BUFFALO, City and county-seat of Erie co., N. Y., second city in population importance mportance in New York. It is built at the E. end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara river, 20 miles above the Falls. It is the W. terminus of the Erie canal, and has a navigable water front of 8 miles, with numerous piers, break waters, basins and canals, giving it one of the finest harbors on the lakes and making it a great commercial center. The city is connected by several steamship lines with the chief lake ports, and by ferries with Victoria and Fort Erie, on the Canadian side. The International Bridge, costing $1,500,000 and com pleted in 1873, connects Buffalo with these towns. Area, 42 square miles; pop. (1890) 255,664; (1900) 352,387; (1910) 423,715; 1920) 506,775.
Topography.—Buffalo is situated on an elevated plain, 50 feet above the lake and 600 feet above sea-level. From this plain the ground slopes gradually to the lake. It is bordered on three sides by water, the Niagara river, Lake Erie, and Buffalo river. Buffalo river is navigable for 2 miles, and two canals pass between the river and the lake. The city is noted for its wide and beautiful streets, and the abundance of shrubbery and trees decorating them. The principal streets are Main, Niagara, Delaware, Broad way, and Linwood and Elmwood ave nues, 120 feet wide, and all over 5 miles in length.
Municipal Improvements. — The city owns an extensive waterworks system, costing $9,000,000. The water is dis tributed through 600 miles of mains. The sewerage system has about 525 miles of pipe, and the sewage is carried off, by means of a tunnel, into the Niagara river. The city is lighted by gas and electricity. Much natural gas, piped from Pennsylvania and Canada, is used for heating and manufacturing purposes. There are more than 225 miles of street railways and a steam belt-line connects with the suburbs.
Public Parks.—Buffalo has an ex tensive park system. There are several attractive parks and squares in the busi ness portions of the city, among them Lafayette, Niagara, and Franklin. La fayette square contains the Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument, erected at a cost of $50,000, and the Buffalo Library. A portion of the Niagara river front rises in an abrupt bluff and is known as The Front. It affords a grand view in all directions and is the site of Fort Porter, where several companies of United States troops are stationed. The Pa rade Ground is one of the principal parks and contains 50 acres of land.
Notable principal public buildings are the Federal Build ing, containing the Postoffice and Cus tom House, a large building of free stone; the State Arsenal; the Board of Trade Building; the Old and New Ar mories; Grosvenor Library; Normal School; two public high schools; Erie County and Buffalo Savings Banks; the Erie County Penitentiary; and the City and County Hall. The latter is of
granite with a tower 245 feet high, situ ated in Franklin street, completed in 1880 at a cost of about $1,400,000. Be sides these, there is the Buffalo Library, in Lafayette Square, containing a cir culating library of 77,000 volumes, and, in the same building, are the Buffalo Historical Society, the Buffalo Fine Arts Society and School of Arts, and the So ciety of National Sciences. The State Insane Asylum has a plot of 203 acres and adjoins the Buffalo Park. Other notable structures are the numerous grain elevators. Buffalo is one of the greatest grain shipping cities of the United States and contains some of the largest grain elevators in the world. The first elevator in the world was built at Buffalo in 1843.
has had an as tonishing industrial growth. Its loca tion at the eastern terminus of trans portation on the Great Lakes has made it an important station on the highway connecting the growing West with the eastern seaboard It is one of the world's greatest ports, and despite the fact that navigation on the Great Lakes is limited to about eight months of the year, the city stands eighth in tonnage among the ports of the world. Clear ances are issued to 10,000 vessels annu ally. The grain receipts in 1919 totaled 93,627,867 bushels. Receipts of coal over water routes were 69,805, tons; copper, 52,501 tons; pig iron, 2,650 tons; mer chandise, 113,937 tons; stone flux, 960, 337 tons; iron ore, 4,837,981 tons; lum ber, 16,374,708 feet. In addition to the foregoing, there is the tremendous ton nage of the railroads, operating twelve months in the year instead of eight, but for which only fragmentary statistics are available, it being impossible to ob tain from the railroads the record which would make such a computation possible. Additional great quantities of grain are received by rail, together with an enor mous coal tonnage and miscellaneous freight amounting to millions of tons. Buffalo is also one of the country's mos' important live-stock markets, receipts for 1919 including 9,522 cars of cattle, 7,993 of hogs, 3,156 of sheep, 773 of horses, and 4,535 mixed cars. The im portance of the city as a killing and packing center is seen in the comparison of the foregoing figures with the ship ment from Buffalo for the same period, which amounted to 5,582 cars of cattle and 3,223 hogs. The stockyards are the second largest in the world. It is the first sheep market in the country and the second horse market. It is also the world's largest lumber market.