" This was written, to be sure, in 1890, and may
have been true in its day; for it takes an American city much less than
a decade to belie a derogatory epigram. Now, at any rate, New York has
had her shoes mended to some purpose. She is not the best paved city in
the world, or even in America, but neither is she by any means the
worst; and her splendid system of electric and elevated railroads
renders her more independent of paving than any European city.
Fifth-avenue is paved to perfection; Broadway and Sixth-avenue are not;
but at any rate the streets are not for ever being hauled up and laid
down again, like some of our leading London thoroughfares. Holborn, for
example, may be ideally paved on paper, but its roadway is subject to
such incessant eruptions of one sort or another that it is in practice
a much more uncomfortable thoroughfare than any of the New York avenues.
For the rest, New York has a copious and excellent water supply, which
London has not; it has a splendidly efficient fire-brigade; it has an
admirable telephone system, with underground wires; and even its
electric trolleys get their motive-power from underneath, whereas in
Philadelphia the overhead wires are, I regret to say, killing the trees
which lend the streets their greatest charm.
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