The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1909-06-16
ROADS
AND S.
ROAD MAnNe&A>
MAINTENANCE OF GOOD ROADS.
What Object-Lesson Roads Have
Demonstrated Thus Far.


roads have readily convinced the
people who have seen them that they
can hardly afford to go without such
highways, except in thinly inhabited
districts. Much os this evidence IS
In substance like that given In its re-
port for 1907 by the Rhode Island
Board of Public Roads. 1t says:
There is no doubt that these sam
pie half-mile roads started up the
taxpayers, in every town where the
worth of good roads has thus been
shown, to demand and to appropriate
the money for more roads of the
same sort. 1t is quite true that
other elements entered into the sit
uation; but to see was to believe
In his last biennial report State
Highway Commissioner Macdonald
of Connecticut said in essence that
many States began their road i'm
provement with a few thousand dol
lars, as an experiment rather than
as a fixed policy, ''and we find that
appropriations for this purpose by
those States have grown by leaps
and bounds, until now it is not
question of thousands but of millions
of dollars" showing clearly and en-
phatically that the people of the
country fully comprehend that old,
long established customs are wrong.
He adds:
''At no time in the history of our
State-aid plan has the movement re-
| ceived such universal recognition and
irrepressible popular demand for
highway Improvement as has been
| shown during the last two years.
| The usefulness, the economy and the
benefits to be derived from good
| roads have become so very manifest,
| even with the small amount of mo-
ney that has geen used during the
last twelve years, that it is almost
financial impossibility to meet the
demands of the people"
1t is true that some of the people
seem to understand that the better
the road the slower this wear, and
the smaller the cost of maintaining
the highway in good conditions but
others appear to believe that road
once made of stone, or of other dur
able material well used, should last
many years, if not forever, without
rpairs. In cases they have implied
| that there is no use spending So
600 to $4,000 mile to make n
good road, if we must pay out mo-
ney every year to keep that road
in good order
Compared with the work done or
the best public road ever made, the
work put into building the best of
known railroads is exceedingly cost
ly. Every practicable art has been
used, and enormous sums have been
spent to make such roads as nearly
perfect as is possible; yet every well
managed railroad, particularly the
more costly of them, keeps men at
work every day retouching here and
there. Almost every year such roads
are in effect rebuilt completely, ex-
cept so far as the heavier part of the
grading is concerned. No railroad
man would dream of letting a road
go years without repairing.
The better the highway can be
made, the less the cost of mainten-
|
valume of traffic that highway bears.
1t may even be that II a perfect wag
! on road, say of solid concrete OF
great thickness and largely of the
toughest and most durable of mater
ials, could be made and remain un-
broken by man, almost no repairing g
would be required in generations.
| inf nf a Of tnl
ford roads can not long endure much
wear of wheels and hoofs, of wind
and water, without mending. Usu-
ally the shorter the period between
repairs, the less costly they are
Where good care is taken of well
made roads the cost has been less
that that of keeping the ordinary
roads in good condition. AS in Mer.
Ger county, New Jersey, for example
where the people of a township had
long voted $1,S00 yearly for road
repairing, that annual cost was re,
duced to $500 BY macadamizing the
highways. Here was a direct saving
of $1,000 per annum, to be add
ed to the other benefits derived from
improvement of their roads.
Perhaps the truth that the best Is
the cheapest in the end is one oi
the hardest in the world for the Am,
orleans to learn. As a nation We
have always been in the habit o.
: patching matters up enough to lei
us get along some way, any way, fol
: the present. We act on the prin ci
, pie of one who has been credited will
: the saying, why should l do any
, thing for posterity? Posterity hal
done nothing for me-"
. A number of the twenty-four State
aid States have arranged to pay from
t their treasures part of the expens,
} of keping their improved roads il
} good condition. In other States tn,
whole cost of rpairing the highway
} falls on the taxpayers of the local.
!. ties in which those roads lie. Indi
: cations are that most of the State
, aid commonwealth will help thei
. different road districts to keep thei
. good roads in good order, befor
manv vaara mass swav -EO0d Road