The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1883-06-20
NC ADAM ROADS.

John Loudon McAdam, according to his
own account, came to Scotland from Amer
lea, in 1888, when the Scotch Turnpike Acts
had been about twenty years in operation
and roads were still being made everywhere.
He got appointed Commissioner of Roads.
and afterward removed to Bristol where he
obtained similar post and was made a
magistrate. Gifted with mania on the
subject he began about 1894 to travel over
the country at his own cost; and these
labors he continued from Inverness TO the
Lands End for six-and-twenty years, ap-
parently to search for well made road.
McAdans plan of road making differed as
much from the old way which he found in
operation as bridge does from ford. In
stead of going deep for "bottoming,n he
worked solely on the top Instead of pro-
ducing peaked, roof-like mass of rough,
soft rubbish, he got fiat, smooth and solid
surface. In lieu of a road four feet and
half through, he made one of at most ten
inches in thickness; and for rocks aud
powders he substituted stone broken small
His Lending principle was tina; road ought
to be considered as an artificial flooring, so
strong and even as to let the heaviest vehicle
pass over it without impeachment. Then
people began to hear with wonder of roads
thirty ana forty feet wide rising only three
inches in the centre, and he propounded the
extraordinary heresy that better and more
lasting road could be made over the naked
al a tba,, oaI-
Another of his easy first principles was that
the native soil was more resistant when dry
than when wet, and that, as in reality it had
to carry not alone the traffic but the road
also, it ought to be kept in condition of
the greatest resistance that the best way of
keeping it dry was to put over it a covering
impervious to rain-the road, in fact.
Surprise followed surprise Roads which
were mere layers of broken stone, six four
and even as little as three inches in thick
uess, passed through the worst winters with
out breaking up, while, as the coachman
used to say, they "ran true the wheel ran
hard upon them, it ran upon the nail"
Commissioners could not believe their eyes
when they saw new roads made for much
less than it had cost them yearly to repair
their old ones. When an old road was given
into McAdam's charge, he often made n new
one of it for .eSS mile, while round London
the cost of annual repairs had been cl70 Il
mile. For he knew that the roads-such
had been the ignorant generally con.
aimed materials enough for their use for
rlxr
the road was hopeless, he went to work in a
practical, cheap way first cutting OF the
'gridiron of rnts in the centre " to level
with the bottom of the burrows" then
picking" the road up to Il depth of four
inches, removing all the chalk, clay, or mud,
breaking the large stones small, and simply
putting them back again, and one of his
directions to his workmen was that "noth-
ing is to be laid ON the clean stone on pre-.
tenee of binding But too often the road
was 80 bad, as at Eghan, that it had to be
removed to its foundations.
For the repairs of his roads, when once
made he always chose wet weather, and
"loosened the hardened surface with u
pick before putting ON the fresh broken
stone things familiar enough to us now,
but paradoxes then to all the conflaternities
OF the roads. In this way he had the great.
est success with the freestone near Bath
and on II road ont OF Bristol toward Old
Down, where everybody had always said n
good road never would be mads with the
materials available. This impossible road OF
eleven miles, which the Post-master-G General,
rs n last resource, was about TO indict, he
perfected in two months, in 1916, for G55 a
nile. Indeed, MS to materials, they were 70
ONE extent matter of Indifference to him,
provided they We're stones, and stones
1nly. Flint Essex aud Sussex, he said,
made an excellent road, if only broken prop.
erly small limestone willis, Somerset, and
Gloucester) consoldntes soonest of all, but
is not the most lasting; the pebbles OF
Shropshire and Staffordshire were also good,
and the beach pebbles of Essex. Kent, and
Sussex were some of the best materials ia
the kingdom but the whinstone or granite
of the north aud of Scotland he pronounced
the most durable.
Even in the breaking Of stones McAdNm
made a revolution lie saw that able-bo1ied
men standing up with heavy hammer
wasted the greater portion of their strength
He made his stone-breakers Sit so that al
the force of tho blows took direct effect on
Che stone and the result was that he found
small hammers did the work perfectly we'll
aad thus was enabled to conine il to Ole
men past hard labor, women, and boys,
which reduced the cost of broken stone 10y
one. half. The size TO which .he stone
should be broken he determined in Il plac-
teal way by the area of contact of an oriin-
airy wheel with smooth road This he
found to be about an inch leng,hwisc, and
therefore he laid 1T down that On stone
which exceeds an inch in any of its dinen
sons is mischieyous" that is to say that tl,,
wheel in pressing on one end of it tends It
lift the other end ont of the road In prac-
tice he found it simplest to fix weight of
six ounces, and his surveyors carried about
scales to test the largest stones in each heap.
He would allow no large stones even for tho
foundation of his roads, for he found they
constantly worked upward by the pressure
and vibration of the traffic The whole road
was small broken stone, even over swampy
ground. JaDleS's Gazette.
IEnMfp MTCEQ