Los Angeles herald., 1909-12-19
These contracts are itemized as fol-

limits to Sawtelle. 773 miles.... 9s,524 Sc
Grading and macadamizing Long
Beach boulevard from Compton to
Long Beach. e.Ss mlies............... 56,742 90
Building reinforced concrete bridge,
32O5 feet long, and three pile tres
ward 12.SOOOO
ton street, Ii5 miles.................. 12.7SO.OO
and Prospect avenues, so5 miles,. S2,95OOO
Grading approaches to Verdugo wash
bridge on San Fernando road........ 1.S5OOO
Grading and building on Ionia walk
extension, "A miie.................... 4.s75.OO
Building two cuverts on Allen ave-
nue. and Colorado street. 650.OO
iunga wash ............s............... 1900 90
Total ,,.,...........,.......... .$277, oil Sc
ut appears from the above table
that the contracts have been awarded
for roads leading to different parts OF
the city of Los Angeles so as to give
all districts of the county, as nearly
as possible, the same advantage In re-
ceiving benefits from the first work
to be done. None of these contracts
extend far into the country districts,
but Ii is advisable not to build isolated
pieces of road and much better to begin
at the city limits of Los Angeles and
extend outward to the final limits OF
the county as rapidly as possible.
Work has not yet been commenced
on all of these contracts but on most
of them, so that there is now work
being carried on under contracts
amounting to $265,211.56 in value. The
value of construction work completed
to November /, 1909 according to the
contract prices. is $69,500
Progress of the Work, Generally
There has been planned altogether
a total of 3075 miles of road work to
be carried out under the bond issue
already voted. OF the total amount,
20S miles have been surveyed and To-
Gated so that contracts for same can
be let in the near future. This leaves
99h miles to be surveyed and located
before plans and specifications can be
made.
"I was unable to learn the number
of miles of rights of way already Sc
cured, or yet to be secured, In time
for this report. There has been some
difficulty and considerable work re-
quired for obtaining rights of way on
certain roads, to which the titles were
found to be imperfect. Substantial
progress has been made IN securing
these rights of way, but the records
were not in such shape that / could
secure the information with the time
at my disposal.
Work Completed
1.-THE only piece of road which is ac-
tually completed at the present time is
the Ell Monte road. This was not COM
pleted on November /, when / visited
it. but was in such condition that
estimate its completion by December
1. l made a careful examination of
this work to determine its character,
and since that time have also visited
the rock quarries at Spadra from
which the crushed rock for the Ell
Monte road is being obtained. From
my examination of the work / was
able to draw the following conclusions:
"Flrst-The foundations have been
well constructed and rolled and are
amply protected against softening by
the construction of drains and oiled
wings on each side of the macadamized
roadways. l detected only two places
where there is evidence of soft foun-
dation, and these had already been
ordered replaced by Mr.. Loder, chief
engineer of the highway commission.
Second - Concrete culVertS and
bridges had been constructed accord
ing to excellent designs and of good
materials The workmanship on these
is as good as / have seen on similar
work anywhere.
"Third-The rock used for this piece
of road was not found to be as satis-
factory as 1t should be. 1t Is an an
desite rock, but the deposit contains
many soft veins and pockets, so that
much material too soft for road pur-
poses is obtained, even when ordinary
care is used in excluding 1t. do not
believe that this can be overcome as
long as the rock is secured from Spa
4 ha 4a