Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1893-01-27
AMERICAN ROADWAYS.

A study of statistics, showing the dis
lance over the average wagon roads Of
the country through which a load of
wheat will pay its own transportation,
would tend to convince any one of the
wealth producing, labor saving and food
cheapening effect of good roads. A farm
twelve miles from railroad station in
district with good roads is worth more
than one equally as good three miles
away from the railroad, where the roads
are as bad as they are in many farming
districts where the land is rich. Of
course the main trouble is that the peo-
pie are not yet educated up to the posi-
bilities in roadmaking. In no part of
the country are the roads what they
should be.
1t seems worth while then for all in
telligent people to have some general
notion concerning the simpler facts in
volved in the science and art of road
making. With such persons the study
of these matters may well begin with
certain fundamental conceptions as to
the essential relation of these construc-
tons. All highways are intended to af-
VI,
possible horizontal surface over which
that great instrument of civilization, the
wheel, with its burden, can be made to
move with the least possible friction.
Every unit of friction which is encoun-
tered is measurable element Of cost,
either in time, power Or damage to the
road and carriage. For every foot of
distance ha t,.oy a &c
curing a tax. If he is conveying the
weight of a ton to market the amount of
this tax for mile may, under favorable
conditions, not exceed five cents. From
this minimum scale Of expenditure, with
the advancing degradation of the way,
the cost may increase until it amounts
to ten or twenty times what it is in the
ideal though seldom realized state of a
highway. At a certain stage in the &C
emulation of the tax even the more ad-
venturous, wisely, though without clear
reckoning, regard the way as econom-
ically impossible.
The first difficulty to be encountered
in the making of good roadways is what
the engineers call the profile of the way
The great majority of country roads are
constructed on the idea that the shortest
line between two points is the most de-
sirable one to follow, yet from practical
standpoint, when the nature of the soil
and the general contour of the country
to be traversed are taken into considera-
ton, just the opposite is the case. The
load which could be hauled over direct
route is sometimes about half as heavy
as one that could be hauled over longer
one where grades are not so steep and
other conditions are more favorable.
Difficult as is the task which the sur
veyor has to meet in planning high
way, the work is relatively simple as
compared with the more detailed part of
his duties when he comes to determine
the exact form and structure of the
roadbed. These features have to be re-
lated to much entangled set of natural
and artificial conditions. He must then
take into account the general nature of
the traffic for which the way is to be
used, the quality of the underlying earth
as regards its solidity and the effect Of
the water upon it, the penetration of
frost and its effects, the dangers arising
from the securing action Of the rain and
the character of the materials to be used
in building the travelled way.
The accumulated experience of more
than a century serves to show that only
in rare cases can we find conditions
where the materials of the soil or of the
subsol are fit for the construction of
roads. The reason for this is simple. It
is found in the fact that the processes
which affect the earth's surface and pro-
duce the debris suited to the uses of
plants tend to divide the rocky matter
into more or less distinctly rounded bits,
which have soft outer surfaces. When
ever the shearing strain of a wheel is
brought upon this detrital matter the
particles generally move over each other,
SO that the greater part of the pulling
force which is applied to the vehicle is
expended in kind of blowing work, a
task which is about as far removed from
the legitimate business of traversing a
way as can well be imagined.
The best exemplifcation of this class
of action is found where road is foored
with gravel. One can there clearly see
and hear the effects of the shearing &C
ton which the wheel produces on the
materials, and from this example he more
readily perceives that the first object of
the roadmaker is to keep the substances
which form the bed firmly in place. Road
engineers, therefore, have come to the
conclusion that the staple or standard
foundation for roads must consist Of
broken stone, the angular faces Of the
fragments so driven together that they
will cling unmoved under any pressure
which vehicles will bring upon them
St Louis Post-Disnatch