The Newark star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1909, 1909-07-22
ORIGINAL
PLAN FOR CANAL
ACROSS MEADOWS
Engineers in Report Say Green
Comedies with the
Commission.
HIS REPORT SUPERIOR TO
ADAMS'S THEIR VERDICT
Latter's Scheme More Costly and
Less Advantageous,
They Declare.

The original plan for a canal across
the meadows is indorsed in a report
submitted today to the Board of Works
by the consulting engineers who were
employed to examine the report made
by Engineers G.. S.. Green, jr., and II.
S. Adams to Mayor Jacob Haussling
on April Il last.
The consulting engineers are James
Owen, George T. Hand and e. P. Good
rich. They say in their report that
Mr.. Green comedies with the report
of the original commission that there
was no need of quoting him. As to
Mr.. Adams, the consulting engineers
SAL that they are of the general opin-
ion that the original report is superior
to that of Mr., Adams.
Eight and a half long typewriter
pages of the report are given in the
comparisons of Mr.. Adams's report on
the proposed canal and dock system
with the report of the original commits
sions, to show that his plan would be
more costly to Newark and less ad-
v%antageous to the development of land
on the meadows on the line of the
canal and north and south of it for
sites for factories.
The consulting engineers said Mr..
Adams's general scheme of develop
ment involves practically the whole of
the meadow land south of the Lehigh
Valley Railroad and east of the Penn
sylvania Railroad, and hat almost no
-~+ - All .--& @o- H. 1@ffaIanal
along the lines laid down by him with
out the city buying the whole-about
5000 acres-and that only a small por-
ton of this could be filed by the canal,
as he pos II is said also his plan
would be many more times more ex-
pensive than the plan of the original
commission g
Cost Would BE Enormous.
1t would be impossible to develop the
property named by Mr.. Adams in his
preliminary scheme. unless the city pur-
chased all the Wheeler Point land, the
consulting engineers say, which is esti-
mated at a value of $1,000 an acre., and
as practically all of 1t would have to be
purchased, the report reads, the total
expense would be $50, 900, to say moth
ing of the cost required by the grading
which will have to be done.
The consulting engineers oppose the
five piers close to the city proposed by
Mr.. Adams, and they hold Il would be
better to have the piers at the bay enc
Of the canal. 1t is also said Mr.. Adams
does not provide for manufacturing
sites directly on the canal front, and
his plan calls for marginal street
only 100 feet wide and on but one side
of the canal. The consulting engineers
say land close to the city will bring
more for factory sites than for ware
houses. Mr.. Adams's proposed layout
for railroads is condemned also, on the
ground that there would be 100 grade
crossing, on the meadows and a tenn
porary Central railroad draw. The re-
port concludes:
Estimate Too Small, They Say.
In making his estimates of dredging.
Mr.. Adams apparently made use of
those prepared by the original commits
sion, n in so doing lost sight of the
fact that the costs of work in connec-
tion with the side slopes of canals are
constant quantities, irrespective of the
canal secured, so that his estimates are,
consequently. too small. Moreover. the
diagonal position of his n makes
necessary some extra length, which has
also been omitted. The cost of these
items will, in the opinion of the con-
sulting engineers, aggregate an *
penditure of. $4,000 more than esti-
mated by Mr.. Adams.
Instead, therefore, of a. milllon-dollar
preliminary expenditure by the city for
the work, as done according to Mr.,
Adams's layout, the expenditure would
aggregate not less than $1,293,000 be-
of the several Items mentioned
above.
Furthermore, under Mr.. Adams's plan,
any additional widening or maintaining of
the canal and channel east of the Centga
railroad would be much more expensive
than in the case of the development sug-
gested by the commission. This is true,
first, because of the very narrow chan
mel. as the work would have all to be
lone with considerable interruption caused
by the traffic in the canal. and, second,
unless the city purchased the extra width
of strip on which to deposit this material
it would have to be pumped through prop
erty already developed or developing.
"OriginaI Plan SUPERIOR"
There is also an additional length of
tanned thar by the development suggested
by the commission This maintenance
would also be expensive unless the city
acquired property on which to deposit
the excavated material, and the same
criticism holds with regard to the main
tenance of the basin west of the Central
railroad.
1t is thus believed that the plans as
proposed by the original commission to
provide for the city of Newark both a
preliminary layout, which is superior to
that shown by Mr.. Adams, and, moreover,
a temporary expenditure of LOCO. 600 will
90 further to demonstrate the success of
the scheme under the commissions prop
osition than under that above considered.