The French Broad hustler. [volume] (Hendersonville, N.C.) 1896-1912, 1907-06-20
. Good Roads. i
Roads in the South.

No movement calling for oDular
aid or cooperative assistance on the
part of legislative and commercial
bodies has made such rapid progress
in 80 short time as the good roads
movement in the South. While this
movement is general throughout the
country and seems to be attracting all
elements to it's support, in the South.
where great natural are
being developed at an unprecedented
rate, and where facilities for trans
portation are a matter of immediate.
pressing concern, largely made so
during the past three years, this sub
iect of improved country highways is
taking deeper root with the people
than in most other sections. ,
The commerce of the world comes
primarily from the ground, and as a
rule the cost of transporting a prod
uct is relatively higher in the initial
stage-from the field or mine to the
railroad, river or canal-than in any
other part Of its journey to the
worlds markets. The most expensive
and the most oppressive kind of
transportation is wagon transports
ton, where it is accomplished over
bad roads, but this fact is often lost
sight of by communities which ad-
dress themselves to the work of cor
recting alleged inequalities in the
freight rates charged by railroad and
steamboat companies.
A village in the West, which had
its own peculiar grievance touching
freight rates, was so situated that
all the incoming freight delivered by
local railroad had to, be hauled up
a steep hill in wagons, on which only
half an ordinary load could be drawn.
This condition was complacently SUBJ
mitted to for a number of years,
when it occurred to somebody to sug-
gest that the point Of attack might
be probably shifted from the rail-
road, or its attitude on the subject
of freight rates, to this hill. When
this suggestion was acted upon,
finally, resulting in the cutting down
of the grade, the reduction in cost
of local carriage one-half, and a CORE
spending saving in cost of t~ransporta-
ton greater than could possibly have
resulted hadthe railroad granted all
that was asked, the business men of
thiS village realized that they had
been guilty of an error of omission
in not having figured, at an earlier
day, the cost of transportation to and
from the doors of their stores and
warehouses instead of between sta
lions on the railroad, and that it is
possible for a short piece of neglected
wagon road to be an important adj
verse factor in the relations of their
community with distant markets.
The encouragement given to the
good roads movement in the South
by the Southern Railway, beginning
in 1901, when It c~o-operated with the
United States Agricultural Depart
ment and the National Good Roads
Association in an expedition for
building object-Tesson roads in the
Southeastern sections of the country,
is a consistent part of the policy
which aims at the development of it's
territory.
In recent years 50 much has been
0OAS ~ pS14OSS NLo444A 4O40IAOho ~
tween Southern Railway points and
all the great commercial centres, not
only of this country but OF the world,
that it is simply logical to extend
the system of economical distribution
of products to the home of the farm
er, and the way to accomplish this
Is through the Improvement of the
c0uufrv wagon roads
One of the most promising and
gratifying features Of Southern de-
veIopment to-day is the activity dis
played by commercial bodies in pro-
noting road building In the country,
assuming part of the burdens in
many instances, and thus recognizing
what has been so long largely ig-
nored-the mutual interest and in
terdependence of town and country in
one of the most important move
ments of the time.-Southern Field.
"