Hesperothen; Notes from the West, Vol. 1 (of 2): A Record of a Ramble in the United States and Canada in the Spring and Summer of 1881 — John Shaqi
Hesperothen; Notes from the West, Vol. 1 (of 2): A Record of a Ramble in the United States and Canada in the Spring and Summer of 1881Russell, William Howard, Sir
History
Hesperothen; Notes from the West, Vol. 1 (of 2): A Record of a Ramble in the United States and Canada in the Spring and Summer of 1881
Russell, William Howard, Sir
United States -- Description and travel
final appeal did not lie with the court in which the judgment had been
entered; and it was the intention of the company to carry the cause
to a higher jurisdiction, where their contention that they had right
to cause inconvenience to the few on account of the benefit of the
many would be accepted, probably, as good morality and law. To my
mind, however, nothing but hard necessity could compel people to live
under such conditions as those to which the inhabitants of the houses
exposed to the nuisance of the Elevated Railway must submit. It is not
alone that they are under incessant inspection of the passengers if
they keep blinds and windows up or open, but that the noise and whirl
must be distracting. A train passes every minute, I was told, during
the hours of business. There are two of these elevated railways, one
going east from the Battery to Harlem, the other west from the same
starting-point to Fifty-Ninth Street. The Metropolitan line starts
from a point near West Broadway to the Central Park. The line on which
we were travelling ultimately struck out for the more open country
till we came to the Harlem river. There we got out and inspected a
very remarkable bridge, with a draw of a most ingenious construction
for the passage of vessels, which will be completed speedily. From the
railway we enjoyed a fine view of the Croton Aqueduct, of which New
York may well be proud, the high bridge by which it is carried across
the Harlem River being an imperial work recalling the grandest
enterprises of the kind of the Roman engineers. There was a good view
of the Central Park and of the country which has been so rapidly
encroached upon by the builders; but there is still a considerable
tract of land occupied by sheds and shanties of a very abject and
miserable aspect, in the possession of squatters who cause much
anxiety to landowners, and are very difficult to dispossess. Whether
they have rights of disturbance or not I cannot say. Probably if they
were to introduce some of the machinery of the law which is considered
peculiarly suited to the wants of Ireland, the New Yorkers might find
it to their advantage.
On the route to the Harlem River the line rises to a dizzy height,
quite above the tops of houses of three stories. Now that the system
has been adopted, it seems impossible to change it, as these "L
Lines," as they are called, have cost too much money (I think more
than twelve millions sterling) to be abandoned or bought up, and they
are still in course of construction. No amount of utility can
compensate for the intrinsic ugliness of these erections which block
up the vista and darken the streets below; and in winter time, when
New York, groaning under a burden of snow, has to suffer from the
accumulations thrown down by the railway, the inconvenience must be
greatly aggravated.
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