Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-11-14

if they prefer them to the boots, and
| there is no reason why Miss Field should
not accord the same freedom to those who
prefer boots.
MAGNITUDE OF THE ROAD QUESTION.
The bad engineering and worse economy
shown in the almost universal condition of
the roads of this country has been the SUBJ
| ject Of much discussion lately But few
have presented it in more striking way
than Mr. J. B. Potter in his article on "The
| Profits of Good Country Roads in the last
issue of the F5rum. Mr.. Potter uses the
license of an advocate in some of his aSser-
tions; but even allowing for that, the sub
! ject as presented by him is very forcible
| Mr. Potter strikes his first blow by point
| ing out that the dirt road, the only avenue
of traffic between the farmer and the rest
of the world, remains practically the same
as it was at the beginning of the century.
He might have gone further and pointed
out that at the close of the Nineteenth
century the great republic is inferior to the
great republic of antiquity in its practical
demonstration of the art of road making.
In every other respect the century has
been one of amazing progress. Its indus
trial and productive capacities have been
multiplied by the devices of improvements;
but in this one instance we have remained
stationary. We have the excuse that the
country has grown up during period in
which a great share of the functions of
the old roads has been usurped
by the railroads; but when
we remember the immense importance
still left to the country roads in the mar
keting of agricultural products, the neg
lect of the known means of improvement
forms a strikingly unfavorable contrast
with the economy of labor established in
every other direction. The farmer has
been quick to adopt tie use of machinery,
which enables one man to do what form
erly required three OF four: but he has
wholly neglected the art of road building,
by which he could do with one horse the
work that now compels him to use two,
and sometimes four.
In dwelling upon the magnitude of this
subject, Mr.. Potter goes slightly into
hyperbole with the assertion that "besides
filling the local markets we are hauling
over our common roads enough produce,
in one form or another, to supply freight
ing business for 150, 900 miles of railroads,
using more than !, 1,000 900 freight cars, and
earning traffic income in 1890 of nearly
81, 900, OO0. .OO0" This is strictly inaccurate,
as it suppoSes all the traffic of the rail-
roads to be brought to them over country
roads, which is not the case with the great
mass of the coal, iron, lumber, petroleum
and other departments of railway traffic
But it has the foundation in the Sec
ondary sense that the agricultural
industry is the fundamental one
of this country If there were no means
of getting agricultural products to market
the coal, iron and other departments of
railway traffic would speedily dwindle;
and in such degree as the marketing of
rural staples is hampered and maue ex-
pensive in exactly the same degree are the
industries which fine their ultimate mar
ket with the farmers restricted of their
full possibilities.
When we give this fact its full weight
we do not alone demonstrate the import
ance of the road question. In addition
we gain some light on other vexing prob
lens. The lack of prosperity for the
farmers has been the topic of a great deal
of discussion: and while there are other
causes there is little difficulty in show
ing that one of the difficulties in the way
of putting farm products in market is the
extra cost of wagOn-road transportation.
Beyond that the question of road improve
ment offers secondary results which most
Ia Il TrJu hoe
often pointed out that the great drawback
to Middle States farming is that railroad
competition on the longer hauls brings the
cheap and fertile Western lands as near
the seaboard markets as the farms
of Pennsylvania or Ohio. But suppose
that road improvement should bring rail-
road competition to the farmers of this
district? There are few sections in which
the railroads are more than thirty miles
apart. Take farmer who is ten miles
from railroad in one direction and
twenty from one in the other. In the pres
ent condition of the roads only the near
est railway is available. But supposing
that road improvement should make the
haul of twenty miles as available to him |
all the year round as the ten-mile haul |
now is! How long would it be before the |
railroads would find themselves in CON-
petition for the traffic they now class as
local? 1t is not hard to see how an i'm
provement in the roads which would |
lessen the cost of hauling farm products |
81 5O@2 90 per ton might bring with it
reduction in freight rates of 81 OO@1 80
per ton.
With ali these important considerations
the most convincing argument of all is the |
of experience In the few |
where the work of making first |
class roads has been Systematically carried |
on, the price of land has increased, trade |
has developed, and the people have testi- |
fled that the boon of good roads is inesti
mable. The agricultural population of |
the rest of the country should perceive
that the same considerations make it well |
worth their while to devote energy, labor
and money TO the task of securing first |