THE greatest evil which ever befell New York City was the division of the blocks into lots of 25 × 100 feet. So true is this, that no other disaster can for a moment be compared with it. Fires, pestilence, and financial troubles are as nothing in comparison; for from this division has arisen the New York system of tenement-houses, the worst curse which ever afflicted any great community.

The object of this paper is to show that all the evils of the system lie entirely in the plan; that with another plan, light, air, health, and comfort can be furnished at the same, if not at less cost than the great majority of the inhabitants of this town are now forced to pay for dwellings not fit for the lower animals. Unfortunately the same division of the land which led to the plan for these houses is the chief obstacle in the way of reform.

The houses are built on lots 25 x 100 ft. and generally about five stories high. A regulation of the Board of Health limits the depth to ninety feet, so that. there is a space of ten feet by the width of the lot at the rear for light. Of course this is doubled when similar houses are erected back to back. In addition there is usually a diamond-shaped court, socalled, or well, at the sides, about four feet wide, when the houses are built side by side. That is to say, each owner leaves a recess at the side of about two feet by forty odd (as shown in Fig. 4); each floor is arranged

for two families in the better class of houses, but more generally four families occupy one floor. Each family has a room facing the street or the yard, and from two to three rooms lighted, or rather not lighted, from the central slit or well. The front rooms measure about twelve feet square. The others about seven by ten feet.

When the city was first laid out, the division of the blocks into lots 25 × 100 ft. was entirely unobjectionable. The people generally built houses of moderate dimensions, lighted at the front from the street, and in the rear from the yard. If a larger dwelling was required, more land was taken and the house was made wider; but as the city grew, the land increased so greatly in value that an effort was made to occupy more of the 25 x 100 ft. lot than was consistent with the proper lighting of

the interior. As a result, the central part of many of our so-called fine houses is unfit to live in. If this desire to cover too much of the land proved objectionable in houses occupied by one family, its results have been simply disastrous in houses occupied by several families.

As everyone knows, the fashionable quarter of the town, first at the Battery, has moved steadily and rapidly to the north. As the rich people vacated their houses to go farther uptown, they were turned over to the poor. Houses built for one family were occupied by twice as many families as the building had floors. As the older houses were comparatively shallow, being but two rooms deep, another house, known as a rear tenement, was erected on the back of the lot, a space being left between the old building and the new. The rear tenement was lighted simply from this space. There are many such houses in the city now, but the Board of Health regulations have for some years prevented the erection of more. The city grew at such a rate that it soon became necessary to erect new houses as tenements. The builders having been in the habit of building houses 25 × 100 ft., saw no better way than to continue the practice, and this new style of building took that form. The first houses to be built were lighted only at the front and rear; all the central rooms being dark as well as the hall and stairs.

During the last fifteen or twenty years, the Board of Health has made feeble efforts at reform, and we now have houses of a so-called improved type, that is to say, buildings of the kind first described, with wells or shafts of stagnant air at the sides, acting as conductors of noise, odors, and disease from one apartment to another. The bedrooms of one family have their windows directly opposite, and four feet distant from, the windows of the house adjoining. Each family has generally a cooking-stove in one of the rooms which open on to this same slit or well. It is unnecessary to comment on this style of house. Very little imagination is required to picture to one's self the wretched condition of people

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forced to live under such circumstances, and the great danger arising therefrom to the health and morals of the community. By far the greater number of the inhabitants of this city live in such houses. From sixteen to twenty families to a single lot.

From the time of its first introduction, there has been no radical change in the plan of these houses. Acres upon acres have been covered by them, all constructed on the same general plan based upon the shape of the lot, 25 x 100 ft. Strange to say, they are not usually built singly. In most cases the houses are put up in blocks of from two, three, and four, up to twenty or more, yet no attempt is ever made to depart from the stereotyped plan. If an owner has a plot one hundred feet square, instead of building one house he builds four houses. It never seems to have occurred to anyone that this is an extremely extravagant and wasteful way of building; yet such is the case, for the system involves the erection of an unnecessary amount of wall, partitions, and corridor, also an unnecessary number of entrances, halls, etc., and consequent loss of room. So great is the loss of room from these causes, that it is possible to plan buildings of a different type which, while having the same amount of rentable space in rooms, shall cover so much less of the lot as to leave an abundant space free for light and air. The buildings, covering a smaller area, will cost less to erect, so that properly lighted and well-ventilated apartments can be supplied at less than it costs to build the dreadful affairs which we now have.

The difficulty has arisen and persistently flourishes, owing entirely to our lack of knowledge of the art of scientific planning. For who would waste money in erecting unnecessary walls, halls, etc., if he knew how to obtain the same amount of rentable space much better lighted without them? By the present system the ground is encumbered, the light obstructed, and the structure rendered unhealthy and unfit to live in; and all this is accomplished at a vastly increased expense over what the same rentable space, well lighted, might be obtained for. Great sums of money

charitable people to relieve the distress which these horrible structures engender. Hospitals are kept full, children die, misery, disease, and crime flourish, because the people are huddled together without light and air; and all this happens simply because the principles of economical planning are not understood. Verily ignorance is expensive!

The art of commercial or economical planning is an exact science very little understood anywhere, and least of all here. It is a curious fact that, although thousands of books have been written upon architecture, there are none on planning, which is unquestionably the most important part of architecture.

In planning houses for the poor, economy of space is of the most vital importance, for any waste in the arrangement lays an added burden on people least able to bear it. Our tenement-house system is the result of accident.

No intelligent thought has been bestowed on the problem, or at least all such thought has been wasted upon the 25 × 100 plan, where the conditions are such as to preclude the possibility of a successful solution.

The fact that so much of the land is held in such parcels is our misfortune, but the obstacle is not insuperable, as shown by our office buildings. The land down town was held under the same conditions, but when it became apparent that it was not economical to

erect office buildings on lots of the standard size, the difficulty was gradually overcome, and such buildings are almost always built on lots of greater dimensions.

The tenement-house evil is staring us in the face, and the community is daily becoming more and more alive to the imperative necessity for reform. A desperate disease needs a desperate remedy. It should be made unprofitable to erect the kind of tenement we now have. If it is clearly shown that the present evils can be overcome by the adoption of a different type of building, erected on larger lots, certain restrictions established by law would in time bring about the desired change.

In order to demonstrate clearly the waste involved in the present plan, it will be necessary to point out a few fundamental laws in the art of economical planning. Let us take a hypothetical case; suppose that it is desired to build a small habitation in an open space. Here we can say definitely that the most economical plan is an exact square, for every deviation from it, except the circle, which is impractical, involves the erection of more wall to inclose a given area in rooms.

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C

10

Let Fig. 1 be the plan of such a building, of the dimensions shown, which we will call the first type. The number of running feet of wall necessary to inclose it is roughly 4 × 20 = 80 feet. The area inclosed is 20 × 20=400 square feet. Now, any deviation from this plan will be found to be more extravagant, as shown in Fig. 2, which we will call the second type. In this case we have a quadrilateral inclosing the same area, measuring 10 ft. x 40 ft. The number of running feet of wall necessary to inclose this equals 2 x 40 plus 2 x 10

1

B

A

12.

Figure 2