The Mankato free press., 1910-01-14
From Saturdays Daily.


to be submitted at last nights meet
ing. He prepared very excellent re
port and accompanied it with drawings
to illustrate the comparative use ant
worth2of different pavements, and how
some of them are laid, and presented
these to the council last night. Tha
august body did not even ask that th'
report be read, neither did single
alderman glance at the drawings. Th'
report represented great deal of work
and the council might at least hav,
listened ''tO it's reading and referred il
to the proper committee.
The following is Mr.. Wilson's report
Mankato, Jan. 7th, l9lO.-To tn,
Mayor and Common Council, Mankato
MINI. Dear Sirs: In compliance will
your order of Dec. that l gathe
some data and information in connec
tion with various forms of pavemen
and report on same with estimates O
cost, which / presume had special ref
erence to Second street.
letters to various city engineers asking
for their experience with different forms
of pavements, and also what form o.
pavement they would select on street
with. very little grade, moderately heavy
traffic, and being utilized both as {
business and residence street. Twenty
nine answers were received out of forty
sent out. While some of these answer:
are of little value the majority are
quite interesting And as might be ex
pected vary greatly on many vita
points; but taken as whole agree
fairly well after making due allowance
for local conditions.
Of those who stated their prefer,
ence for street as described above
one preferred macadam, two bitumin
Gus macadam such as "Tarvia" Tar
iod' etc, two asphalt, one concrete
seven brick and eight creoscoted wood
block. The average costs per square
yard of all answers received were as
follows: Macadam $O.55, bituminous
maeadam $l.l0, concrete $3.50, asphalt
sos, brick $l.92, and creosoted wood
block 1912.
s A few of the most interesting com
ments are as follows:
asphalt is the ideal pavement foi
residence or business streets where the
traffic, is not too heacy, creosoted block
equally. as good but more expensive
oni streets with heavy traffic we used
granite block, and where grade is
steep Kettle River Sandstone, bitulitrit
and brick on streets with moderate
traffic and moderate grade to 8 pei
cent creosote and asphalt is used Oh
Streets, up to per cent grade" City
Engineer, Milwaukee, Wis.
Ia "In this locality creosoted wood block
would be selected. On streets where
traffic is light the cost is too much
generally, for the abutting property
City Engineer, Appleton, Wis.
block when properly laid is
by far the best pavement. Brick block
is very good, but noisy. Asphalt is
good but not quite SO durable. Con,
crete is very hard for anything but
slow traffic. City Engineer, Sioux
City, Iowa.
81 iwould unhesitatingly recommend fo1
your use the creosoted block paving.
have given the matter of paving con-
study and have visited nearly
every city in the United States that
has creosote, and comparing this ma
terial with all others l will state that
for residence OF heavy traffic business
it comes the nearest to the perfect
pavement" City Engineer, Fargo
North Dakota.
= f<"Dear Sir: Enclosed find answers
to your question in regard to pave
ments. l think that Portland cement
concrete put in properly is the pave
ment for small towns on account of
first cost, cheapness to maintain and
being so easy to repair when holes
are: cut into the same by plumbers.
would name brick paving next. Creo-
soted wood block is the best of all for
both heavy and light traffic but its
first cost makes it almost prohibitive
We will pave about four miles of
streets this coming year most of it
being Portland cement paving planned; =
City Engineer, Mason City, Iowa.
"My preference is creosoted block. We
laid it here on our main business
street after making thorough inves-
tigation of various paving materials -
City Engineer, Albert Lea, MINI.
Local condition enter into the selec-
tion of a pavement to such an extent
as to make the preferences of other
cities of little value except as far as
certain qualities pertaining to some
specific form of pavement are concerned.
The points generally taken into con-
sideration in selecting a pavement are
these; first, cost, cost of maintenance,
ease Of traction, good foot hold, ease
Of cleaning, noiselessness, healthfulness,
freedom from dust and mud, comfort
the heat too rapidly. Now particular
values or rather comparative values
may be assigned to each of these after
taking grade, amount of traffic, width
Of street, character of soil, value of
property, the use to which
it may be put in the future as well
as that made of it at the present time.
I The most complete reports | have
hn oft