The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-10-10


 them how to proceed to secure state aid,
 This communication was followed by another describing our method of con structlon, If any of your honorable body had seem the responses coming in nom all parts of the state you would have no doubt as to the interest the people take in the matter. There were requests to address town meetings, questions to answer, treatment to sug- gest and thousand and one inquiries to answer We never dreamed of the large interest manifested,
 After month of as hard work as the commission ever put in the towns com menced to send in their requests, and then came the plans to inspect and the specifications to look over and correct, then the letting of contracts. Now we are ready to commence inspection of the work, TO give you an idea of the work done by our commission and results accomplished, it will only be necessary to say that SS towns have applied for state and county aid 30 towns have let their contracts, IA in process, rescind- | ed the vote for state and county aid, 80 are now advertising their work for bids, all of which are to be let later on; | 72 specifications have been examined and corrected where needed, 72 plans examined, both surface and profile. The commission could not, owing to .he short time it will have to work, and the number of plans to inspect, | visit each town; we therefore called for l T surface plan with the profile. If the profile shows a grade Of s per cent. or l 1Ver We try to cut 1t down. It is here wher ethe surface plan Is valuable, as We can then see if it is possible to make the change without injury to abutting property In this respect we | have been able to make some radical changes that will be very helpful for | all time, making an easement of grade in some instances of ? or per cent. ] A very valuable feature of the bill is tha surveying of the roads. These surveys will be collated and placed in | safe keeping in a cabinet, for that pur- 1 pose, arranged by towns, so that in case 1 of litigation, proof may be had to es- tahlish the road lines which will in | the future protect the towns from eX- | pensive law suits
 1 The commission has had a great many obstacles to contend with | First-Everything new, no room, no | tools, no desks in fact, nothing to work with. Through the kindness of Comp l tloller Mead all our wants were speedily l taken care of,
 | Second-The bill to explain.
 Third - Small appropriation; time short to do much this year.
 | Fourth-Road contractors in each
 town who wanted to do the work as | formerly.
 l Fifth-Scarcity of contractors to fig ure on the work
 | Sixth-Few tools in the state to do the
 work We had to modify these at the expense of the work both in regard to economy and durability.
 l Seventh-Local jealousy, everyone
 wanting the road passing their house, l treated first.
 Eighth-Towns long distance from railroad, making it almost impossible to | give them any road Next year We will
 find a way to remedy this, if possible.
 Ninth-Crusher plant not large
 enough to crush stone to supply the de- mand This will be remedied next year. Non-acquaintance with the | conditions that prevail in the different towns, as regards material for road construction. l We have tried to surmount these diff. faculties and meet them as best we could. The good road movement is yet in it's infancy but the future is bright
 and full of promise. We believe it is
 not stretching fancy nor going into the realms of the visionary to say that
 with the wonderful growth in popula- ton of our country in the past that
 every foot of land that now borders the highways of our state will yet become a
 building lot and become in time street
 of some future city yet to be built by
 this nation of home builders. It will not be in this generation nor yet in the next, but it will come as sure as the sun will rise tomorrow.
 l I have not the time to go into figures | to demonstrate the importance of good roads. You have no doubt been through all that before the discussions you have had before your board on this subject, but let me call your attention | to one phase of the question which | you perhaps have not touched on:
 namely, the connection of good roads l with the beautiful scenery with which
 our state abounds. Those of us who
 rush madly through the state on the cars have no conception of the beauties of nature as we whirl past. It is only
 when we ride through the country on the roads that we begin to realize the
 splendor of natures handiwork in our | state.
 1 Go with me up to Norwich and I will show you in miniature, perfect repro duction of the horseshoe fall at Nj agara. It is on the Yantic river that has it's source in Lake Gardiner The | falls have a sheer fall of fifty-fve feet; i a beautiful picture, once seen to live in the memory forever Or up on the | banks on the Thames or on the grand old Connecticut river, living pictures for your mind to feed on for many a day, or up the Naugatuck Valley. where I rode thirty miles over the road a short time ago; one moment through i a ravine shut in by the trees, then along l on the edge of a raVine at whose bot 1 tom you could see through the delicate l tracery of the leaves, a little stream |