NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13409, 11 February 1907, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

THE WORLD'S GREATEST CITY

"Wiri-v will New York be the most populous city in the world? In what year will it surpass London?" These are questions asked by the New York Sun in a recent issue. Jt is, according to American statisticians, merely a question of time. Opinions on the subject have been gathered in various quarters. Thus the assistant chief engineer of the New York Telephone Company, whose duty i! is to look ahead occasionally in order that the company may i know how to provide for its coming needs, '• said he had made no particular study as to the growth of the population of the city proper as a separate proposition. The basis j used in making the computation for the company was the metropolitan district. According to the studies he had made, thisdistrict will have a population of 9,000,000 in 1920. He does not think, however, that the city proper will have caught up to London in population at that time. "There will in all likelihood still be a shade of difference in favour of the English capital,"' said he, "and our estimates do not extend beyond 1920. Our calculations relative to the population within 18 miles of the City Hall produced these statistics:—ln 1870 it was 1,880,000; in 1880, 2,400,000, an, increase of 30 5-10 per cent,; in 1890 it was 3,278.000, an increase of 38 8-10 per cent. ; and in 1900 it was 4,538,000, a gain of 38 45-100 per cent. In view of the statistics, and after consulting every available source of information, the telephone company made this forecast: Within New York City and within a radius of 18 miles from the City Hall there will be by 1920 a population of 9,000,000. Our figures 'for Greater New York would indicate a population of 5,900,000 by the year 1920." Registrar Guilfoy, of the Department of Health, estimates that within the next 34 years, possibly sooner, the population of Greater New York will be three times what it is to-day. He also believes that the population will be doubled by 1927. Dr. Guilfoy's figures show that the growth of the city annually is 3.15 per cent, compounded. The population of the Greater City on June 1, 1905, was 4,014,304. On June 1, 1910, the population should have increased to 4,700,000. According to the registry's estimates, the natural and healthful growth at this ratio of percentage should give New York, in 1927, a population of t more than 8,000,000, and in 1940 there should be slightly more than 12,000,000 people living here. Dr. Guilfoy believes that there is an excellent chance that tin's huge total will be reached much sooner than the ratio would indicate. The average death rate for the five years 1900-05 was 19.40 per 1000, while for the year ending June 1, 1906, it was only 18 per cent. If this death rate is maintained or lowered, as seems probable, the gain in population would be 1.40 in 1000. This would mean that the city's population would be doubled a year earlier than the date given in Dr. Guilfoy's estimate. While the race for supremacy in population seems to lie exclusively between New York and London, Herr Olumko, a noted statistician, declares that Berlin will, 50 years from now, bo the largest city in the world. Ho calculates that its population will be nearly 14,000,000, and that it will have no serious rival except New York. In a pamphlet he has written to set forth this theory Heir Olumke says that the population of Berlin is increasing faster than any other city except Buda Peeth, Hungary. To-day Greater Berlin contains more than 3,000,000 inhabitants. The rapid growth, with Berlin's political and commercial importance, will place the Prussian capital ahead of London, Paris, and New York.