New-York tribune., 1907-09-15
CROWDED NEW YORK.
Gro7cing Worse and Horse" Stand
ing Room Only Some Day.

The business districts of New York are to-
day congested with traffic. 1t is only necessary
TO push ones way through the throngs in the
downtown streets, when the tall buildings empty
their thousands into narrow thoroughfares at
the noon hour, to realize that the limit of over
crowding is rapidly being reached in many dis
tricts. Sidewalks are no longer able to accom-
modate all the pedestrians at such times. They
overflow to the pavements and make it neces-
sary in some cases for vehicle traffic to seek
other routes.
This naturally raises the question of how the
many narrow streets in the downtown business
quarters will be able to accommodate the traffic
of the future when the maximum number of
twenty-story office buildings is reached 1t also
makes one ask how the future thousands who
will those high buildings are going to get to
and from their offices to their homes.
Manhattan's population is increasing at the
rate of one hundred thousand a year At that
rate it will double itself in forty years. The
population of outlying boroughs and contiguous
areas is multiplying at a much more rapid rate.
So is the proportion of that outlying population
which daily travels TO and from the centre OF
the city rapid transit facilities contn-
ually increased
Still another element Of congestion Will be in
troduced within a few years. Three great rail-
way systems the Pennsylvania the Hudson &
Manhattan and the New York Central. are pre-
pairing to bring suburban traffic into Manhattan
by systems Of subways and tunnels. When
these enormous enterprises are completed Wall
Street and the retail shopping and theatre dis
tTicts will be within easy distance of every town
on Long Island. half score of towns in the
State of New Jersey and dozens Of populOus
communities along the shores of the Hudson
without single change Of ears and in frac-
tion of the time now consumed in the trip.
Persons who used to do their shopping IN the
business centres of the districts in which they
live will soon be BILE to run into New York
handily. The phrase "Forty-ive minutes from
Broadway Will then apply 10 rapidly growing
communities which now are hours distant. y
new impetus will be given the northward marcn
OF the skyscraper. Another congested centre
will be created uptown about the terminI OF
these great railway systems.
All this will tend make Manhattan Island
by far the greatest business of it's size in
wealth Of the city. But it will likewise multiply
the millions who already find their days work
in the congested area, no matter where they
make their home. II will add hundreds OF
thousands 10 the army of shoppers and pleasure
seekers who now shop and find their theatres
in centres Of population closer and more acces-
sible 10 the places where they live
a given amount Of the earth's space can only
be made TO accommodate a certain volume of
human traffic. Nature has been stingy with
Manhattan in the matter of space but generous
In the matter Of isolation Human ingenuity has
surmounted the barriers nature has intervened
by constructing many stored buildings. on the
one hand and the other by opening easy
routes into the centre Of the city. under the bed
OF the Hudson under that arm Of the sea called
the East River, and under the centre of the city
itself All this adds 10 the congestion.