The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1909-08-10
CONNECTICUT ROADS RAPIDLY
 GIVING OUT
Sober Conclusions Drawn From Comparison With Massachusetts Highways
 Building and Keeping.

O I That something is the matter with Connecticut roads is the constant com plaint which has been made by auto mobilists during the past few months. In view of the liberal provisions made by the Legislature for road building this seems a bit ungrateful but, as a matter of fact, the trouble is not with the amount of road building being done. but with the way in which the roads once built are kept in order. To towE roads and State roads criticism are alike applied.
 The one great cry since high-pow- cred automobiles became universal has beer that they were highly destruc- tive to the roads and, now, even the most optimistic of automobilists makes no pretense of denying this. But, on the other hand, the automobile has become so universally the common means of locomotion thats to say that roads are used more by. automobiles than by horses, would hardly be an exaggeration - especially when the trunk roads and main highways are kept in mind. The inevitable conclu- sion is that, as roads are built for the greatest number of users. the time is at hand if it has. not already arrived, when roads must be constructed with a distinct ioea of withStanding auto mobile traffic.
 To know that they are not with standing it at the present time one has only to take a car and go out of the city ten miles in practically any direction-to New Haven, to Hartford, to Springfield. In every case it will be found that the hard macadam road is being worn in two little furrows in which the large stones of the bed have been laid practically bare while, in the center and in patches all through the bed the top dressing has entirely dis appeared leaving hollows of large ct md Q Tcr11 n1II1 nv Scattered for stretches, 100 yards or more in length, moreover, will be patches of loose stone Strewns appar- ently for the single purpose of; pune of these evils are obvious. The pow erfu1 grind of the automobile tires passing over the road with their adhe- sive rubber surface whirls the top dressing from the bed stone beneath The wind catches it up or the rain washes it off and the large stones are left more exposed at the passing of every automobile.
 There is, it has been said, no way to cure these evils except to rebuild the road. To .confute such a state ment one has only to cross the Con- necticut line into Massachusetts and see what is happening .there-smooth roads, no. ruts and a smooth, firm, hard dressing like a cinder track. What is the difference-tbe method of construction or the method of preser-
 
 . To get an idea of the difference take a motor from Hartford to Enfield street and from Enfield street to Northampton, or, better sti1l,: take the border and" then the Massachusetts roads from Long1neadow to Boston. On the one hand they are rutty, filled with hollows, strewn with loose stones. On the other they are smooth as a floor, dustless, and with the top dress ing still serving it's purpose.
 Two very apparent differences sug- gest themselves, even to an amateur, in a comparison of the construction and maintenance of the two. roads. The first is obvious in an instant-the Massachusetts roads are oiled and the Connecticut roads are not. Put on, originally, simply as a, dust-layer, the tar dressing of Massachusetts is serv- ing the very admirable purpose of a binder. Not only is the dust nuisance entirely ahated, but the oil dressing its place, binds it together, and makes it more than ever a hard, smooth fin ish for the road.
 The second difference is that the Connecticut roads are crowned or rounded over at the top, while the Massachusetts roads are flat. At first glance the Connecticut method would seem superior, but results would ap- parently not show it to be so. A dirt road must, of necessity, be crowned to let the water, run off and to keep it from forming deep quagmires. In macadam road there is, apparently, no such danger and good deal of harm. The water running off very swiftly takes the top dressing, worked loose by the automobiles, with it, and fur nishes one of the chief causes of the denudatiOn of the roads.
 Another argument against crowning the roads is, cautiously enough, attrib- utable to human nature. An automo- bile driver, on a crowned road very naturally drives nearly the ion of it as possible. If he goes off to one side he is, so to speak, on a side hill, and the weight of his car is not only thrown to one side, but the tires are put to a very heavy strain of being run over" exactly in the manner in which a high heel is run over if the foot is not set down square1y. Under these circumstances the whole instinct. of each and every driver is to keep as near possible to the top of the road, and, as all cars are travelling in practically the same place. the. result very shortly appears in two large ruts through the center of the road. In Massachusetts no such thing ap-1 pears. The roads are flat, or nearly flat, and the automobilist runs where chance happens to carry him. The likelihood of two drivers taking exact ly the same path is greatly reduced, and the wear and tear on one place is practically done away with More ever, instead of refusing to run off. the water on the flat roads serves a very useful purpose, and, instead of carrying away the top dressing, tends, apparently, to mat it down.
 Greatest of all is, of course, the tar dressing. Obviating the dust nuisance binding the top dressing and making a perfect running surface, the dressing is near the ideal, while, in the vicinity of large cities, the cost is nearly met by the saving in the matter of sprink- ling.
 Of course it is very easy to sit at ones desk and tell how to build roads, but, for all of that, the critic has the very obvious facts before him. An afternoons trip, of which part is in Massachusetts and part in Connecticut is the most convincing argument And