Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1912-10-22
.PARKES SAYS THE SYSTEM Is GOOD In His Report to Levying Court County Engineer Tells of Districts.
 .syssr,
MANY IMPROVEM ENTS
Says More Roads Were Worked Past Fen Months Than Ever Worked
 Before in County.

The new county highway engineer,
 Major w. J. Parkes, has prepared an exhaustive report of the work ngs of the new road district system, author ized under a special act of the Legis- lature anI under which Major Parkes was appointed by County Judge Phil pot. His report is made to Judge ] Philpot, but will be read before the ] County Levying Court on Wednesday. In lis repor, Major Parkes says:
 Honorable c. M. Ph bot,
 County Judge,
 Pine Bluff Ark.
 nave to repor; as follows regard
 ing &orling aE;i c-nditicn of County
 roads and bIi1ges:
 W.en you appeinted me C3ura y Highway Engineer on January 1st, 1912, the County at that time had two t road -ort ts, ,qne on each side of the River. In accordance with your ,n- sis. rnclions4I carefully investigated the
 subject of the most satisfactory and
 economical waylof working the coun- ty roads and recommend to you, that
 you divide the county into seven dis Fricts, No. 1 being the City of Pne l Bluff and osher SIX being divided
 through the ,souny, three son each Eside of tle river,ss covering 'approxi- Rnate,y the. same Area. You saw fit
 to adopt this recommendation and to hput t into effect on April 1st, 1912. Fin order 10; db so it became necessary Itha; Wefpdrchase sufficient teams and
 equipment for the other four outfits,
 which the county has done. We now
 have six outfits on the field, three
 ons each side of the .aiyer:. .
 Each. severseer has ia certain terri
 t0ny and deyojes his en ire time to he I work; camps with his outfit and also
 acts as overseer, warning out the Ishands in that particular district. In
 order to accomplish this purpose the
 county had to purchase additional 5 mules, read machines, blows, scrapers
 and ether essentials. Each. of these
 outfits now have eight mules a first
 class road machine, and the necessary
 equipment of wheeled and drag scrap
 CTS, blows, wagons, etc, as well as
 tents and camping equipment EacE outfit represents an investment of ap-
 proximately $350G.0O' or a total fol the six of $21 100000. Of his amount four .futfits have been completely equipped this year and new road ma Il ch nes and other. equipment nave 1 been purchased for the remaining two outfits, so that about $17, ,500C0 has been expended this year in the equip
 ment of these road outfits. This rep,
 resens a draft on the county funds which will not have to be met neX year. I wish to recommend that, l possible, each outfit next year be gly
 en two more mules. Tn S is neces
 sary fer the following reasons: First
 it absolutely requires eight mules tt 7 Cperaje the road machines we ar'
 now using. If anything happens et incapacitate one of these mules w
 are unable to satisfactorily operate
 the toad machine. Second, we iron
 time to time have to do a cons derabl' } amount of slip work. This cannot b l economically done with only fou slip teams. If we had five teams WI would then have extra mules avail able if any hing happened, for us' with the road machines and woult also have a greater number for us with the scrapeTs.
 You have adopted policy, I which I heartily concur, of maEla' \ all your bridges and culyerts perma nent. We nave put in this year cor rugatad iron cuiverts 10 the amour of $6,700.o0, and have two ether ear loads of such culverts which have no been paid for. 5he payment thereon not yet being due. These eulVeru < represent permanent investment They are good for about twenty years and, in addition to ta's fact, they pre- < sent no obstruction 10 traffic like fh \ old wooden culyerts. They also pre- vent possible damage to live stock people using the road as was the eas < when wooden culverts were usea hope that you will continue this pol icy and we will eventually have Il wooden culverts in he county.
 Where the waterway has been lafs CT we have constructed concrete eu' yer.s and bradgess They sare perma x nent for a life time, CT longer. ! trust that you will continue the pol icy ti putting these in on all tn most important roads. It is not eco lnomical to construct cenerst l hridac longer than 40 feet unless tn