Los Angeles herald., 1905-05-21
PAST AND FUTURE
OF Los ANGELES
COMMENTS ON SOLID GROWTH
OF THE CITY
CHANGE OF BUSINESS CENTER
Los Angeles Far Ahead Of Cincinnati
and Minneapolis In the Retail
Trade-Value Of Electric
Railway System

Railway System
In the reading room of one Of the
local clubs the other night the past and
future of Los Angeles clubs was under
discussion.
Commenting on the claim that Los
Angeles today stands alone as wonder
in the line of enterprise and advance
ment, that the population of the city
now exceeds 100000 and that the city is
growing with wonderful rapidity inI
all lines of business, A. L. Holey, the
architect, said in substance:
"It may be interesting to many new
comers to know where we started from,
that is from a real estate viewpoint.
One needs not be told, as 1t is as easily
traced as the miner traces the ore ledge
Of a mine. In early days buildings were
erected around the plaza, but from the
very day of their completion the trend
of investment has been to the south
take, for instance, the Baker block,
at one time the finest structure of its
kind in Southern California. The old
Downey block now being torn down to
admit of the new government postofice,
was another fine specimen of early
architecture, and no doubt attracted
more attention at the time they were
put up than the twelve-story building
did, or does now.
Early Architecture
Next in line of Improvement was
the Nadeau hotel, the Los Angeles
National Bank building and the Will
son building, all of which were among
the first of early architecture.
THE question among a great many
is where are we going to stop? In my
opinion Los Angeles will continue to
grow beyond the 100000 point.
1.-THE new government postoffice Isl
bound to have a great influence upon
the value of real estate of North Main
and Spring streets property, that went
begging for time but now is held at
a stiff price.
Spring street and Broadway will al
ways take the lead for high-price retail
stores, and from First street south toI
Ninth rents will continue to advance
until the small ones'' are driven out
to make way for the big ones
Extension of Business
Main street has shown great strides
in the past five years and bids fair
to become one Of the close rivals OF
Spring street. Hill street is coming
along in fine shape, and with the
scheme of lighting for Hill street, as
now installed on Broadway, there GER
tainly is in store great surprises as to
what may be expected of this thorough
fare.
when one reflects upon the gen.
eral conditions of affairs of our four
main thoroughfares, Spring, Broad
way, Main and Hill streets, he is unable
to find comparison with any city of
our class.
Los Angeles has four streets run
ming parallel that give more indi-
cations of prosperous retail trade than
snv other city of its class in the entire
United States. Comparing Los Angeles
with Minneapolis, Mimi, for instance
a city claiming 25O000 population, kept
up by It's great farming and milling
interests, that city cannot hold a
candle to us in regard to fine retail
stores. 1t Is a conceded fact that our
retail trade exceeds that of Cincinnati,
Ohio, a city claiming three times our
population.
Another feature no doubt having
made itself evident to II. E. Hunting
ton in connection with his great sys-
tenn of street railways and his many
suburban lines extending out in all
directions from Los Angeles. People
ride on the Huntington suburban lines
for pleasure In the cities of Mime
apolis and ST. Paul one never sees a
passenger riding upon the electric lines
between these two thriving cities
except ne is on business.
Restoration of Values
Los Angeles has fully recovered
from the effect of its boom of 1885 to
1887. and it has in many instances
taken all these years to put values
back to the prices the same property
sold for in 1885 to 1887.
The great slump in prices Of real
estate taught many a severe lesson
and no doubt has had it's good effect
in keeping down any similar move-
ment during the past five years Of tho
general prosperity of our wonderful
city.
During 1sS5-S7 there was no thriv-
ing town connected with Los Angeles
by the Huntington system of suburban
railways. The city was ahead of the
county in those days and the slump
was to be expected.
Center of Business
"Our city has moved it's center of
business a distance of three blocks in
the past twenty years and in my
opinion the center OF business will