The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1890-04-12

\"/%> built for less thar
pikes have cost
SAMUEL H. DOWNING. that a macadan
costs less for repair, and that it i:
the most economic road. some very
good people will not so much as wrestle
with the new saying, but, clinging to the
old ideal, will argue that inasmuch az
pixies are rough. macadams must be
rough; inasmuch as pixies are built below
frost, macadams must be so built; that
inasmuch as the hand hammered pike
has cost as much as s., 900 per mile, and
because of its coarse construction, Sl0C
per mile annually for repair, that con.
seguently machine crusher, roller
made macadam structure must cost the
same (S5, 900 per mile) for the making
and the same $500 per mile) for annual
repair.
1t is becoming usual to call pixies
macadamized roads. A macadam road
Is not pike, in that the macadam is in
finitely better and less expensive than
roads heretofore called pixies.
The imperfections of a pike are:
First-In that it is composed of loose
stone in its making and repairing. Thus
the pressure pike receives from passing
wheels deepens into ruts. A rut once
made, although filled and refilled, will
reappear.
Second--Pikes have been constructed
of hammered stone. Hammered stone is
too coarse for the best superstructure of
roads. The originator of the macadam
principle stated before a committee of
the house of commons that stone road
was saving of repair in ratio with the
fineness of the stone used. Thus a bed
of one inch stone would cost in repair Of
such bed but one-hslf of that of bed of
two inch stone.
Again, pike composed of hand.
broken stone may have cost $4,000 per
mile for hui]ding, and 500 per mile an
nually for repair-$5, 900 per mile for
building, because the stone was hand
broken, at 81 per perch, and 500 annu-
ally for repair, because the superstruc-
ture was coarse and loose. Thus ruts are
started and are expensive to erase. The
experience Of macadam builders teaches
stone bed is laid upon a rutted clay base
ruts will appear in the stone bed directly
over those of the clay foundation. Thus
one rut in pike is the predecessor of an
endless series of ruts and an endless bill
of costs.
On the other hand, macadam struc-
ture avoids these imperfections of a pike
in that (irst its superstructure is COM
posed of small stone and stone siftings
or chips, and (second) while wheels press
the unlimited, loose surface of pike,
and reach solidity within one track at
two inches below the general surface,
thus forming ruts, the roller used in
macadam structure does exactly what
wheels do, but further, it presses the
entire surface of the bed, so far as wheels
can penetrate, in ruts, and thus makes
the entire bed as solid as the base of a
rut. Thus, again, macadam is so uni
formly resistant of wheel pressure that
ruts cannot be produced in some mao
adam within period probably of ten
years.
A crusher turning out so perches of
stone per day will earn in day, at 10
cents per perch, $12, which will easily
pay for the cost of running crusher per
day. The difference between 81 per
perch for hand broken stone and Is cents
for crushed stone is 50 cents. In the re-
alization of this gain of SO cents by the
use of crusher we can reasonably con-
clude that a macadam ought to be built
for less than half the cost of hammered
pixies.
Then again, as to the economy of a
macadam over that of pike. A mac
adam being virtually rut and water proof,
and continuing SO for ten years, what
will it cost to repair a macadam per
mile annually during ten years? l think
you will reply, really nothing.
But will macadam resist wheel pres
sure for, say, ten years? In answer we
are furnished proof in an eight-year-old
macadam leading from the Pennsylvania
railroad freight and passenger station at
Devon, Chester county. Mr.. Charles
Paiste, superintendent for the Devon
Land company, tells me that this mac
adam has endured all the traffic from the
railroad, being equal at times to two
tons at draft, and yet this macadam
has not cost cent for repair for eight
years, and, as saw for myself, has not
as yet a rut. The question then arises,
This macadam being as good as it was
eight years ago, will it not endure eight
years more without cent for repair!