The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1909-11-13
Trunk Line Highways.

/ liHc p6IHduSHl highways III NelnOHt
Trunk line highways are all right
when they are all paid for. But to
start in now to build several hundred
miles of that kind of road would be
folly The immense increase in sal
aries and appropriations within a
year has placed this State close to
the point of being obliged to levy a
direct tax to defray current expenses.
1t would hardly be wise to plunge in
to debt trying to compete with more
wealthy states in the matter of high
ways. Under our present system
trunk lines will exist in time for the
county highway commissioners are
seeing to it that the State money is
expended on the main thoroughfares;
and our roads are surely, though
gradually becoming better and better
each year 1t is better to let good
things come slowly than to plunge
heavily into debt for them. Lon
donderry Sitter
The Messenger hasn't heard any
'howling' for trunk line highways,
but it has heard some very earnest
men talk very earnestly in support
of the idea, and it has on occasion
been glad to join with some of its
contemporaries in earnestly advocat-
ing trunk line highways too. If to
be in earnest is to howl, then let
us have more of it.
It is true that it is one thing to
propose some departure in the way
of building public improvements and
quite another thing to show how the
proposition can be financed. Theory
is, indeed, oftentimes easier than
practice. But the trunk line high
ways proposition is not a new and
unteted theory; it is born of the
everyday, matter-of-fact, common
place business experience of some
of the most progressive common
wealths in the Union.
How does a man start in business
when he has no capital? He Dor
rows money. How does city build
a reservoir or city hall building or
lay its sewers or pave its streets
II borrows money 1t is considered
good plain common sense to borrow
money TO start in business when
there is a reasonable prospect that
the business will repay the loan with
interest and leave the borrower with
his own business all paid for In the
end. Indeed, so complicated is mod
ern commercialism that it is we'll
nigh hopeless for any man to think
OF venruring into trade without a suf
hcient capital at the state to put him
on fair terms of competition with
men already established in that
trade, and most business houses are
now and have been for generations
founded upon borrowed money
What is considered to be good
plain business sense for the indiyid-
ual is logically 10 be considered
common sense for group of indiyi-
duals making up a community when
the undertaking proposed by that
community is also business venture
and offers as reasonable prospects Of
being successful one. No city can
expect to do business today without
an up-to-date sewer system, plenty of
pure water, well paved streets, and
various other investments. Proper
ty owners in that city know that If
they do not maintain these things
erty at a direct loss before very
long. They consider it good PLAN
common sense to borrow money on
their city bonds to use in buying the
city's stock and fixtures and munich
pal economists undertake to show
that, in the long run the prudent ex-
penditure of such borrowed money
not only helps to save money on pri-
yate property already owned in the
city but actually tends to enhance
it's value to a point that enables the
city ultimately to pay back the Dor
rowed money and have something
left ahead that it did not own before
it borrowed the money and probably
could never have owned it if it did
not borrow.
Why is it not good business policy
for city, also good business policy
for State? Where is the line of
demarcation that separates our inter
ests as taxpayers dwelling upon
city street that we demand shall be
kept in first class condition and as
taxpayers dwelling upon country
road that is a veritable Slough OF.
Despond for more than half the year?
If an investment for first class
streets is a good business PROPOSE
ton for the city, why is not an in
vestment for first class highways a