necessary to constitute the reservation, the Board decided that the 

 fairest basis of valuation would be the present value as assessed for 

 the purposes of taxation, and has based its estimate of cost upon 

 such assessed value. After careful consideration of the subject and 

 conferences with representative taxpayers in the City of New York 

 and County of Westchester, the Board decided that the cost of 

 the improvement should be divided between the City of New York 

 and the County of Westchester in the ratio of two-thirds for the 

 former, and one-third for the latter, and that this cost should be 

 met by a bond issue in the necessary amount. 



Some of the considerations which have influenced the Com- 

 mission in its conclusion are as follows : 



BETTERMENT AREA. 



The City of New York, with its narrow peninsular form, be- 

 tween the Hudson River and the Long Island Sound, is exceptional 

 in having really only one landward extension from Manhattan 

 Island. The land connection extends through the Borough of 

 Bronx and lower Westchester County; and is a comparatively 

 narrow territory, only six and a half miles wide at the north line 

 of the city, and at Tarrytown, the distance is only seven and a 

 half miles from the Hudson River to the Connecticut line. 



In general topography, this territory occupies a rising elevation, 

 a succession of valleys and wooded ridges extending along the gen- 

 erally parallel, dying spurs of the Green Mountain and Berkshire 

 Ranges. 



In the longest of these valleys lies Bronx River. Its course 

 runs almost south and parallel with the Hudson through West- 

 chester County and the Borough of the Bronx, and terminates, so 

 far as picturesque features are concerned, in the Zoological Park 

 and Botanical Gardens. Between the city line and Kensico Lake, 

 the river forms the boundary between the cities of Mount Vernon 

 and Yonkers, and the townships of Eastchester, Greenburgh, Scars- 

 dale, White Plains, Mt. Pleasant, and North Castle. 



Thus between the so-called " Hudson River Section " on the 

 west, and the towns designated as ' ' Along the Sound ' ' on the east, 

 there is an equally well-defined middle or interior zone, the Bronx 

 water-shed, uniform in its interest and development, having an area, 

 north of Bronx Park, of about fifty square miles. This district is 

 developing with great rapidity. 



