USA > New York > Bronx County > The Bronx and its people; a history, 1609-1927, Volume II > Part 41
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Under Chapter 378 of the Laws of 1897, on January 1, 1898, the City of New York was "consolidated," and the old City and County of New York had added to its domain the counties of Kings, Queens and Rich- mond (The Bronx at that time was a part of New York County) and became the Greater New York. This event gave the metropolis an area of little less than two hundred and eighty-seven square miles, and opened up countless new sections for development. The population of the Greater City in the first year of its consolidation was 3,350,000. Already the city had begun to adapt itself to the new conditions by the use of the new type of building-the sky-scraper. The development of the rapid-transit system begun about 1875 came within the same period. At the same time that elevated and subway lines were being extended through The Bronx, tunnels for such purposes as gas mains and water- supply conduits, bound the metropolitan area together more and more closely. The rapid-transit service redistributed the population over the territory of The Bronx and in other outlying territory. The Bronx thus came to be built up with amazing swiftness, while on the other hand throughout Manhattan there began a decrease of the rate of grow- ing population. The mounting figures of the population of the Greater City tell the story : In 1910, 4,766,883 ; in 1920, 5,620,048; in 1924, 6,015,- 496. Thus the great area of the Metropolis, and the area of The Bronx in particular, would appear destined to be one of the greatest of the world's residential districts, and perhaps the greatest of all.
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The Building Code-An account of building construction in The Bronx, as in Manhattan, must take into consideration a compendious body of laws known as the Building Code. Modern developments in construction, in fire-proofing and the like, have come about so rapidly, and the necessity for erecting buildings in limited time on limited ground-space exerts such a tremendous influence, that regulation was inevitable if the boroughs were to protect their interests. In general the aim of the Building Code is to guard against fire, accident, un- sanitary conditions, and public nuisances. As high a proportion as three-fourths of the 452,897 buildings of all kinds and descriptions standing in the five boroughs in January, 1923, were said to have been built within the preceding twenty-five years. It is easily seen therefore how important a factor the Building Code is and how quickly its pro- visions take shape in brick and mortar and stone.
Municipal building restriction in New York dates back to the early days of the Dutch settlements in Manhattan and Bronx territory, when after several fires further construction of thatched roofs were prohibited and inflammable chimneys were torn down. From that time on re- strictions of a similar nature were adopted and enforced by the muni- cipal authorities. Systematic regulation of building operations for the entire metropolitan area, however, dates from the incorporation of The Bronx and the other boroughs in Greater New York in 1898. The municipal government was at that time given authority "to establish and, from time to time, to amend a code of ordinances to be known as the 'Building Code' providing for all matters concerning the construc- tion, alteration and removal of buildings in Greater New York." The Building Code adopted in 1899 has been frequently amended. The Tenement House Law of 1901, not a part of the Code, and the Building Zone Resolution of 1916, in particular extended the restrictions placed upon buildings in the five boroughs. In The Bronx enforcement of the Building Code is in the hands of the Borough President, who appoints a Superintendent of Buildings. Plans for new or altered tenement houses must first be approved by the New Buildings' Bureau of the City and Tenement House Department before they are submitted to the Super- intendent of Buildings in The Bronx. The Bureau of Buildings grants and carries on systematic inspection of all construction and alteration. No permit for any construction or alteration is granted until a complete copy of the proposed plans is filed with the Bureau of Buildings, ac- companied by a detailed account of the specifications in writing.
The original Building Code and early amendments contain detailed provisions regarding excavations, fireproof construction, safety meas- ures, kind and quality of building materials required, and methods of construction. The Tenement House Law of 1901 established a separate Tenement House Department, the law made detailed provisions for
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better lighting, ventilation, and sanitary conditions generally, and in- creased protection against fire. Certain trades and occupations were prohibited in tenements, fireproof construction was required for all houses above six stories, and the use of fireproof stairways and sufficient fire escapes of special design were carefully stimulated. The law also provided for enlarged yards and courts, vent ducts, hallways, and win- dows. In 1916 the Board of Estimate and Apportionment adopted a resolution "regulating and limiting the height and bulk of buildings, hereafter erected, and regulating and determining the location of trades and industries, and locating of buildings designed for specified uses, and establishing the bounds of districts for the said purposes." This resolution divided the city into three types of districts according to use, height, and area.
Districts described as "use" districts are of three kinds-residence districts, business districts, and unrestricted districts. Within the limits of residence districts no building can be erected other than those for certain specified uses, of which dwellings, clubs, railroad stations, and hotels are typical. In sections designated as "business districts" the erection or use of buildings for certain specified trades, such as fer- tilizer, glue manufacture, stockyards, and stone or monumental works, is forbidden, and restrictions are placed on manufacturing of any sort, the general rule being that not more than twenty-five per cent of the total floor space of any building should be used for manufacturing.
The districts described as "height" districts are specified as three- quarter times districts, one time districts, one and a quarter times dis- tricts, one and a half times districts, two times districts, and two and a half times districts. The regulation for the last mentioned is typical of all: "No building shall be erected to a height in excess of two and a half times the width of the street, but for each one foot that the build- ing, or a portion of it, sets back from the street line, five feet shall be. added to the height limit of such building, or such portion thereof." In general a street less than fifty feet wide is rated the same as fifty, and a street more than a hundred feet wide, the same as one hundred. "Area" districts are designated as A, B, C, D and E, according to the size of court and rear yard required. The dimensions of such yards must always be in a definite ratio with the height of the building and, in general, the depth of a rear yard must be at least ten per cent of the depth of the lot.
Modern Building Construction-The skyscraper or steel skeleton construction, of which examples are now found in many parts of The Bronx, is distinctly an American development. Its first use in New York was in the ten-story Tower Building erected in 1889. This build- ing introduced a new era in construction methods. Strangely enough
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the first skyscraper developments occurred in Chicago, not in New York, but this new type of construction was so particularly well suited to its situation that New York gladly took the leaf from Chicago's note book and developed the idea to suit its own requirements. The soil of Manhattan and The Bronx, differing from the gravelly loam and clay and quicksand of Chicago, was particularly suited to the carrying of heavy buildings, with its ridges and gneiss and limestone areas provid- ing a firm bedrock near the surface. The addition of The Bronx to the city has largely lessened the real problem of the New York architect, which was to erect the greatest possible floor area upon a fixed ground area, which the steel skyscraper provided the opportunity of partially solving.
The use of steel and wrought iron in the modern buildings of The Bronx is directed largely for reinforcing concrete and for metal trim, apart from its use for structural parts. Metal trim is usually made of cold drawn steel, trimmed and die pressed to exact sizes and shapes, then enameled and grained to give the appearance of natural wood. Metal trim is used for partitions, picture moldings, window trim, wain- scoting, doors and the like. The doors and moldings are usually hollow except for a cork or other filler used to deaden the sound. The chief advantage of metal trim is its fireproof quality. Copper, zinc and lead in sheet form are generally used for covering roofs and for gutters and spouts because of their sea-air and weather-resisting properties. In addition copper is used for such ornamental roofing work as hip rolls, crestings, and dormer windows on turrets.
Reinforced concrete is becoming an indispensable element in building construction in The Bronx as in Manhattan. The concrete is made like ordinary concrete, usually with Portland cement as the matrix and broken stones small enough to pass through a seven-eighths-inch ring for the aggregate, but is reinforced with steel rods or a network of steel.
Influence of Port Developments on Real Estate-New York owes its prestige among the world's great cities largely to her magnificent harbor and encircling rivers. Within the area of Manhattan and The Bronx the intense activity that has brought about the vast concentration of wealth has also resulted in crowded districts, coveted space and the highest real estate values in the country. In the early days waterfront developments were comparatively few. The length of the waterfront of Greater New York is 578 miles. From the founding of the United States Government in 1789 until 1918, total federal appropriation of $29,431,000 were made for the improvement and maintenance of the channels in New York Harbor. A good deal of this amount went into the developments around the Bronx River, Eastchester Creek, Arthur
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Kill, East River and Hell Gate, Westchester Creek and the Harlem River. The Harlem River carries a yearly commerce estimated at four times that of the port of Baltimore and almost seven times that of Savannah. Plans for the improvement of this channel have undergone many vicissitudes; they were adopted in 1878, modified in 1879, 1886, and 1893, and finally enlarged by an Act of 1913. The present project provides for a channel four hundred feet wide and fifteen feet deep at mean low water from the East River to the Hudson, except that the channel width is to be only 350 feet at Washington Bridge and Dyck- man's Meadows. Considerable dredging has been done on the river bed by the United States Government in accordance with this plan, but the matter has been held up by legal complications involved in the removal of certain obstructions, the chief of which are the New York Central Railroad drawbridge at Spuyten Duyvil, the U bend around the Johnson Iron Works, the midstream piers of High Bridge, and the shoal water of The Bronx Kills. The project is to be finished when the obstructions are removed.
Residence Building in The Bronx-Within recent years great apart- ment houses approximating hotels in their general architecture and lavishness of finish have been built in the more favorable sections in The Bronx, as well as in Manhattan. While very few individual resi- dences are being built in Manhattan, family houses still form a very large proportion of the residential building in The Bronx. Many small houses of bungalow or New England type are being erected; and in these all the skill of modern building construction is used to provide adequate and attractive facilities within a limited space. The duplex or two-family house, is a comparatively recent development, as is the cooperatively owned apartment, or cooperative community of small houses with central heating plant. In the better sections many large residences have been built in recent years.
The Bronx achieved a new high record in plans filed for the con- struction of multi-family houses in the five months ended May 31, 1926, with seven hundred and fifty-seven buildings, housing 17,805 families and estimated to cost $70,799,500. This record is far in the lead of all other boroughs of Greater New York, and at the present time there are no signs of any decline in this class of construction in the borough. The five months record for 1926, according to Building Superintendent Patrick J. Reville, is more than double the figures of 1925, both in number of buildings and in estimated cost of construction. During the first five months of 1925 there were filed in The Bronx plans for 304 multi-family buildings, housing a total of 8,252 families and es- timated to cost $33,096,000. The month of May of 1926 was also a record breaker, showing a total of plans filed for a hundred and fifty-
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three multi-family houses planned to accommodate 3,249 families and estimated to cost $11,306,500. During May, 1925, plans were filed for thirty-four multi-family houses, accommodating 1,046 families and es- timated to cost $4,462,000. On several days during the month of May, 1926, the estimated cost of the buildings for which plans were filed ran well over $1,000,000.
Retrospect and Prospect-Writing of the future of The Bronx in 1895, Hugh N. Camp declared that in 1965 the territory might have a population of 1,500,000, and that in 1900, five years after the date of his prophecy, there might be 200,000 people in the area designated. His prognostications were more than fulfilled in this latter year, and by 1920 The Bronx had reached the half million mark, was close to a million five years later, and at the present time gives clear evidence that one quarter of the forty years still to run on Mr. Camp's prediction would see his figures passed. It is to be recalled that large as was the population of The Bronx in 1920, it only amounted to twenty-seven people to the acre. It has, indeed, room for all the overflow from Man- hattan.
Jonas Bronck himself, father of all the property owners and real estate operators of the borough, showed a quite acute sense of real estate values. Having bought his land in the legitimate fashion of the time from the Indian sachems, Ranaque and Tackamuck, he built a stone- house, and barns, and started to raise tobacco. The precise boundaries of the lands owned by him cannot be traced, but the best opinion would appear to be that they ran from a north line about 150th Street to Bungay Creek, the Harlem River and the Bronx Kills. Bronx was soon followed by other speculators in land. The student has only to run over the names of the pre-colonial patents, the various manors, to see the interest that was displayed in this section. Litigation started at an early date and was carried on even into the present century by the heirs of the first proprietors. Lewis Morris was conspicuous as an early booster of the land above the Harlem. As we have related else- where, he endeavored to have the capital of the United States established in his beloved Morrisania; and there are anecdotes which illustrate the haughty conceptions of the importance of Bronx territory which have prevailed from the beginning among those most intimately associated with its interests.
Following the Revolution marked changes occurred amongst owners of land with the boundaries of The Bronx. The region had suffered greatly from the armies that had moved over it. The forests were denuded, farms were destroyed, and in many cases the proprietors left their holdings in the vicinity of the Harlem to begin a new life on pioneer lands further up the river which were thrown open to settle-
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ment about that time. There thus came into possession a new type of owner. The well-to-do men of New York City began to become conscious of the beauties of the northern section, where with the varia- tion of hill and valley, bay and stream, there was a type of location to suit any fancy. Run down farms were purchased ; cattle and farm stock were brought from across the ocean; and landed estates began to be in fashion. New values were quickly realized from this renewed settle- ment on the older farm lands. The Pelham and Third Avenue bridges were built and new roads were built connecting The Bronx by new ties of easier access to Manhattan and the regions along the Hudson and the Sound. The Harlem River was dammed and a highway was built over it at the junction with Jerome Avenue. Then, in 1836, the dam was removed and a drawbridge substituted; and about this time also High Bridge was begun with arches "not less than a hundred feet above high water." In 1842 the Croton waters were brought by viaduct across the Harlem. The Red Bird stage carried mail for the region. Through Eastchester was developed one of the principal turnpikes, giving a soggy, dreary note of transportation.
The building of the Harlem Railroad about this time through the North Side not only gave an added impetus to the development of the district, but gave variety to the character of its development. It be- came no longer merely a farm and estate area, though farms and landed estates were longer to take up much of its area, but an urban region, dotted by villages, some of which began to concentrate and take on an air of civic dignity. The town of Morrisania in particular began to wear an aspect of importance. In 1863, two purchasers, by name Campbell and Willis, secured about a hundred acres from Gouverneur Morris, located north of what is now One Hundred and Thirty-eighth Street, east of Third Avenue, then called the Boston Road. A year later Clarence S. Brown purchased from Henry Lewis Morris, another hundred acres, lying between the Harlem River and One Hundred and Thirty-eighth Street, west of Third Avenue. Although there were no houses on these properties, so confident were the purchasers that New York would extend its city lines in that direction that the lands were laid out in streets, the numbering of which was a continuation of those located in Harlem, the one nearest the river being called One Hundred and Thirty-third Street. This later became the Southern Boulevard. The greater part of the region was, however, taken up by a large num- ber of villages, each having a street system of its own devising. In 1868 the village of Morrisania, wanting to have a comprehensive and sensible layout for its rapidly developing streets, secured from the State Legislature an act by which a commission was given powers to map the area and to decide on some plan for the naming and location of streets.
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There was at the time also a movement for the combining of the towns of Morrisania and West Farms. There was opposition to the idea from some of the large landowners in West Farms, and it was not until 1869 that direct action was taken in the Legislature in favor not . only of the union of these two towns, but of their annexation to New York City. In 1872 an act of the Legislature provided the people both of New York City and of the County of Westchester with an oppor- tunity of declaring their will regarding this matter of annexation. The vote that resulted was favorable to such union, and by the act of the Legislature in 1873, the Westchester towns of Morrisania, West Farms and Kingsbridge and part of Eastchester and Pelham became a part of the city of New York on January 1, 1874, bringing with them about fifty villages or settlements. In 1895 an even larger territory, compris- ing 14,500 acres, east of the Bronx River, was annexed. This new territory carried with it not only half a hundred villages with more than a hundred miles of streets, but also part of Bronx Park, Bronx and Pelham Parkways, and Pelham Bay Park.
The result of the annexation became soon apparent. The population of 28,981 in 1870 had expanded in 1890 to 81,255. Following 1895, there was a decided boom in real estate and an accelerated rate of increase in population. Surrounded by waters all of which are famous in history, the Hudson, the Harlem, Long Island Sound, the East River, the sec- tion of the mainland nearest the Atlantic Ocean, the extensive territory of the new borough, bright with a new metropolitan dignity, became heir to all the largesses of commerce as it had from the beginning been heir to a striking scenic beauty. On both the Hudson and Long Island Sound sides, manufacturing and residential sites were secured and developed. The variegated and undulating surface of much of Bronx territory provided a rich variety of plots for homes and business that permitted a full enjoyment of its salubrity of climate. The educational advantages were developed with an extraordinary impetus, for its ninety- five public and thirty-eight private schools continue to be added to, and its two universities are already among the greatest in the world. There are already nearly five hundred miles of streets, with permanent pavements almost as long. New bridges have been built across the Harlem every few years. But more striking and attractive than any other element in its diversified make-up, fit concomitants to its rivers, its hills and tidal waters, are its rich and extensive parks, that provide its people as well as the people of Manhattan with a rus in urbe at their very doors, where the noises of the vast metropolis die away, and the busy worker may seek diversion and repose amid the air, the scenes and the murmur of the deep country.
The recent rapid growth of The Bronx has now become a proverb; but, despite its great natural advantages, the development of the terri-
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tory proceeded at a merely normal rate in 'the period that antedated the development of its lines of transportation. The Harlem Railroad gave the first impetus to the North Side. Soon the newly developed electric systems made The Bronx part of an easily accessible area that took in Manhattan and the regions to the north, while the metropolitan rapid transit lines pierced the barriers of rivers and brought the heart of The Bronx nearer downtown New York than the eastern and western districts of Manhattan. The early lines were parallel, moving in a north and south direction. The leading purpose held in view was to link the important parts of Manhattan with the important parts of The Bronx. Everything could not be done at once, and the great highways of traffic had first to be developed. But soon there was a call for the linking together by quick transit one part of The Bronx with another. In 1890 cross lines began to be built through Bronx territory, making trans- portation more easy in an east and west direction. Then when the new century had opened the improvement of transportation began to proceed apace. Elevated and subways were extended and one part of The Bronx began to have an intimate acquaintance with other parts that had formerly appeared remote. As lines of traffic of every kind, those on the ground, and under the ground, and above the ground, spread their radii through the reaches of the new borough, the great boom in real estate of which the end even yet cannot be seen began. The Bronx became grid-ironed by a fixed street system that took account of every square yard within the vast territory. Great apartment houses adorned favorable situations which before that time had been bare rock or wooded elevations. Great manufacturing and business buildings were erected to house organizations that had formerly made their home in congested regions of Manhattan; so that the more populous portions of The Bronx began to wear the aspect of populous Manhattan, save that the newer borough wore a newer appearance, and had fewer drab dwellings of an older day to pull down to make way for the new gener- ation of building, or by comparison to contract the modest grandeur of the past with forms and accessories of architecture that spoke of the marvellous knowledge of a modern generation, wielding a power and authority still novel and mysterious to an age of science, feeling its way along the shore of an ocean from which modern man has learnt not to be surprised at any miracle or manifestation.
In the eastern region of The Bronx the development in real estate gradually spread, and in recent years large and small estates that had been held for more than half a century by individuals and families were overtaken by the new flood. These estates were acquired by speculators, and were sold and resold, and divided and subdivided until finally they went under the spades of the actual builders. The William Watson Estate, after an ownership of seventy-five years, disposed of 1,600 lots
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