Historic Skywalks in NYC (Again)

Can't help, but I'm going to cross-post this to alt.fan.cecil-adams, 'cause there are some people over there who are the sort who might be able to help with this kind of thing.

(OK, afcans - can ya' help? This was posted in alt.architecture)

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TinyUrl for photo:

On 06 Oct 2008, HVS wrote

Scrap that; doesn't work as a tinyurl. Sorry.

Your tinyurl is broken. Try

Sadly, I dunno s*it about New York, so somebody else can help with that.

It looks like the 20's to me, based on the boxy car, its skinny engine and wide fenders. (using microsoft magnifier in accessories)

Don

A friend asks "any chance a higher-rez scan available?", and that's a good point. Rather than introducing more noise into the image by trying to blow it up, if there's a pre-blown-up one already available, that'll make things easier...

By squinting, I see circa 1930 trucks with long edge-shaped hoods. Of course, I could be wrong. I can't find anything to back my hunch up but I want to say that it is 43rd St, west of Madison, looking east. Note the short block on the left. By squinting really really hard I think I can just make out the Chrysler building above the window washer's left shoulder. Too, there's not that many Manhattan streets that dead-end like that.

Fun.

The skinny engines are on the trucks, which presumably last longer than urban-dweller cars (beaters head out of town to low-rent districts)

The car right "above" the near walkway is a smooth torpedo back. Were those done before the war at all? It looks something like the following, but with perhaps a longer hood.

But I'm astonished at the number of walkways compared to what you see in modern cities. You see a lot of second storey walkways but very seldom anything higher. The skyway between the Petronas Towers is an oddity in today's world. But in this view, we have an 18th storey walkway in the middle background, a five-storey walkway atop a two or three storey building, and a two storey walk in the foreground. All of this in a two-walk view.

Is the disappearance of walkways related to an increased "flex" in steel-framed buildings? Due to faster elevators that make it more practical to walk across at ground (or sub-ground walkways) than "at altitude"? Increased security issues that led to reduced access points? To the sheer acreage of modern towers -- if you have an acre on each floor, then you're not renting anything across the street to link to? To faxes and networking so that you don't need to walk a note over as often?

two block view. Many more than two walks.

If you live in Calgary, you do, or some other city where they've made it common practice to connect unrelated buildings above ground. Other cities mostly do it underground (as here) and still others not at all.

Wikipedia has articles on "skyway" and "underground city", which looked rather cobbled-together the last time I looked at them.

Certainly true.

Objection, assumes facts not in evidence. I think these walkways were unusual at the time and this is why the photo was taken. I certainly don't remember seeing that sort of thing in old photos of New York that I've seen.

If there is a real phenomenon to explain, I suggest the fourth of these five suggestions makes sense. The presence of a large number of walkways suggests that one corporate owner needed more space and found it easiest to expand into a series of buildings, including some across the street. (Of course, this theory may be shot down if someone can identify the buildings.) If the company continued to exist, likely they would eventually move to a single new larger building.

Mark Brader wrote, in on Tue, 07 Oct 2008 08:41:21 -0500:

Really? I think the reason is the window-cleaner.

I agree. Look at the window closer to the front of the photos. You can see the wet footprints.

Boron

I don't think walkways were that uncommon. My high school building (8 stories) was connected to another high school building that way. The walkway was put in after WW1 as a memorial.

I also remember several other building walkways in downtown Detroit in the 50s and 60s. The was also one connecting an old to new hospital building not far from my parents' house.

Boron

Just in case anyone wants to look at them, both old and new...

Probably the developement and/or popularization of elevators made walkways to a large part unneded. Other than that, my WAGs agree with you (possibly not so WA)Gs.

Not NYC, but elevated walkways between buildings were certainly not uncommon in circa 1900 industral buildings in New England.

My guess would be the move of manufacturing out of the city. Those walkways could have been connecting the shirt-sewing room to the button sewing room.

Try the New York Historical Society. They might be able to point you in the right direction.

It turns out that there were a surprising number of elevators in New York by the time period of the photo above. See:

In 1870 the 9-storey Equitable Life Assurance Society building was then the tallest in New York and the "first to have passenger elevators specifically designed by the architect for office building use", so elevators in NYC go back a bit further than I'd imagined.

It is my understanding that buildings in NYC that do not have elevators are limited to 5 stories. I couldn't easily find a cite to show when this rule was adopted.

The real question should be: with all his money, why is Anthony Hopkins washing windows?

Yabbut what fraction of buildings did that represent?

When did Mr. Otis do his work? Ah, Wicked Foot to the rescue: "In 1853, Elisha Otis introduced the safety elevator". I still can't see when elevators became commonplace enough that architects didn't consider people climbing stairs to be a limiting factor in building design.

My meatware says that's generally true everywhere (even without some law making it so), as people aren't -in general- willing to go up more than 4 floors above ground level on foot.