The record-union., 1895-01-01
THE STATE ROAD CONVENTION
CALLED AGAIN.

President Lennon has issued call for
the second annual session of the State
Road Convention. It will be its third
session in fact. it having held one semi
on Thursday, February 7th, at 2 P. NJ,
and all persons who were entitled to sit
in the first convention are ask ed to make
up the membership in this one. Where
the delegate was an official and has gone
out of Office, of course his successor is
entitled to sit, as for instance all County
Surveyors, all Supervisors arc delegates,
and every Board of Supervisors may ap-
point three delegates. There are twenty
delegates who were named by Governor
Markham and these will serve, as will
twenty others Governor Budd may ap-
point.
Under an Act of Congress passed in
1893 Bureau of Road Inquiry has been
created in the United States Department
of Agriculture, and Secretary Morton has
appointed to its administration General
Roy Stone, dIsti nguished engineer, and
Nice-President of the National Good
Roads League. under whom a great deal
of valuable good road literature is being
sent throughout the land from Govern
ment presses. With the assistance of the
Governors of the several States. General
Stone has chosen one citizen in each
State to advise with him on local condi-
tions, and assist in the distribution of
good road official literature.
General Stone has been invited to be
present at the Road Convention of Cali
fornia in February, and Secretary Nor
ton has consented that he may come on
for that purpose, invitations from the
Governor, the Mayor of Sacramento, the
President of the convention and others
having prevailed to that end, and Cen
eral Stone will be present.
The first road convention was expert
mental, but it was in many essentials
success. For while it developed wide
divergence of opinion as to method, and
head, it developed also unanimity of
opinion as to the high importance of the
good road agitation, and it confessed that
uneconomic systems now obtain in this
State in the construction and maintenance
of highways. It disclosed too the fact
that there is objectionable misapprehen-
sion prevalent regarding material in this
State for economic road metal, and that
as a rule the least desirable material is N
use. while the best and most permanent
and economic material is passed by and
remains unused.
Another fact developed at the two ses-
sions of the convention already held,
namely; that our road laws are made
uuate to the attainment of the very ends
at which they aim, and that our system
of superintendence is at swords points
with the system which experience in
older States has proved to be wise. It
has come out, also, in the search of statis-
tics, that over S20.000.000 have been ex-
pended by owners of property in rural
sections in California in the last few years
in road building and maintenance, Of
which not two millionspf road values re-
main to represent that vast expenditure,
and vast output of unrewarded energy.
Another important fact developed is.
that our law regarding tree planting along
public highways is error. and by its lin
itation of distance from property lines
either causes land to be shadowed to the
serious injury OF large acreage per cent.
of production, or prevents tree planting
altogether, and that in this regard the
law needs radical amendment. There is
also a general desire that wide-tire
ordinance should have consideration in
the Boards of Supervisors of each county.
Likewise, that there shall be introduced
some system by which counties may
avail of the knowledge of engineering
science in the projection and the con-
struction of highways. There Is also