all of the avenues except Fifth Avenue and part of Madison, which lack transportation. This has led to the rapid northward movement of shops on all of these axial avenues, so that a considerable portion of the city consists of north-and-south business streets and east-and-west residence streets. It appears quite probable that the greater part of the surface of Manhattan Island will be ultimately devoted to business solely, the space above the ground floor, if not utilized for business, being occupied by hotels, apartment houses, flats, and tenements. Probably the only exclusively residence occupancy will be in the most fashionable locations on and near Fifth Avenue and Central Park, where the very rich who desire to live in town can afford to hold their property against the encroachments of business. Even here restrictions running with the land may be necessary, the weakness of their position being that one shop injures an entire block, while one residence may have but little effect on a block of stores. Brooklyn, on one side, and Jersey City and Newark on the other, have tended to check the northward movement of some forms of business, and it is quite to be expected that the general growth in all directions from Manhattan Island will create a shopping, hotel, and amusement center near the middle of the island, necessarily south of Central Park and probably between the termini of the new Pennsylvania and Long Island subways and the Grand Central station at 42d Street. The banking district appears to include the most valuable land in the world, the financial section in London being the only competitor. The two corners of Wall Street and Broad Street were sold about thirty years ago at $350 per square foot, and $450 has been offered for the corner of Wall Street and Broadway, by contrast with which The Statist says that £62 (or $300) a square foot, including a fairly substantial building, is the highest price known in London. It is, however, very difficult to arrive at the highest values in the two cities, as the best property changes hands only at long intervals. The favorable factors creating high prices in the two cities would be for London a larger population, lower capitalization rates, and fair transportation by underground railways, and in New York better transportation facilities, improved methods of building, freer building laws permitting a height of thirty stories by contrast with the London maximum of eight stories, the limited area and narrow shape of Manhattan Island, promoting greater concentration of population, and a more buoyant spirit with greater tendency to discount the future. The average price of land in the financial district varies from $150 to $200 per square foot. Next in the scale comes the women's shopping district on Sixth Avenue from 14th to 23d streets, also on 23d, 34th, and 42d streets, and on Broadway from 9th to 23d streets, with an average scale of $60 to $100, and an occasional sale such as that at Sixth Avenue and 22d Street at $180 and the northwest corner of Broadway and 34th Street (having an area of less than 2000 square feet) at $350. The values on the other business streets might average as follows: 14th Street, north side, $35, south side, $60; 23d Street, north side, $65, south side, $120; 34th Street, $60; 42d Street, $70; Fourth Avenue, $20; Third Avenue, $9; Bowery, $15. The wholesale district on Broadway from Canal Street to Ninth Street varies from $30 to $60 per square foot, with the side streets from $20 down to $8. Residence values vary from $60, a fair average for Fifth Avenue above 42d Street, up to $75 for the very best locations facing the Park. The side streets just off Fifth Avenue from 34th to 70th streets vary from $40 to $30, and from 70th to 90th streets, from $30 to $20. The side streets from 59th to 70th, between Madison and Park avenues drop to $15 or $20 per square foot; from Park to Lexington avenues $10 per square foot; from Lexington to Third avenues about $5 per square foot. Land in the best residence district on the west side varies from $7 to $20 per square foot. The persistent tenement occupancy of the lower east side is apparently due to the shape of Manhattan Island, the outward curve including territory away from transportation lines and hence not desired by business houses. Tenement districts wherever located average from $4 to $10 per square foot. An approximate scale of normal values per front foot for cities of different sizes might be as follows, it being understood that actual highest values in the various cities vary widely from any average scale, owing to the marked differences between these cities in wealth, character of industries and inhabitants, topography, transportation, platting, climate, etc.: The above table for business values is based on the consideration that each thousand of population adds from $12 to $16 to the front-foot value of the best locations. Reference to the plats will show how this scale applies to the examples given, it being noted that the populations stated are for 1900, while these cities. have grown and values have increased in the past two years, and it being particularly noted that the figures apply to only two or three corners in each city, adjacent locations being worth possibly only half as much as the best. To sum up: the economic rent of business locations represents a normal proportion of the profits of the shopkeeper, running from 20 per cent to 40 per cent, less operating expenses and interest on the capital in the building. The value of business land is limited by what the locations can earn, this being continually increased by new inventions and improvements, both in transportation and in building construction, as well as by increase in the population and wealth of cities. The economic rent of residence land represents the normal proportion of income, varying from 15 per cent to 35 per cent, which various classes can afford to pay for house rent, less operating expenses and interest on the capital in the building. The increase in residence values comes from larger individual fortunes and more of them. The broad movements of value are that value by proximity, responding to central growth, diminishes in proportion to distance from the various centers, while value from accessibility, responding to axial growth, varies in proportion to transportation facilities which frequently carry high values to considerable distances from the main center through areas of low value. The principal causes of redistribution of values are changes in transportation facilities, such as new service, elevated or underground lines, new railroads, bridges, tunnels, ferries, and the more gradual readjusting force of the reaction of new utilities and new occupied areas, which brings harmony out of the complex contending factors. Present tendencies are entirely towards greatly increased values at strategic points, although the general run of values for the great mass of medium business and residence property changes slowly, since such property supplies the wants of a large number of people of moderate earning power who cannot pay beyond a certain price. Moreover there is but little speculation in such property, a more sober view being taken of its possibilities and it being realized that the repair and depreciation account is increasingly large as property sinks in grade. Ordinarily a gradual lifting of values for all classes of property occurs in proportion to the growth of the city with the exception of the decaying sections left behind in the onward march, where values fall steadily, sometimes to the point of extinction. The point of highest value, responding in scale and location to the growth of the city, moves onward from the first business center, the crest of the wave being usually about the middle of the shopping districts, frequently strengthened by exceptionally large and handsome buildings, and its movements checked by strong cross streets. Apart from any factors which might deflect the line of growth, the land lying in its path is quite certain to increase in value, the time of such increase, however, being difficult to gauge, while the land which it has left behind is quite certain to sink more or less rapidly in value. In the largest cities, apart from the onward movement of residences, retail and wholesale shops, a financial section with even higher values arises in the territory left behind, where the banks, trust companies, brokers, and office buildings cluster close to the original center, |