Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1891-05-01
THE COUNTRY ROAD PROBLEM.
Its Solution and the Wisdom of Apply.
ing 1t.

The New York Evening Post says:
An interesting addition to the literature
OF road making is a pamphlet recently
issued containing an address delivered
last January before the New Jersey state
board of agriculture by Mr.. Chauncey
B. Ripley on Improved Roads," and a
collection Of his views on the making of
good country roads and their financial
value. Mr.. Ripley is a lawyer practic-
ing in this city and living in New Jer
sey, who has, as a property owner, the
most unbounded faith in the doctrine
that money expended on roads comes
back to the taxpayer who expends it.
Having been instrumental in securing
the passage of the New Jersey law which
permits the chosen freeholders of each
county to designate certain tn CROUCH
fares as County roads," and to bond the
county to raise money for their improve
ngent, he has stirred up the people of his
own county (Union) to take quick ad-
vantage Of this law, and he bears graft
flying testimony to the result.
Mr.. Ripley defines ga good road" to be
"a road available for all sorts of travel
and at every season Of the year." No
one certainly can find fault with road
which can stand this test. The ordinary
country road is the exact opposite. In
deed, it may be said of it that it is real
ly available for no kind of travel except
for few weeks in a year. If Of clay, it
can be driven over with pleasure only in
dry time. If of sand, it affords good
driveway for only few hours after a.
rain, before it's packed surface is cut up
by wheels. Nature very seldom pro-
vides a roadbed which is not a mire hole
in the spring and a dust bed in the sum-
mer; and in this country only in recent
years and very slowly have farmers come
to recognize the fact that the cost Of
making ga good road" after Mr.. Rip
ley's definition, will come back to them
in any way. Accepting the adage that
the condition of a country's public roads
indicates its civilization, Mr.. Ripley
points out that in our country we have
been spending our millions on the rail
roads which were unknown when this
adage was framed, and which have had
so much to do with shaping the civiliza-
ton Of all countries in modern time.
The farmer who would look on any one
as schemer who should tell him that it
would pay to mortgage his county for 5
per cent. of it's valuation in order to
macadamize the wagon roads has been
easily persuaded of the personal advan-
tage to him of bonding the same county
to assist in laying out railroad through
it, and may have invested few hundred
Of his own hard earned dollars in the
original stock of the road, the ultimate
value of which is so generally mythical.
The railroad, in a word, has been &C
cepted as anecessity and an unquestioned
benefactor, while the good wagon roac
has simply been dispensed with as too
expensive luxury.
Whoever attempts to stir up interest
in good wagon roads in this country
outside Of the few Newports and Lenoxes
where Injuries are demanded as such
must prepare himself to prove that good
roads will pay. The rural property owner
is not generally susceptible to the purely
aesthetic. When first appealed to to
assist in road improvements his reply is,
"Let the owners of fast horses make fine
roads," To get him interested he must
be shown by practical example that it is
to his profit to be able to haul ton where
before he has been able to haul only half
as much, or that with roads that are
'good" in the technical sense he will
find his land in demand at prices which
before no one would offer. For this rea-
son the testimony presented in Mr.. Rip
ley's pamphlet is very valuable. Here is
some of it: Real estate has doubled,
trebled and quadrupled in value since
the construction of telford roads from
Orange to Dover, N. J. One of the
chronic grumblers against taxes for road
improvements in Union county, when
asked if he would consent to have the
road restored to its old condition in order
to save the taxes, replied: "Well, as
shall not be required to pay more than
two dollars year for the rest of my life,
it would not be worth while" The travel
has increased on these roads tenfold in
years time. 'Since the law went into
effect" says Mr.. Ripley, ''real estate
values in Union county have advanced
nearly $1,5O0,000, exclusive of property
advances in Elizabeth of about 800, 900
more" This statement was made in
October, 1890, and work under the coun-
ty road act was begun only the year be-
fore. So rapidly has real estate advanced
since the roads were made better that
one Of the largest real estate owners in
the county expresses the opinion that the
appreciation in future values will cover
all the cost of the improvement.
Every one who has watched the prog
ress Of country road making must have
noticed that road improvement is con-
tagious Every good piece Of TO ad is an
object lesson to produce imitators. In
one district near this city, where no
general system Of road making has been
adopted, q great deal of such work has
been done in the last few years by in
dividual farmers who have been shown
by two or three enterprising neighbors
what luxury and time saver q piece of
good road is. in Union county, N. j.,
it is noted that many property owners
on the cross roads, which have not been
improved under the county system, are
putting these roads in good condition,
brief experience having convinced them
that no roads but good roads pay. Mr..
Ripley's chief point in his address to the
board OF agriculture was the ACCESSIBILITY
OF laying out, at state expense, two per-
feet roads across the state Of New Jersey,
one crossing the state, as from Newark
to Camden, and one running from Cape
May 70 The most northerly point. A
good argument in favor Of these roads
would be the missionary work they
would DO in setting examples for inita
ton; and if New Jersey can secure an
executive and legislature whose chief
objects are something besides the crea-
ton Of offices and the distribution Of sal
aries, Mr.. Ripley's state road scheme
may soon be reality,
A Cruel Process.
A casa of secret society initiation occI1r-