The Pensacola journal. (Pensacola, Fla.) 1898-1985, 1908-01-30
rENsAcoA FIoRIpA rHURsD Az MoRNNe JANUAaY 80 1908
Striking Proof of
Value of Parks.

1t is quite the custom of the nation,
and even of New Workers themselves,
to look on that city as being, above
alb other American communities, the
one in which the almighty dollar" is
placed above every other considera-
ton except the priceless ties of love
for family and dearer friends. But it is
easy to mistake the value of signs,
and many signs, properly read, show
that New York is not as mercenary as
She seems on the surface. Witness,
for instance, the fact that that city
maintains as public parks lands which
rs vacant real estate would be worth
1900, 000, 000-one hundred times the
= total assessment, both realty and per-
sonal property, of the city of Pensa-
cola. This is what the New York Her
aid says on this point:
Records of the city department of
parks give interesting figures and gen
eral information unknown by many OF
the residents of the city. II is esti-
mated that the public Fairgrounds,
the open places that are not only in
bodies of many acres, but in small
plots of green that are lungs for the
great congested districts of the me-
tropolis, are worth as vacant real es-
tate $1,000, 0OO, 900. This enormous
amount in value is tied UP in land for
the health and pleasure of more than
four millions of inhabitants of the five
borOughs and friends who may visit
them and strangers who come within
the city's borders.
But, one may say, these parks are
worth. as realty. lch more than they
cost New York. True; but at that,
New York, the supposedly sordid and
inhuman, the reputed Sodom and Co.
morrah combined. established her
parks at "a cost of about five and half
times. the aggregate real estate and
personal assessment of the city of Pen
sacola. Think of that, Pensacolians;
and think how much cheaper and cas-
Ter it were for Pensacola to do rela
lively as much To quote the New
York Herald again:
1t is shown that the original cost of |
these parks, which number 113, was
about $66, Ass, 900, and they are worth !
now nearly twenty times as much as
at the dates OF their purchase. Take, |
for illustration, Union, Madison, Temp |
kins, and Washington squares. They |
cost respectively $116,051 in 1888, !
$685. in 1S47, $93,35S in 1884, and |
$77,97o in 1927, or S353,331 in all, and |
row real estate experts say that they |
are worth $20,000,0O0.
These numerous parks vary in size |
as much, as they vary in location, from !
small fraction of an acre at the |
junction of streets to 1,756 acres in !
Pelham Bay Park, the most extensive |
park in the city, and forming grand |
and magnificent system through the |
Parkway connects 1t with Bronx !
park, of Gel acres, which. in its turn, /
Is connected on the west by Mosholu |
parkway with Van Cortlandt park of !
1882 acres.
South OF these throughout the Bronx |
and Manhattan Island are 90 parks. |
remarkably EVENLY distributed, Offer 1
Ing ready access from every portion
of the entire surrounding territory all |
the way down to the Battery.
Manhattan. with its more congested |
population. naturally has the most |
parks. which number AZ, with magnifi-
cent Central park, containing S43 |
acres, leading, as it leads the world |
Brooklyn borough, with 80 parks.
comes next, with Prospect park. of SIG |
acres at the head of the list. The
Bronx has the greatest park mileage.
with II parks; then comes Queens.
with Z, followed by Richmond, with 3.
Lives there the Pensacolian with so
little faith in traditional southern gen.
crosby as compared with our conven-
tional ideas of New York's humanity I
that he can read these New York facts
and yet fail to say that this day he
will become a persistent, consistent,
aggressive factor in the movement for
public parks in this city?
Lives there the Pensacolian who
can ask: What's the use? Do they pay?
New York answers.