General Trends

From the Wurts Brothers in 1931, “General View – Manhattan – Aerial view – 42nd Street – Fifth Avenue – looking west”:

Given the angle and the height, this was probably taken from the roof of the Lincoln Building at 60 East 42nd Street. (Lincoln is about 20 feet shorter overall than 500 Fifth, the tower on the right, and it sure looks like we’re just about at the same level as the top of that building.)

The center of the photo is Bryant Park, and the lowrise building in front of it is the main building of the New York Public Library. The library is not T shaped: it’s more or less square in plan, with two large interior courtyards. The back of the square, to the west, and the central east-west bar have higher roofs than the front, which is what gives the T appearance. The buildings that appear white are a mix of white glazed brick, light gray glazed brick, and limestone veneer; the darker buildings are tan or red brick except for Raymond Hood’s American Standard Building on 40th Street, facing the south side of the park, which is black brick with gold terra cotta trim.

The effects of the 1916 zoning law, requiring setbacks based on the zone (in this photo, mostly commercial with some industrial in the distance) and the width of the street. For example, the asymmetrical setbacks at the base of 500 Fifth are the result of 42nd Street being zoned for more bulk than Fifth Avenue. 500 Fifth, the building immediately west of it (11 West 42nd) and the white pyramid off to the left are good examples of what happened with the 1916 zoning law with different size lots. The zoning did not cap height once setbacks had reduced the floor plan to 25 percent of the lot size, so the long series of typical tower floors at 500 Fifth is that size. The pyramid site was too small for 25 percent to be a useful floor, so it simply ended at the top of the required setbacks. The pyramid west of 500 Fifth, the Paramount Building at Times Square similarly ends with the setbacks…and a globe.

If you wanted to explain what typical Manhattan buildings looked like circa 1930, you could do worse than this photo.