fJSKJL^" .28 IN 53 LIBRARY ANNEX -*•- Jt ■i\ {■J §> /. — '~'T Wf r mm y-Ki K >, 3tljata, JJrui lark COLLEGE OF ARCHITECTURE LIBRARY Cornell University Library NAC 8128 .N53A2S Report on public markets to the honorabl 3 1924 024 462 438 Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924024462438 MARKET REPORT The Newark City Plan Commission AUGUST, 1912 SUPPLEMENTARY SUGGESTIONS JANUARY 29th, 1913 8128 Cornell llntoerBttg Xibrar? OF THE College of Hrcbitecture ftSJT.4r.gu I. ^1076 REPORT ON PUBLIC MARKETS TO THE HONORABLE THE MAYOR AND COMMON COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF NEWARK, N. J. BY THE CITY PLAN COMMISSION CITY PLAN COMMISSION DAVID GROTTA, President AUSTEN H. McGREGOR, Vice-President FREDERICK J. KERR, Treasurer JOHN COTTON DANA C. W. FEIGENSPAN l / . GUSTAVUS STAEHLIN '7. JOSEPH M. BYRNE RICHARD STOCKTON ROBERT L. ROSS, Secretary, IN AC 812-8 NS3 A-as- September 4, 1912. To the Honorable the Magor And the Common Council, Citg of Newark, N. J. Gentlemen : I have been directed by The City Plan Commission to respectfully submit for your consideration the enclosed "Newark Market Problem" report, prepared by their experts, Messrs. Geo. B. Ford and E. P. Goodrich. The said report having been -approved and adopted at a meeting of the said Commission, lield on September 3rd, 1912. Respectfully yours, ROBERT I,. ROSS, Secretary. NEWARK MARKET PROBLEM. Report to Newark City Plan Commission by Geo. B. Ford and E. P. Goodrich. August 29th, 1912. DATA. It is proposed to replace the present Centre Market in Newark with a new market to cost about $400,000. The present market consists of a long one story building with a central aisle on either side of which are retail stalls. A small space is devoted to general and cold storage. The Morris Canal runs under the length of the building. The major part of the lot is paved without shelters and with narrow islands at regular intervals. During the early hours the farmers' wagons back up to these islands as close as they can stand. All the neighboring streets are packed with local retail produce merchants' wagons. Across all the surrounding streets from the market are low buildings, the ground floor and basement, and part of the second floor of which are occupied by commission merchants. Their total fr-ontage is about 1600 feet and their average depth is about 100 feet. The farmers' wagons arrive during the early hours of the morning and the retail merchants' wagons begin to arrive about three or four in the morning. The trucks from the railway freight terminals begin to arrive about 2 A. M. The farmers sell largely to the retail merchants direct, a very small proportion of their goods is sold to the commission merchants and a very small amount is sold directly to the con- sumer at retail. As to the latter, the farmers prefer to sell to the retail merchants even though they get a much lower price for their goods because they claim they cannot afford the time to wait at the market all day for the retail purchasers. The commission merchants secure most of their goods direct by consignment from distant points ; the food-stuffs being brought to their warerooms by truck from the railway freight company. The retail merchants in the public market building buy directly from the farmers' wagons and from the commission merchants. 6 City Plan Commission. PRESENT SITE SHOULD BE ABANDONED. The present site of the Centre Market is objectionable in many ways and we strongly recommend that a market on this site be abolished. The Auditor's report of the City of Newark shows a profit for the Centre Market. An analysis of the figures, however, shows that no account has been taken of interest on the cost of the land and buildings. These are appraised at nearly $1,000,000. Four per cent on this equals $40,000. This changes the city's profit of $33,000 into a loss of $7,000. If this property were disposed of, the city would have an additional $20,000 a year in taxes; furthermore, this property is extremely valuable for business purposes and would undoubt- edly, within a very short time, be covered with at least a $1,000,000 office building. This means another $20,000 in taxes. Furthermore, the moment the market was removed, all of the surrounding property would jump in value so that it is safe to count on at least another $20,000 in additional taxes. The total of these four items shows that the city, instead of making money on this market, is the loser by $60,000 to $70,000 per year. Located where it is the Centre Market is a nuisance. The noise, smell, the clutter, the congestion of teaming and the general unsanitary condition of the neighborhood are highly* objectionable to people who have to use this part of the town. The present Centre Market site has no direct railway con- nections. None of the successful markets of the world are without such accommodations. We find that it costs on an average of from $10.00 to $15.00 per car-load to bring food stuffs from the freight terminals to the market site. All of this is most unnecessary additions to the already high cost of living. On consultation with the railroads, we find that it will be impracticable to give this site railway connections. The present site is already crowded. Even the proposed plan of devoting the whole ground floor area to farmers' wagons and the second story exclusively to retail stalls, would not solve the difficulty. The congested character of the neighbor- hood and the high cost of the land thereabouts (the cost is about $2,000 per front foot) make the acquisition of more land for market purposes most uneconomical. We find further from our minute study of the distribution of population in Newark, that the center of population is moving to the south and is already several blocks south of Market Street. City Plan Commisscon. 7 THE CITY RETAIL MARKET SHOULD BE ABOLISHED. We further recommend that the City Retail Market be abolished entirely. The recent experience of all large cities tends in this direction. Virtually the only successful markets today, which are municipally owned or run, are wholesale, not retail markets. The New York State Food Investigating Com- mission and President Cyrus W. Miller, of the Bronx, have made a careful survey of the whole market problem and their -findings prove that the retail city market has survived its usefulness. The three arguments in favor of a city retail market are as follows : 1. That produce can be bought cheaper there. 2. That produce is fresher. 3. That by going from stall to stall the purchaser can find a larger variety and choice. The facts do not substantiate this argument. A wide in- vestigation has shown us that produce is just as cheap and just as fresh in the average private retail store as in the city mar- ket stalls, and in the larger private stores the assortment is just as large as can be found anywhere. These being the facts, we do not see why the city should be called upon to waste $60,000 to $75,000 per year in keeping up a fetish which at best serves only a very small proportion of the population. HOW PRODUCE COMES INTO NEWARK. We are convinced that it is just as important that the city should take care of food supply as that it should take care of water supply or sewage disposal, and to this end we have made a careful investigation of the facts relative to food supply in Newark. We find that during the summer months about two- thirds of the produce comes in by the railways and about one- third by the farmers' wagons. During the eight or nine winter months, from 80 to 90 per cent comes in by the railways. As Newark grows and as the truck gardens move farther and farther away, the relative proportion of produce that comes in by the railways is and will rapidly increase. Of the produce that comes in by the railways we find that from 65 to 75 per cent comes in by the Pennsylvania Railway and about 15 per cent more by the New Jersey Central. The latter road has good freight connections with the former. Practically all the produce which arrives by the Pennsyl- vania comes in on five or six special spur tracks at its South 8 City Plan Commission. Newark freight terminal. In other words, about two-thirds of all the produce that comes into Newark arrives at this one point and this proportion is increasing. A CITY WHOLESALE AUCTION MARKET. We do recommend and recommend strongly that the city provide for a wholesale auction market. The New York report, before referred to, strongly recommends this type as having proved the most practical solution of the problem of reducing the cost of handling food from its entrance into the city until it arrives on the consumer's table. In several of the large cities in Europe the public wholesale auction market has been recently tried and has proved an enormous success. It has been tried too in New York City in the citrus fruit trades, and the principle is being extended now to other classes of produce. The greatest advantages of such a market is its absolute publicity, thereby protecting all parties. Such a market should be controlled by the city so that all can be convinced of the fairness of its management. A SITE FOR THE MARKET. In searching for a site for such a market, we first con- sidered a large plot of land between the projected boulevard connecting Military Park with the Pennsylvania Station and River Street and between Mulberry Street and the Canal. This site has the advantage of being directly across the street from the Pennsylvania sidings on the east of River Street, but on inquiry we found that this site would not only be too small and would hardly permit of a proper growth, but we were most surprised to find it would take from 1J4 to 2 hours extra to switch the cars from the Pennsylvania south freight terminal to these sidings and that it would cost fully as much as the present method of bringing the produce by truck from the south terminal. After a careful study 'of the factory and housing maps of Newark, we were convinced that there was only one logical site for the city market. This site would be the land immediately east of and adjacent to the Pennsylvania south freight terminal. There is here, just east of Broad Street and the Pennsylvania main line, a large tract of virgin land eminently suited for this purpose. It is also very close to the head of the proposed ship canal. We have prepared a detailed plan, 6x4 ft., showing what we consider to be the best disposition of such a market on the site. City Plan Commission. 9 PLAN OF THE MARKET. Basing our judgment on the very successful experience of other cities, we believe that the maximum of economy can be effected by selling directly from the freight cars to the retail merchants who will thus take the produce from the cars to their wagons with only one handling instead of two or three, now customary. This will be a great saving in expense and freshness. The matter of doing this is as follows : On this property we would place ten spur tracks parallel to Avenue A. Adjacent to one side of each of these tracks, on a level with the floor- of the car, would be a continuous platform 9]A ft. wide. This would be used by the commission dealers. Then there would be an open space wide enough for retail merchants' wagons to back up against these platforms, with a clear space in the middle for wagons to pass in either direction. This means 54 ft. of clear space. Then would come a 9]A ft. platform adjacent to another spur track. In this way, we find that we could accom- modate on this site about 300 freight cars with about 1500 wagons backed up to them. This is more than enough to take care of the present business, but as Newark would soon overtake this capacity, Ave would provide for an extension of this same system to. the east. Across the ends of the spur tracks we have provided for a street 100 ft. wide which would connect through three arches under the Pennsylvania main tracks to Broad Street and the rest of the city. Along the north side of this 100 ft. street, which would be a broadening of Poinier Street, we would recommend the erec- tion of a building, 4 stories in height, to be used on the ground floor for auction rooms, where produce would be sold by sample only, the remaining space being left -to commission merchants. A large open space in the center of the building, running from north to south, would allow free access of the commission merchants' wagons and trucks to the elevators and lifts by which surplus produce could be taken up to the cold storage rooms on the third and fourth floors. The second floor would be occupied bv the offices of the administration and by commission merchants' private offices. As this building, which is about 200x400 ft., would not provide sufficient space for all the com- mission merchants, we would recommend the erection of one or two story buildings, 100 ft. deep, on several of the surround- ing streets, with the intent that they should be rented to com- mission merchants. 10 City Plan Commission. An arrangement such as this would give us a complete and systematic plant for handling the city's food supply. The necessary land for these buildings could be had for an extremely small sum and the -buildings themselves could be erected in re-inforced concrete so that the total cost to the city would be less than for the proposed Centre Market. The rents which could be charged the commission merchants, who would, in self- interest, be forced to move to this site ; together with the rents for cold storage space and office space, would be a source of real revenue to the city. Furthermore, a market on this site would bring all of the land in the immediate neighborhood into the real estate market, all of which would be to the advantage of the city in increased taxes. THE FARMERS' MARKET. We have not yet considered the farmers' market, which, while decreasing relatively in importance, is still a vital issue. We have taken a careful count of farmers' wagons as they come into Newark in the early hours of the morning, and find that about 40 per cent of them come into the city by Bloomfield Avenue, and most of the rest of the wagons come in from the same general direction. In talking with a number of these farmers, we find that they are quite adverse to moving farther- south ; it would take them from 20 to 30 minutes longer to go down to the. Pennsylvania south terminal site. We therefore recommend that a place be provided for an open farmers' market in the region where they now come. We are convinced that the present market site is far too valuable for this purpose and we believe that they should be kept off of Broad Street and away from Military Park. We are certain that after a short while the farmers will tend more and more to locate in the neighborhood of the wholesale market because of the demand on the part of the retail merchants that they should not be forced to jockey back and forth between the wholesale terminal and the farmers' market, a mile and a half apart. We therefore recommend that the triangular piece of property, now unoccupied, between the Pennsylvania Main Line, Broad Street and Poinier Street, be acquired by the city for this purpose, and we would tentatively recommend that the whole space between the Pennsylvania tracks and the west side of Broad Street be paved, and we further recommend that this triangular space above referred to be transversed from east to west by islands 10 ft. wide, alternately 40 and 48 ft. apart. The 48 ft. spaces would allow farmers' wagons to back up against City Plan Commission. 11 the curbs with space for circulation in between and the 40 ft. spaces would allow five lines of retail merchants' wagons, all going in the same direction, to buy across the islands off of the tails of the farmers' wagons and deliver directly into the retail merchants' wagons. By this arrangement we could take care of 150 farmers' wagons on the triangular space alone, and of as many more in the surrounding streets. The acquisition of a block to the north of this would add space for nearly 124 more wagons of the farmers. We believe that this arrangement would use the available space with the maximum economy. CONCLUSION. In conclusion we wish to re-state that we urgently recom- mend, in consideration of the greatest good to the city and the community, that the city abandon the present market site. We heartily recommend that the city establish a wholesale market in the immediate neighborhood of the Pennsylvania south freight terminal, adjacent to which would be a place reserved for a farmers' market. Respectfully submitted, GEO. B. FORD, E. P. GOODRICH. Approved and adopted by the Newark City Plan Commission, September 3, 1912. City Plan Commission. 1.5 SUPPLEMENTARY SUGGESTIONS TO PREVIOUS REPORT. JANUARY 29th, 1913. GENERAL STATEMENT. We wish to emphasize again everything we said in previous reports. We hold absolutely to our suggestions with regard to the arrangement and development of. a wholesale auction market at the South Broad Street site. It is unquestionably the best thing to do. W r e believe strongly that a city retail market as proposed by the Market Committee of the Common Council would be a great mistake, but, if it is impossible to secure a wholesale market unless a retail market is first provided for, we make the following suggestions concerning the latter : CITY RETAIL MARKET. The city now has its present market site valued roughly at one million dollars, and an appropriation of $400,000 for a new market. No stipulation appears to be made as to whether or not this $400,000 should be spent wholly on a city retail market on the present site. That being the case, we believe that the following is the best possible use of the funds available. SITE FOR RETAIL MARKET. There does not appear to be much interest in the question of the location of the farmers' market, as farmers sell almost exclusively to retail dealers. The best location for it is near to the place where the retail dealers go or will go to get their provisions. The farmers' market should therefore be separated from the city retail market and be located as originally proposed by us, near the wholesale auction market, that is, South Broad Street. We now have to consider the best site for an exclusively retail market. As the retail market serves, according to -our findings, only two per cent of the population, and as the tendency is in all large cities for the use of the retail markets to decrease rather than increase, we believe that a new retail market with the same floor area as the present city market. 35.000 square feet, will be adequate to suit all demands. 14 City Plan Commission. The three considerations in choosing a site are : nearness to Broad and Market Streets, cheapness of land, and street or rail connections. Of the several sites considered where we can secure sufficient ground at a reasonable cost we appear to be reduced to a choice of the site on River Street, between Canal and Mulberry, and a site at the eastern end of the present Centre Market plot. The former site has the advantage of being cheaper and having possible rail connection, but from the standpoint of an exclus- ively retail market it has the overwhelming disadvantage of being too far from Broad Street, even with the proposed di- agonal street. On the present Centre Market site the land near Broad Street is much more valuable than the land at the Mulberry Street end. The Mulberry Street end at the most is only about 700 feet from Broad Street. We, therefore, recommend, if a new city retail market is to be built, it be built on the easterly portion of the present market site, fronting on Mulberry, Canal and Commerce Streets. NEW CITY RETAIL MARKET BUILDING. This should be of one story type, probably of a saw tooth front to save expense, concrete and steel and glass construction and as open as possible. There should be a ten foot basement under the whole building. Such a building can be built for thirteen cents a cubic foot. To cover the same area as the present market site it will have to extend back to the west of Mulberry Street for about 300 feet. This will make the nearer end of the market within 400 feet of Broad Street. This is also taking into account either that Commerce Street be widened to 80 feet and that the building be built to the south line of the Canal, or that Commerce Street be kept at its present width of 40 feet and that the building be built to the south line of South Canal Street. The area in both cases will be the same. We would reserve on the western end of the market, between South Canal and Commerce Streets, a new street, 50 feet in width, a continuation of Pine Street and con- necting with a continuation of Beaver Street, having in view the continuation of Beaver Street to Mechanic Street at some future time. This would leave the remaining portion of the Centre Market plot with an area of 19,597 square feet. This portion of the plot on account of its proximity to Broad Street would probably be worth in the neighborhood of $400 000 possibly $500,000. City Plan Commission. IS FINANCIAL STATEMENT. The cubical contents of the proposed city retail market are 1,056,000 cubic feet. At thirteen cents a cubic foot this would make the building cost about $137,000. This, subtracted from the $400,000 appropriated gives $263,000 available for the South Broad Street market. If the city sold the portion of the present market site nearest Broad Street for $400,000, we would have a total of $663,000 for the wholesale auction market as proposed. Of this $74,740 was for the 77,000 square feet of land. The cost -of improvements was as follows : Auction market rooms, 1,000,000 cu. ft $120,000 Offices and Administration, 784,800 cu. ft.. . 156,960 Farmers' Market, paving, curbing, etc 20,000 These are the only necessary items. The total of the land plus these three costs of improvements equals $371,700. This leaves us of our $663,000 $291,300 available for cold storage and Commission Merchants' stores. In our original estimate we allowed $623,580 for these two purposes. By cutting the space allowed for these purposes in half we would have sufficient for some time to come and at the same time would be within our total available'funds. CONCLUSIONS. With no additional appropriation, the available funds can be so distributed that the city will have a modern, bright, one story retail market on its present site, and an up-to-date econ- omic wholesale auction market at South Broad Street, according to our original suggestions. Respectfully submitted, D. Grotta, President. Attest : Robert L. Ross, Secretary. /- ■■■-,.- hff/££5*ir IJT- m sBSsS )n ■■.W'mBSS »«i ^«K|* Vs. - i^ifs ", iM* V . 'fck -^ ■