Seward weekly gateway., 1906-04-14
TO OPEN TRIAL
 TO INLET TOWNS
Capt. PillSbury Will Recommend Construction of Road From
 Hope to Railway.

Hope and Sunrise will have a gov. ernment trail to the railroad at the head of Turnagain Arm by falI if q promised recommendation of Capt. c. E. PiIsbury Of the Alaska road com mission is adopted by the war depart mcnt, and the project executed. The road. according To C. A. Kyle. locating engineer of the Alaska Central. will be of easy construction mos, of thc way and will not be expensive. It will be about thirty mile, long from Hope to the head of the Arm.
 The promised recommendation for this road is due to the suggestion of Frank l.. BaIlaine. Capt. Pillsbury visited Seward to look up the survey records of the Alaska Central and figure on a route for a trail to the Panama from Cook inlet. While doing so he frankly admitted that it was doubtful whether anything could be done on the Panama road this year be- cause the territorial road plans already ordered for execution are likely to absorb nearly all the availa- ble fund.
 NIr. Ballaine then suggested that Seward ought at least to get the bene- fit of the license fees which it con- tributes to the road fund and Capt Pillsbury was considerably surprised to learn that Seward is not incorpo- rated and that therefore the license fees collected here, amounting to nearly S7OOO last year, are diverted 10 improvements elsewhere.
 Capt. PiIlsbury admitted the injust- ice of taking money from this com munity to build roads for remote por- tions of the territory, and when his attention was called to the isolation of the prosperous mining communities on the south side of Turnagain Arm and to,- ti1c fact nat -Trruad tJ the railway could be made for few thousand dol lars which will give them easy egresS and ingreSS in the winter time he readily promised to recommend the construction of a trail from Hope to the railroad.
 "Of course all 1 can do is to recom- mend," said Capt. PillSbury. "The war department may not adopt my recommendation but I will put it up to the powers that be as strongly as l can and hope to be successful
 If constructed the road will be chiefly beneficial to Hope and Sunrise, and only of incidental consequence to Seward, but it will bring those towns into closer touch with this city, the only accessible seaport in the winter, and enable them to trade here tine year round. It will follow closely the line of tidewater, avoiding steep climbs, and will be good freight road as we'll as one easy for travellers. Mir. Kyle thinks there are only two or three miles of hills which will re- quire heavy work. The remainder of the distance will require only the clearing away of timber and brush and the construction of roadbed.
 Capt. Pillsbury said that he was un- able to say whether anything will be done toward the construction of the Panama trail this summer. He said lit would depend altogether upon the state of the fund. The money for the construction and maintenance of gov ernment roads in Alaska comes from the licenses. Extensive work is al- ready mapped out for this year which will absorb nearly as much money as the fund contained last year. Never theless business is increasing all over the territory and license collectors have been instructed to collect very closely, so there is no doubt but the fund will be largely augmented this year.
 Maj. Richardson, chairman of the commission, has already expressed approval of the project for trail from Cook inlet to the Panama. and has promised to visit the Inlet region this summer. He is now in Washington. Capt. Pillsbury and Lieut.. Orchard are the other two members of the com mission. All belong to the engineer ing corps of the U. S. army.
 Capt, Pillsbury is stationed at Skag- way. He came west recently to sup erintend preliminary work for a bridge over the Tazlina river on the Valdez trail, and has just come out. He re- ports that winter travel over the trail has ceased.