Mower County transcript. [volume] (Lansing, Minn.) 1868-1915, 1889-07-17
COUNTRY ROAD MAKING.
How to Overcome Some Of the Difficulties
III Securing Good Roads.

1t is q very difficult thing to give
directions for road making that shall
be universally applicable, for the
reason that formations of soil are so
varied that what is practical and ap-
proved in any one locality is not suited
to the conditions found in other places.
Thus the plan of constructing roads on
flat, clayey lands differs from that
found most effective in rolling,
gravelly or sandy country. Tho great
est difficulty in securing good roads is
found whore the natural condition of
things is most easily overcome, or
where roads are fairly good the year
round for the passage of light loads.
Where roads are almost impossible
at certain seasons of the year for the
ordinary purpose Of travel, the people
along them are prodded into some in
tellieent effort by those regularly
recurring periods, and so the most ap-
proved methods are likely to be en-
ployed. But the greatest need for
missionary work lies along those roads
=
required to keep them in such repair
that the public does not enter a vigor-
Gus protest against their inet1iciency.
Those who have been accustomed to
hills or undulating roads from boyhood
do not appreciate the difficulties they
voluntarily encounter on every passage
over them. Hills or grades that do
not exceed one foot in thirty are not
serious obstacles to overcome. but all
grades Of hills sleeper than those that
can be dug down to lengthen the grade
should at once be attacked and per-
sistently worked until grade of one
in thirty is reached. At this grade
the angle of repose in Il horse is not
changed, and he is able to trot up Or
down with q light carriage with but
little extra effort. No gravel or other
surface application should be made
until the grading is completed and the
roadbed slightly rounded, so as to be-
come readily drained of surface water
If hill can not be economically cut
down it is often better to go round it
than to compel the travel to go up a
steep grade. BY studying the system
of road dynamics it has been found
that it is better to go twenty feet fur
ther on a level than to climb one foot
in height-that is, it is as easy to go
1000 feet further as to climb 100 feet
or that the longest way round on a
level is the shortest way home, and it
is found also that the distance is not
so much increased by a little devia-
ton as is usually supposed. A de.
Election or curve of 100 feet between
two points 600 feet apart only adds to
the distance 80 feet, and between
points mile apart one-fifth of a mile
detection adds but 400 feet to the dis
lance A little observation of the
paths made by animals across uneven
surfaces will show that they always
make a path as nearly horizontal as
possible along the line Of direction,
and they avoid short cuts that must
be made by climbing. When an as
cent must be made it is always along
the line of the lightest grade. We have
very little appreciation of the aver
sion the horse we are driving has for
the steep grade we force him to climb.
1t has been found by careful expert
ment that the horse power-computed
by Watts as raising %, 600 pounds one
foot per minute-exerted by draft on
the road is equal to a tractive force of
l2O pounds for light hours at q miles
per hour. This is considered the unit
of power for road service, where the
| track is level, hard, and smooth Any
obstruction, therefore, whether it be
! an uneven surface or a stcop grade,
renders the travelling difficult for the
horse in the degree of unevenness or
of steepness of the grade. II the
grade is ! in 80 the horse can draw
two-thirds of it's load on q Lowell; if
in 81 it can only draw one-half, or if 1
in 10 then it can only draw
one-fourth of its load on
a level. 1t is true that for short
distances or for brief time a horse
can draw five or six times its constant
load on a level. Except for short dis
tances it is inhuman to require the
horse to draw more than double it's
normal force which is required when
the grade is in 80 or 49, according to
whether the surface is hard or un-
even. On a level gravel road the
horse can draw a load in round num-
bers fifteen times heavier than it's
tractive power, or 1900 pounds, and
three times this load, or 5,4OO pounds,
on a hard, broken-stone road, and 3d.
400 on a railway track.
Good roads seem more of necessitv
to those familiar with them, and no
better spur to endeavor can be fur
nished than a half mile of good level
gravel road between sandy or billy
stretches of highway. Good gravel is
nearly always found in a sandy coun-
try, and there can be no excuse except
Indifference for poor billy roads, for
the road work, if intelligently applied,
can reduce the grade and spread gravel
to effect an entire revolution in country
travel.
Good roads are an Indication IF thrift