obtaining third tracks for the elevated roads than it has in building additional subways, doubtless because in this way it will increase the value of certain perpetual franchises and because it will secure by these means a considerable increase of traffic at a relatively small capital expense. No wonder, conseciuently, that its stock has jumped up In price. "While there is no reason to be particularly enthusiastic over the kind of service improvement which will result, neither Is there any reason for finding fault with the Commission for granting the concessions. By means of these third tracks and the other proposed improvements to the elevated system, the convenience of the millions of people who now depend upon the elevated'roads will be very much increased; and the improved means of communication will be effected in a comparatively short time, and substantially without any expense to the city. Moreover, the proposed increases in elevated trackage will not serve to diminish to any consider¬ able extent the value of those subway concessions which are now being seriously considered; and by the time com¬ petitive subways are constructed there will be enough traffic for all. In view of the fact, consequently, of tho present congestion and of the probable increase of congestion before any additional subways can be constructed, the Public Service Commission has done well to reach an agreement with the Interborough Company in respect to additional tracks on the Second, Third and Ninth avenue elevated lines. AS to the arrangements made for using the Steinway Tunnel and the Queensboro Bridge, their desirability is obvious. The bridge has been completed for about two years, and has not been used anywhere near as much as it should be. It was intended in the beginning that there should be a connection with the Second avenue elevated; and after such a connection is made residents of Queens, who have reached the vicinity of the Bridge terminus, will be able for five cents to travel to the lower end of Man¬ hattan in a comparatively short time. Of course such a connection still leaves a good deal to be desired. The travelers on the Bridge are still cut off from a large part of the business district of Manhattan, from its retail stores, from its theatres and from its restaurants. There would be only one way in which they could reach practically all these points of interest. A connection with the proposed Lexington avenue subway would not serve the purpose, be¬ cause that subway does not touch the shopping and amuse¬ ment district. On the other hand, if the Interborough ever builds a Madison avenue extension and one along Seventh avenue, a connection with the Madison avenue line at 59th street would enable the travelers from-Queens by the Bridge to reach almost any part of the central ridge of Manhattan. Another extremely useful connection would be the extension ol! the McAdoo system from the Grand Central Station to 59th street and Second avenue. Travelers in the Steinway tunnel will under the proposed new arrange¬ ment be very much better oft than travelers on the Queens¬ boro Bridge. They will, in the first place, be able to reach any point on the existing subway or on any future subway controlled hy the Interborough Company hy paying five cents. In the second place they will connect at '12d. street with the Grand Central Station, the McAdoo system and eventually with the Broadway-Lexington avenue route, and in making their subway connections they will have the beneflt of an express'station at 42d street. These are great advantages, even in case some of them do have to be purchased by the payment of additional fares. If the arrangement goes through, the Grand Central Station will become the greatest traffic center in New York City; and the pity is that the dif¬ ferent subway and tunnel systems which will exchange traf¬ fic at this point will uot all be under a single management. THB most interesting part of the report on water termi¬ nals in the United. States, issued by the Commissioner on Corporations, Mr. Herbert Knox Smith, deals with the situation at the port of New York. The Commissioner draws up a severe arraignment of the policy pursued hy the municipal government iu this respect, and he exposes at length the waste and inefficiency involved by the existing arrangements for getting freight to and from Manhattan and handling it while there. He says, "There is nothing like a comprehensive belt railroad system. This absence of any general rail-water co-ordination and the present lack of organization of tlie harbor with respect to its important functions undoubtedly exert a deterrent effect upon the commerce of the port." He also points out that much of the $100,000,000 which the State is spending on the Barge Canal will be wasted, unless better water terminals are secured for this port. It has always been incomprehen¬ sible to the Record and Guide that this subject has not aroused more interest on the part of local trade and real estate organizations. The whole future of the port of New York and particularly the future of the Manhattan water¬ front hangs upon the construction of a warehouse system and a freight railway in Manhattan; and yet the subject apparently excites no interest either on the part of general public opinion or of bodies like the Chamber of Commerce and the Board of Trade and Transportation. Surely some committee of representative business men should be organ¬ ized, who could report upon the practicability of Commis¬ sioner Tomkins' apparently excellent plan for a marginal ele¬ vated railway and a group of municipal docks. The mat¬ ter is just as important as is that of increased rapid transit. If some plan of the kind is not adopted within a compara¬ tively short time, it will undoubtedly mean the eventual use of the Manhattan water-front merely for the purpose of receiving freight actually consumed in Manhattan, Iu the end the South Brooklyn and the Jamaica water-front will absorb practically everything except the local trade. There is only one big corporation which is vitally interested in pre¬ venting this result and that is the New York Central. It may be hoped that it will co-operate with the city govern¬ ment in keeping the Manhattan water-front really alive. CERTAIN parts of Mayor Gaynor's letter, expressing his unwillingness to have the Democratic nomination for Governor forced on him, make curious reading, "I am well aware," he says, "as has been pointed out to me, that there are some large things which a Governor could readily do for the city of New York by oversight and legitimate inter¬ ference, which the Mayor of that city cannot do without much time and difficulty, if at all. Among them I may mention the planning and construction of a comprehensive system of subways with a single fare over the whole system, which in the discordance, or duality of government, or both, now existing iu that city is a difficult and protracted matter." The Record and Guide would like to know what the Gov¬ ernor of the State of New York has to do with the planning and construction of a comprehensive system of subways, and how the Governor can in any way alleviate tlie effects of the "discordancy, or duality of government" now in existence in the city. He could, it is true, dismiss the existing Pub¬ lic Service Commission, and appoint men in their place who were pledged to a comprehensive system of subways with a single fare, but that would be the limit of his power and he could not secure the proposed object by any such means. Before the new Governor could act, the contracts for the Broadway-Lexington avenue subway, which is planned as an essentially independent route, will probably be signed; and even after a new commission were appointed, the "duality" and "discordance," would remain. There would be no assurance that the Board of Estimate would agree with the plans of the new Commission; and the Governor would be powerless in the face of such a disagreement. The passage is interesting, however, because it indicates that