980 TjiANSACTIOXS OF THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE. 



river, beyond the construction of a guard lock and some cliannel 

 improvement, it will imdoubtedly lead to its improvement as a ship 

 canal, and on a more direct line than it now has. The use of this 

 river will not only save the sound commerce, which now does busi- 

 ness chiefly on the Hudson, the difficult, expensive and circuitous 

 passage around the Battery, with a distance gain of about eighteen 

 miles, but upper jSTew York will then have an o)>portunity of ade- 

 quate commercial development. New York merchants annually 

 crowded further away from their business localities in search of 

 homes, must have before long, an enlarged range of wharfage and 

 • v/arehouse facilities, or they will be driven tu the opposite shores. 

 ' Of the advantages which immediately follow an adequate and per- 

 manent connection of both cities by avenues of slight grade and 

 ample width and on a location which, without injuring the great ferry 

 system of the older Brooklyn, really controls the future center of 

 population, it cannot be necessary to make much argument. Upon 

 the principle of the important decision of the final Court of Appeal 

 in the Eock Island bridge case, where the Mississippi was ordered to 

 be bridged, because this involved the greatest good of the greatest 

 number, very serious inconveniences to East river navigation would 

 be not only justified but legally sanctioned, if such injuries were even 

 formidable in character. What this plan proposes to do for the main 

 arteries of New York commerce at Sandy Hook and at Albany, it 

 also comprises as a municipal benefit, in the complete junction of 

 cities which now aggregate mure than a million and will soon double 

 that number. If a few enterprising citizens of Brooklyn are willing, 

 with their common council, to incur an expense of about $12,000,000 

 for an elevated bridge, certainly this project, at even twofold the cost, 

 is amply justified through its superior civic advantages. Continuous 

 and safe foot passage, street railwa}^ and vehicle transit ; pneumatic 

 tube expressage and telegraphs; great wharfage and storage facility; 

 large increase of population and taxable property near the great cen- 

 ter of business, are among the evident and immediate results of this 

 plan. 



Objecuoms. 

 An important project like this, affecting many different interests, 

 must needs meet strong oppo-^ition, some of it factious and unreason- 

 able, and some worthy of careful deliberation. These objections, 

 however, are to be examined ihI settled by the ])rinciple3 which 



