Evening journal., 1901-01-26
BUILDING
UNDERGROUND
IN Interesting Departure
in Scientific COnStruc-
tiOR
R. j, Mccurdy, in Harper's weekly.

air. The new century finds them build
Ing down into the ground. The Bible
and the Building Code differ on Man
haitian Island as TO the propriety o.
lMldlng a house in sand. Progressive
engineers have q scovered that it t
SAFER ID follow the Bible. Seventy
even hundred, ieet straight down
from tho curb-lne, through the run
n.ng sands which cover ali the south
ein END CI this richest island IN tne
world, on through the hard-pan de-
posted by the glaciers that workea
their way from the Palisades, and OIL
through the coarse sand and gravel
down into the everlasting gneiss, these
engineers are now piercing the bases
icr their sky-scrapers.
Greed for gain is vulgarly supposed
To be the secret Of most Of the money
saving inventions OF the close of the
nineteenth century. Rather would
attribute the scientific discovery OF the
best method OF utilizing our posses
si0ns and making them most econOmi-
cally productive to the sensible science
ct living which has been called com
mcn-sense. This departure from es-
tablished methods of building busi-
ness structures upon ground which is
second Cnly to-LoudOn dirt in its mar
ket value is not only of scientific inter-
tst but marks an ear in the economy Of
real estate. "Cujus est sOlum, eius
est usque ad coelum," the convey
ancers Of long ago were ready enough
to discover. Thanks to the Mutual
Life Insurance Company, the axiom
may now be announced tha tcujus est
SCUM. ejus est usque ad interest Nor
IS there in the whole range of human
literature aEd human experience an
axiom whose practical application isl
! kelly to cause more tremendous
revolution In the most lasting values
which human economy knows A
building ten stories above the curb
line, and if it contain abOveground one
structed five stories below the curb
ne, and if Il contain aboveground one
hundred thousand square feet, may
be made to contain fifty thousand
more below. It requires no reasoning
20 demonstrate the astounding addi-
tion thus TO be made to city real
estate values. The enormous floor
space required now in all modern
buildings Of the better sort for ma
3hinery, such as steam-engines, boil
ers, dynamos, pumps, and the like.
may with the new method of con-
stiuctiCn be utilized for more prOduc-
tive purposes, the machinery being re-
egated to the sub-cellar, where. rest
ing upon the rib-rocks of the under
world, it will nevertheless pulsate in
unison win the heart-beats of COM
merce.
so the next decade is likely to see
wise men wondering that buildings
founded in quicksands were ever sci
towering into the air. TO bewilder the
BIRDS, while the small fishes were get
ting acquainted with their founda.
tions. foundations which, by the old
methods universally pursued with one
or two exceptions up to this tlm,.
actually touched water, salt water at
that, at the comparatively shallow
depth of eighteen, fourteen, and SOME
times ten feet below the curb-line. By
the new methods this means that eXca-
vatiOn beyond that point must be done
in a caissOn; no man can fill hole IL
the sea, nor in the running sand which
covers all the lower part of Manhattan
Island, without doing his excavation
fist in a protected compartment OF
+, steel.
j Just what the underground streams
are which unquesuonably exist IL
some parts of Manhattan Island, one
OF them, for example. draining what
! used to be the Collect pond, il is
not now material to inquire, because
the water which has been encountered
in the depths of the new subterrausal
4 structure Of the Mutual Life Insurance
Company is not running water, but
I the eternally present sea-water which
d has been residing on the bedrock for
- oh oh fQI %
1 That the seas long ago swept over the
whole of what is now Manhattan
l Island needs no argument, and that
, the period within which saltwater
y covered entirely the lower part of th1
island is not so very far back. Our
engineers have demonstrated this
y with other interesting geological data
in the excavations for the foundatior'
Of the extensions OF our building on
Liberty and on Cedar streets.
CaissOn construction was used Z
z far back as 1896 when the founda
tons Of the Commercial Cable Build
i ing in Broad street we're built twenty
Z FIVE feet into the water, thirty feet il
Y all below the curb. The building Law
OF New York declares that any builde
who shall eXcavate to a depth OF mon
u tLan ten feet below the curb-line mus
support and protect the foundation
OF adjoining buildings. Naturally tn
construction Of the Commercial Cabl
foundations thirty feet below tn
z curb-line ought to have caused seriou
thought in the minds of those VIII
were supposed to look after the cor
structive safety Of lower New Yor
2 city. The nature OF the problem sul
gested-nOr the subject is so enormou
that ] am only attempting to sugge'
y it--by the digging down to depth ,
n one hundred feet below the curb Il
the foundations Of the extensions
n the Mutual Life Insurance Company
buildings on Liberty and on Ced.
. streets is self-evident. Such constru
ten invloves going forty fe
deeper than any other constru
N ticn has ever gone II involves, Il
Il deed. the reconstruction Of lower Ne
a York city and the ercctcn CT ercav
ton Of earth-scrarcrs under the SIX
scrapsrs
4 A building rising a hundred fe
49,, f.ttu1,- 1fv|n ", +1a 1,,-f~, a