The Washington times., 1912-07-20
ENGLISH PEER, ON
VISIT HERE, CALLS
ROADS INADEQUATE
Says We Should Appropriate
for Upkeep of High
ways.

That there are plenty of automobiles
but no good roads In this country to
run them on, attesting that the art Of
road building in America has not kept
pace with the motor car industry, 10 the
opinion expressed by Lord Montagu, of
Beaulieu, who represents the motoring
fraternity In the English house of lords.
Lord Montagu, who was in Washing
ton some weeks ago, and was extensively
entertained while here by Vice Presi-
dent Sherman and others. has just re-
turned to New York, after an extensive
trip through the Middle Atlantic States
and Canada, during which time he visit
ed many Of the automobile manufactur-
ing centers and carefully studied the
road conditions during his trip.
Gives Views.
In an interview Lord Montagu relates
in an interesting way the impressions
he has gathered during his sojourn In
this country.
Here in America you have three
quarters of a million cars and next
year you will have a million, and yet
you have no roads to run them upon"
he said. mot that you do not spend
enough money; your appropriations are
the money in building the roads and
hardly any in keeping them up. There
seems to be no legislative method OF
obtaining money to maintain the roads
the roads were built before the motor
car; in many instances these come
down from the early Romans. Our
whole road system has gradually de-
| veloped and we have regular main
tenance tax laid upon the road users.
Your roads have come after the auto
mobile and you eat up your appropria-
tions in building. but there is no sys-
tenn by which you tax those who use
the road, in order to maintain II.
why, II you had good roads through:
out the country, tens of thousands OF
| foreign tourists would gladly pay a
| tax of say 81 for each fifty miles to
come to the United States and view its
an enormous inflow of foreign money
into the country. The customs house
could make arrangements with tour
lists who intended taking their cars out
again so that there would be little ex-
pense in that direction.
"Now these tourists are kept away by
the roads The best roads l have seen
during the time ! have spent In trav-
cling about the country have been In
the vicinity Of New York, Boston, and
Washington. Throughout the middle
West the roads are nearly all dirt and
are in extremely bad condition.
| Can't See End.
! Regarding the motor car industry
itself, needless to say It is tremendous;
It Is growing so fast that 1t is impossi-
BILE to tell where we will end. In the
cheaper cars especially the manufacture
ing business is tremendous, as Is shown
by the great number of your low-priced
cars which are sold in England. We
have not done much in the cheap car
way. but so far have left that for you
to do.
"The use of the car in England is
different from what 1t is in the United
States. You use your cars mostly for
pleasure driving; we have outgrown
that. Our business men use their cars
to come to the office. We use them IN
place of the trains In our own office
there are gentlemen who come from
their homes, forty miles from town
daily in their cars. America has not
reached the stage yet where automo'
.biles are used on a large scale for pur::
poses of utility: here they are used
nearly entirely for pleasure purposes.