The New York herald., 1920-01-19
BUILDING MARKET
IS BEING INJURED
BY CAR SHORTAGE
Government Must Put Indus
try on Preferred List to En-
courage Construction.

nation 'SuncreaSlng need for more building
space is held responsible for the constantly
increasing price of building materials in
this and other markets and the constantly
advancing cost of building construction,
says the DOW Service Daily Building Re-
ports
The situation has reached a point where
building material manufacturing estab-
lishments have already closed down be-
cause they cannot get cars TO ship ma
terial from overloaded warehouses. Others
have withdrawn their statesmen. They
have all the labor they want. They have
more business in prospect than the mills
can take care of for almost half year,
but still they have to shut down because
the Railroad Administra ton has kept the
building material industry at the bottom
of the preferred list for car acconmo-
dation. In consequence no building ma
terial can be moved by rail until all other
preferred industries have had car service
and there are cars to spare fer the build
ipg trades.
This apparent prejudice against build
ing materials and building construction is
not only holding back construction work
all over the country but il is causing
stampede for the small quantity Of build
hands. Stampedes occur when buyers are
willing to pay premiums for prompt de-
livery OF needed building materials from
dwindling building material reserves.
There is at present temporary famine
IN brick, plaster board and cement. In
Buffalo plaster board mills have actually
closed with warehouses full and all the
labor needed to operate n tremendous
mill capacity, all because they cannot get
cars to ship this material TO this market.
In the meantime this market is practic-
ally barren of plaster board, except what
can be furnished by certain small hand
made plaster board shops in this city. In
cidentally the price advanced two cents
a board last week.
The cement industry offers another
illustration. There is a shortage Of ce-
ment but it is only temporary one due
to coal shortage and car curtailment.
The mills in zones 1 and 9, the Hud-
5oli and Lehigh districts, supplying this
market, have capacity sufficient to sup
ply more cement than the market can
absorb. Both have reported a great i'm
provemmt in the labor supply, but they
cannot get sufficient cars to make ship
ments. In New Jersey general contrac-
tor figuring an important building opera
ton was announced as low bidder, but
every one of his supply men have with
drawn their estimates because building
material interests were unable to guaran-
tee the sub-contractor supplies Of material
on schedule owing to inability to get
cars. Here is the situation in the cement
market supplying New York.
There are 329 kilns in the two districts.
If they could run twenty-four hours a
Gay and for three hundred and sixty-five
days. they would be able to turn out a,-
39s65O barrels of cement. This is what
might be called maximum production.
which never has been attained. Operating
three hundred and ten days, or eighty
five per cent of capacity. these mills
could turn out Al, ,193, 100 barrels. The best
previous output for the district was only
100000 barrels, including 100000 bar
rels for export. The government has de-
MED this industry coal and 1t has denied
It cars for shipping its finished product
The cost of bags has advanced to $500 .
thousand, or more than two hundred per
cent and yet the leading minds in the in
dustry absolutely condemn any further
price advance. They are not alone in
heir insistence that the government ban
on building and building material produc-
lion be lifted. They say it offers the
,iuickest and surest means of stopping
this ruinous and constant increase in
prices
The building material dealers OF New
York have taken the lead in their de-
mands for having the position of car
preference on the Railroad Administra-
TONS list taken from the last to the first
place. In winning the cooperation Of the
Merchants Association in this matter the
dealers pointed out that the housing
shortage and rent profiteering has al
ready constituted a national menace TO
business prosperity.
The Associated General Contractors OF
America the National Lime Manufactur-
ers various lumber interests. building
stone. crushed stone. sand and gravel deal
ers have all taken up the fight to
ha .nNFa n ~
cognition of the absolute necessity of lift
ing the wartime restrictions on the move
ment of building materials by rail and
put the Administration on record as help
ing To solve the menacing house-famine
throughout the country. instead OF hinder
ing Il.
The financial institutions are the latest
10 ioln the protest against existing con-
Sitions by threatening to refuse further
loans i'm such an unstable building materi-
al price market, yet this weeks building
material price list shows common brick
rated at 81 a thousand. Wholesale or
approximately $50 thousand laid in q
wall in Brooklyn or Bronx. The same
Lat shows "a further advance in hollow
brick from so to So thousand, and
further price advances threatened in
many other lines depending upon rail-
roads for supply to this market.
The labor situation has greatly inn
proved. Men are making the chief con-
alteration pcrrnanency of work rather
than shordter hours or higher wages at
present. They say they are tired OF theo-
ries and propagandists. They want work
md are passing out OF the former prefer
entail war time industries into the build
ing material manufacturing industries be-
cause of the promise of steady work and
steady pay The difference in demand be-
tween this and former years is merely
that Of stampede or an attempt by
powerful building interests 20 corner the
meagre building material supply because
cars are not made available to keep up
the supply here. The open weather and
the starting of the 1870 building season
about 60 days before the season usually
opens has helped to stimulate this stam-
pede.
Building material dealers, manufactu-
rers, architects and contractors have .
way to bring about stabilized building
material price market, say authorities in
the industry, and that is by backing up
the efforts Of the various organizations
AT work on the Fuel and Railroad Ad-
ministration to change the preference OF
the building industry from last to first
10 check a growing national menace
Sale at West New Brighton.
w. 8. r. Hall. at st George s. T., sold
IA - cx,t t,,