The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1912-10-31
Members of County Board Learn from
Experience in Milwaukee the Real
Trouble in Getting Results in Road
Work in This County,

sunday WneH DIS SueStS VI Ih0 A0AooAA"
Automobile Club the party of more
than forty people made an inspection
of the permanent roads built by Mil
waukee county this year. The trip
which was one Of the most pleasant
junketing trips ever arranged for the
county solons had as it's special object
the demonstration of the superiority of
the concrete road way and most of the
members of the party returned to Ke-
nosha late Sunday evening convinced
that the concrete road was the real So
luton of the permanent highway for
the rural districts. The day proved a
most interesting one and the members
of the boards secured a lot of informa-
tion which had been gathered through
the experience of the Milwaukee county
road department. The visit to Milwau-
kee brought an answer to the question,
What is the matter with Kenosha road
building and the answer was that the
road building lacked business manage
ment and was being carried forward
without proper study of the subject.
It is most probable that the visit will
make change in the entire road prob
lem in this county in the future and
that the supervisors will insist that per-
manent roads be built even though only
few rods of road are built each year.
Most interesting of the events of the
day was the actual inspection work.
The members Of the board saw roads
completed, in course of completion, and
roads which had been simply graded for
building. They had chance to judge
between the macadam and concrete
roads as Milwaukee county has put in
both kinds of work this year and the
declaration of the officials of that coun-
ty was that they had decided to expend
all their money in the future in the
building of concrete roads. The Keno
sha men were taken over miles Of these
roads and every one of them proved
highly satisfactory.
H. J. Kueling, commissioner of high
ways for Milwaukee county and the
members of the Milwaukee county com
mittee on roads gave up the entire day
to the work of fraternizing with the
Kenosha county men. Mr.. Kueling
showed what had been done by his
county. He showed that the average
cost of the concrete road had run
from "a cents to $1.10 yard and that
the cost of the macadam roads had run
from Sc to 80 cents a yard. He declar-
ed that in his opinion the life of the
concrete roads would be many times
that of the macadam and that after ma
ture consideration he had advised the
abandonment of the building of all
roads other than concrete. f. I'll. Jaco-
bus, who is chairman Of the Milwaukee
county committee made the same state
ments and declared that during the
coming year Milwaukee county would
spend nearly half million dollars in
the building Of concrete roads. He stat
ed that before this plan had been de-
cided on the committee had visited
many counties in different states and
had decided that the concrete road was
the best by all measures.
The visitors saw concrete roads under
construction in the village of South
Milwaukee and in several of the towns
of the county. Milwaukee county has
built most of her roads with a width
of eighteen feet, but in some of the
less Travelled districts the roads are but
eight and nine feet in width and these
roads seemed to give entire satisfac
ton. In Milwaukee county the work
of building the roads has been done Iii
rectly under the supervision Of the
county road committee and in South
Milwaukee village the work was done
by contract. The officials held that
there was large saving by having the
work done under the direction of the
committee rather than by contract.
Kenosha men raised the question that
the work here had not proceeded well
under the committee and highway COM
missioner plan and Mr.. Kueling in re-
Spouse declared that if this was the
fact that the trouble was with the COM
mittee and the commissioner. He made
a strong plea for business methods in
the handling of the road work and
showed the methods that had been in
use in his office in Milwaukee. He de- |
clared that the committee must be
moving force in the county and able to
take the matter out of the hands of the
workmen and provide ex-
perieneed men to build the roads.
The trip of inspection proved some
thing of social function. With per-
feet weather the auto run to Milwaukee