A History of Skyscrapers

choi

A history of skyscrapers | The Up and Up; Using economics to explain why buildings get big. Economist, Aug 18, 2016
http://www.economist.com/news/bo ... s-get-big-up-and-up
(book review on Jason Barr, Building the Skyline; The birth and growth of Manhattan's Skyscrapers. Oxford University Press, 2016)

Note:
(a) "Jason Barr, an economist at Rutgers University-Newark"

Rutgers University
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rutgers_University
(now public; founded by Dutch Reformed Church in 1766; was renamed Rutgers College in 1825 in honor of Colonel Henry Rutgers [who donated $5,000] ; three campuses, with main campus at New Brunswick, New Jersey [27 miles (43 km) southwest of Manhattan] )

(b) "Why is Manhattan synonymous with skyscrapers? * * * New York's first skyscraper, the 11-storey Tower Building, went up in the 1880s. Situated on Broadway, it was a technological breakthrough. The architect, Bradford Lee Gilbert, realised that supporting a super-tall building using conventional techniques would require walls so thick that there would be little floorspace left. So he created an iron frame for the building (after which the only function of the walls was to keep the rain out)."
(i) skyscraper
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skyscraper
(section 1.1 Early skyscrapers)
(ii) Tower Building (New York City)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_Building_(New_York_City)
(1889 - 1913; 39 m / 129 feet in height, and 11 stories high; No longer profitable by 1913 due to its lack of tenants)

(c) "there are relatively few towers between Downtown [below 14th Street] and Midtown [34th-59th Streets]. * * * [thanks to] New York's economic history. Mr Barr argues that the area between Downtown and Midtown historically had low land values. In the 18th century the rich lived in Downtown areas close to the port and the seat of government. The poor lived just outside. The wealthy reacted to the gradual introduction of public transport in the 1820s and 1830s by moving far out, eventually as far as Midtown, a less-developed area which could be built to their tastes. The in-between zones thus left behind were undesirable, and few people thought it profitable to build skyscrapers there."
(i) list of Manhattan neighborhoods
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Manhattan_neighborhoods
(boundaries)
(ii) "New York City is distinguished from other US cities for its low personal automobile ownership and its significant use of public transportation. * * * New York City's uniquely high rate of public transit use makes it one of the most energy-efficient cities in the United States."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transportation_in_New_York_City
(iii) New York City Transit - History and Chronology. Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), undated.
http://web.mta.info/nyct/facts/ffhist.htm

the first two paragraphs:

"Private companies originally managed rapid transit routes and surface lines. Abraham Brower established New York City's first public transportation route in 1827, a 12-seat stagecoach called 'Accommodation' that ran along Broadway from the Battery to Bleecker Street. By 1831, Brower had added the 'Sociable' and 'Omnibus.' "

"The next year, John Mason organized the New York and Harlem Railroad, a street railway that used horse-drawn cars with metal wheels and ran on metal track. By 1855, 593 omnibuses traveled on 27 Manhattan routes and horse-drawn cars ran on street railways on Third, Fourth, Sixth, and Eighth Avenues

* omnibus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omnibus
(Omnibus is the Latin for "for all," and refers to a passenger-carrying vehicle, originally an enclosed horse-drawn one)

(d) after reading this book: "But whatever your persuasion, after reading this book you will never look up at a skyscraper the same way again."

persuasion (n): "a belief or set of beliefs, especially religious or political ones <writers of all political persuasions>"
www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/persuasion