RECORD OF TESTIMONY AND STATEMENTS IN RELATION TO 129 



NECESSITY FOR DISTRICTING PLAN 



industry carried on in that block. Again, it will tend to make the problem 

 of furnishing adequate fire fighting facilities simpler if we have the restricted 

 zones. There is not needed in a true dwelling district the amount of appa- 

 ratus, nor of water supply that is needed for the industrial or business 

 districts, but, with no restrictions it is practically necessary to furnish the 

 same facilities for the whole city. With restrictions the fire department 

 will also be able to better concentrate its forces for handling the different 

 districts where an entire district is subjected to the same use. 



Effect of business on insurance rate 



The rate of insurance in a store and dwelling building reflects greater 

 insurance risks. The ordinary private dwelling, now accepted as a build- 

 ing occupied by not more than two families, changes its character, so that 

 the first floor or basement is occupied for a store, with one family above, 

 the insurance rate is about twice as much as when it was occupied wholly 

 for dwelling purposes. This is due to the fact that the store brings always 

 an unknown quantity of waste material, poor protection to stoves, gas 

 lights, care of ashes and ordinary accumulations — the risk is about two to 

 one. 



Fire statistics 



Even if special precautions are provided to prevent the spread of fire 

 from the business building to the tenement above, there is great danger, 

 especially to the occupants of the tenement. The proposition frequently 

 advanced that the first floor is so protected that there shall be no communi- 

 cation when there is a store in the basement with the floors above, over- 

 looks the fact that in a fire the smoke will always seek any exit available. 

 It will ascend naturally if there is a way. If not, it will pour out of the 

 doors and windows and follow up the side of the building and enter the 

 living floors in that way. Some of the most serious panics have been due 

 not to fire but purely to the smoke condition. 



In connection with this subject a report of the Bureau of Fire Investiga- 

 tion of the City of New York, for the quarter ending March 31, 1916, is 

 herewith submitted. It gives the character of the stores in which fires 

 occur, showing that out of a total of 375 fires, 291 originated in stores 

 situated in residential buildings. 



One thing that stands out prominently from the Fire Chart of the Bor- 

 ough of Manhattan, prepared by Mr. A. Niflot, for the years 1910 to 1912, 

 is that those districts occupied by the mixed conditions, as stores and 

 dwellings, have by far the larger number of fires proportionately than 

 any other portions of the territory shown. Where the use is uniform, 

 that is, either dwellings, business, or manufacturing, there is then an appreci- 

 ably less number of fires than in the mixed districts. 



