Please note: this text may be incomplete. For more information about this OCR, view
About OCR text.
April iS, 1903.
RECORD AND GUIDE
753
^ ESTABUSHED'^ WiHClI2l*i^ 1868,
fiW&im ID JW EsTAjt. BuiLdij/g *^rrEiTrupiE .^ouseiJold DEOCttijiifltl.
BusqIess Alio Themes op GEttefi^ Iifttr;^^
PRICE PER YEAR IN ADVANCED SIX DOLLARS
Vttbtished etlers Saturdap
Commnnlcationa should be addressed to
C. W. SWEET. 14-16 Vesey Street, New YorK
J. T. LINDSET, Business Manager Telephone, Cortlandt 3157
"Entered ai the Post Office at Nmo TorJc, K Y., as second-class matter."
Vol. LXXI.
APRIL IS, 1903.
No. 1831.
THE stock market during the past week suffered from some
of the heaviest selling and was assisted by some of the
l)est buying that has heen seen this year. The net result is
favorable, and the tone apparently more cheerful than it has
been for some time past. It is not, indeed, either to he desired
or to be expected that the prices of the leading stocks will re¬
turn to anything like the level, which prevailed last fall. Those
high prices, not only encouraged the issue of more securities
than could be wholesomely "digested," but were a tremendous
strain upon the banking resources of the country. It is ap¬
parent that financiers will have to he e^xtremely conservative
for some time to come about the issue of such securities, no
matter how sound they may be. But on the other hand the
prices of the best stocks and bonds are considering the business
prosperity and prospects of the country rather too low than too
high, and unless some unforseen calamity occurs, they are likely
next fall to be selling at higher prices. It will not take very
many months of financial conservatism to bring about a better
adjustment than that which now prevails between the amount
of securities offered for investment and the power of investors
to take them up. In the meantime the large business flnancial
interests wili await with uncertainty and even dread the next
session of Congress, for at that session it will be decided whether
Congress will persist in its policy of declaring all combinations,-
whether good or bad, to be unlawful. There can be no doubt
that the anti-Trust law, as recently interpreted, and if strictly
enforced, could utterly disorganize many of the most vital and
useful business arrangements of the country; and that unless
there can be found some means of legally discriminating be¬
tween beneficent and evil combinations in inter-state commerce,
a far-reaching reorganization will have to take place in Ameri¬
can industrial methods. This danger from future legislation is
still a long way off; but it will doubtless prove to be a power¬
ful conservative agency throughout the whole of the present
year.
â– ^' HE amendments to the Tenement House law introduced by
â– ^ Senator Marshall, sanctioned by the Department, and
passed by the Legislature have been signed by the Governor. In
sanctioning these amendments, the Department has gone as far
as it cau in meeting the grievances of the builders of- the outly¬
ing borcughs. It recognized the fact that the law as it has stood
during the past year, has proved to be an obstacle to the build¬
ing in any large quantities of three and four-story tenements iu
Brooklyn and the Broux; and consequently, since it is the policy
o£ the Department to adapt the law, so far as possible, to the
needs of tbe speculative builders, it proposed certain amend¬
ments looking towards a cheapening of these classes of build¬
ings. The more important concessions concern the three and .
fcur-story tenements, containing two families on a floor, the
apartments running through from front to rear. The 8x14 court
which last winter was legalized for the three-story tenements,
is now authorized for the four-story tenements also. The court
required for a single three-story tenement is not reduced, but,
where two three-story tenements adjoin, the 8x14 court is
deemed sufficient to ventilate them both, provided the houses do
not occupy more than 65 per cent, of the lot. Furthermore
three-story three-family frame buildings are permitted outside
the flre limits. All these concessions may be approved, in that
they enable builders to erect these classes of houses witb more
profit to themselves and yet without any threat to wholesome
conditions of residence within the houses. But the Department
goes further and makes even more liberal concessions with re¬
spect to fireproofing provisions. Bulkheads in new tenement
houses less than five stories in height may be constructed ot
wood, if covered with metal on both sides. New four-story
houses, which do not contain more than two families on a floor,
may have wooden stairs, provided the hacks or soffits of the
stairs are covered with metal, and the floors of the stair halls
are filled with deafening to a depth of five inches, and that such
stair halis are inclosed with fireproof partitions, constructed on
four-inch terra cotta blocks with angle iron construction. Oa
the other hand the three-story tenements, which were allowed
wooden stairs, floors and partitions by the amendments last
year, must under the proposed modiflcations be made semi-fire¬
proof. Inside cellar stairs will be permitted in three and four-
story buildings, provided they are enclosed with brick walls, and
furnished with flreproof doors. All these changes with the ex¬
ceptions of those concerning bulkheads lower the existing
standards with respect to four-story buildings, .but raise them
with respect to three-story buildings. Taken altogether they
will enable the builder to save a good deal of money in the
erection of the four-story tenement.
â– ^^ HERE can be no doubt about the timeliness of these con-
â– *â– cessions. Brooklyn and the Bronx, but particularly the
latter, wil! soon enter upon a period of even more rapid expan¬
sion in population than heretofore—an expansion which will be
encouraged by the opening up of large areas of territory now in¬
accessible. For these enormous quantities of cheap land, cheap
buildings will be necessary; and the amendments will again
make the erection of the cheaper tenements a profitable enter¬
prise. Unless we are very much mistaken they will reconcile the
Brooklyn builders to the law very much as the Manhattan build¬
ers and operators have already been reconciled. It will mean
that, with one exception, the speculative building of tenements,
upon the freedom of which the living accommodations of the
population of New YorkCity depends,will have been placed upon
a normal and profitable basis. The one exception is the case of
seven-story apartment houses in Manhattan—a vexy necessary
type of building for erection on property which is too dear for
the ordinary six-story building, and too cheap for a flreproof
structure. Fortunately, however, there is a good chance that
before the Legislature adjourns these seven-story buildings, im¬
proved somewhat as respects their flreproofing, will again be
permitted—a step which will he followed by a large increase in
the amount of new apartment-house construction planned for
Harlem and the West Side.
T X THEN the present Subway was laid out a big mistake
JL V was undoubtedly made in situating the West Side ex¬
press stations at 72d street, and the property-owners, who ap¬
peared last Thursday before the Rapid Transit Commission to
plead for an express station at the Circle had strong grounds on
which to urge their claims. Seventy-second street is an impor¬
tant centre of population and has become more so ever since
it was granted the great privilege of an express station; but it
is not a centre of business or of trafflc and is likely to become
one. The Circle, on the other hand, is destined to become an
extremely important centre both of business and of traffic; and
an express station at that point would be of enormous and in¬
creasing utility to many thousands of people. It is becoming,
for instance, a favorite place Eor theatres and restaurants; the
Blackwell's Island Bridge will bring swarms of passengers to
59th street to whom express trains would be the greatest con¬
venience, and we have no doubt that ten years from now the
want of them will be considered, perhaps, the worst error made
in the planning of the present tunnel. The error cannot be
remedied, in case the change would delay for long the opening
of the Subway; but the fact that it has been made should be
taken into account in providing express stations for the East
Side extension.
------------*------------
ON Tuesday last the Committee on Finance of the Board
of Aldermen reported favorably upon a resolution appro¬
priating $10,000 for the expenses of a commission, to be appoint¬
ed by the Mayor, which is to prepare a plan for the beautifying
of the city of New York. The report was laid over and made
a special order for the next meeting, on which occasion it will
probably be passed. There is every reason why it should be.
The expense of the commission is small; its appointment com¬
mits the city to nothing. It simply means that the responsible
city oflicials say to the advocates of municipal aesthetic im¬
provement. "There is the commission for which you have
been asking; and now it is "up" to you to formulate a report,
which will command public support, and which can be accepted
by us as the representative of the city's taxpayers." This will
not be an easy task; but it is not an impossible one, provided it
is approached from a sensible and practicable point of view. In
preparing such a report it should always be kept in mind that
New York, unlike Washington or Paris, is not a city, in which
the interests of commerce and property are subordinate to those
of a national government with unlimited resources. On the con-