The Washington herald. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1906-1939, 1915-03-07
The Change in New York City.

The Change IN New York City.
| Naturally enough, older people are impress SGD
much more than younger people with the rapidty
with which great changes in almost every.
thing that man has created. People living con-
stantly in a town city seldom notice that the
outward appearance of these localities is notably
altered by time; but if they the old neigh
borhood after long absence they observe at once
4 vast difference. These alterations were accom-
plished gradually. The transformation of the
structure OF city is the work of a single night
like tic building OF Aladdn's Palace. 1t goes on
daily and hourly, and people under whose eyes
the mctamorphosis takes place generally una
ware of it.
A striking instance OF all this and of the in
sensible way in which such shiftings go on in
everything-in laws, in political parties, and in
social affairs-is the immense change in the out
ward appearance OF the City OF New York in re-
cent years, and indeed in the very character of the
city. We think it is not too much to saw that the
change which has occurred there concerns not
merely the character OF the city, but the actual
existence OF the city itself at least in the that
this existence defined and recognized up TO
twenty-five years ago.
We assume that all OF our readers understand
Just where the city is built and how it has grown
up and developed from carly days The City OF
New ork proper is located upon Manhattan Is
land, but the so-called Greater New York now
includes the old cities OF Brooklyn. Long Island
City and what used to be the adjoining parts oil
Long Island and Westminster County in New
\ ork State. Beyond this what is known as the
metropolitan district embraces practically all OF
Long Island large portion OF the northern part
Connecticut and the territory bordercd by the
Hudson River for forty miles north OF the
boundaries OF the actual New York City. All this
is matter OF common knowledge as is also the
fact that on Manhattan Island the center OF bust
ness and social life has moved steadily northward
This northward march moved by very slow steps
during the FIRST $50 years OF the city's existence
but, in the last few years, it has moved with the
stride OF giant, and New Nork city it used
to be known to residents who have attained
the age OF nifty years has become thing OF the
past.
What is more interesting to discuss, and what
has now become most important matter to
discuss, is not the past but the future of Man
haitian Island, and whether it is likely 10 play a
hereafter in our country's history.
One day last week the attention OF the pco-
pic OF New York excited by story in the
newspapers OF riot at the corner OF Fiftieth
street and Fifth avenue, opposite the great ST.
Patrick's Cathedral. the part OF some striking
employees of ncighboring sweatShop Disturb
anceS OF this kind are not uncommon in n cw
y ork, but there good many people to whom
the news came something of d shock that
the swcatshop was located within a few doors OF
St. Patrck's Cathedral. The matter illustrates
the vast and difficult problem which New York
City is facing. Fifth avenue has long been the
most prominent street in the greatest city on
a
over three miles from Washington Square to
Central Park it has been and is the center OF
the fashionable residence section and of the high
class business district of The town. For years
there were no stores speak OF Fifth avenue,
but there were many stores located on the cross
streets near the avenue. When people began to
move uptown from lower Fifth avenue their homes
were naturally rented for business purposes; and
by degrees pretty nearly the whole of Fifth ave-
nue. has been turned into shopping and general
district. But this was not the, worst The worst
p,er NJ fhcf nea
Fifth avenue to lofty buildings whose floors were
occupied by the wor kshops of the stores located
on Fifth avenue itself 1t was, of course. very de-
srable that stores on the avenue should have
their workshops located nearby rather than in
the natural places for such locations in the poor
or districts of the city the North and East
old sweatshop districts to the streets Fifth
avenue was rendered possible by the fact that
there is no law nor municipal ordinance in New
Of TRus has eome about t that
stantially all of Fifth avenue south of Forty
second street has become a sweatshop district.
1t is as if the Champs Elysees in Paris had been
invaded by the working class and had become
a part of the district of what is known Old
Paris across the Seine. There is doubt at
all that within, less than ten years the proud
Fifth avenue of New York will be destroyed
throughout its entire length, SO far as concerns
its usefulness the center of the residence sec
ton. Lofty buildings will be erected in the side
streets from Forty-second street to Central Park
just they have been erected in the side streets
below Forty-second street. The trend of the
movement and what it will result in is plain.
But how will this leave the city of New York
as whole? Where will the center of the BUSH
ness and the social section of the city be here
after. The trouble with answering this ques-.
ton is that it seems the northward march of
business and fashion in New York must end at
Fifty-ninth street, inasmuch this is the boun-
dairy of the large Central Park. From that point
there is great street that will take the place
of Fifth avenue for business social pur-
poses. 1t is true that Fifth avenue continues
north from Fifth-ninth street, but it there runs
along one side of Central Park and, of course, this
fact makes its use as business street impossi-
Bile. The financial district of New York will prob
ably hold its own in the old Wall Street neigh
borhood because that portion of the city was long
since given over to finance exclusively. But with
Fifth avenue gone. what will become of New
York? Will it longer exist city with center
at all, will there be three four centers here
after in widely separated parts of the city; And
York retain the particular and peculiar pre-cmi-
nence that it enjoyed in former dayss