The Canon City record with which is consolidated the Canon City cannon., 1912-01-25
THE STATE
GOOD ROADS
CONVENTION

Roads convention held in this city
during the past week. The convention
resulted in awakening the people ii
the entire state as they have never
been made to realize before what good
roads really mean. Good roads have
heretofore been of little concern -
anybody except the farmer or the al
tomobilist. Today in Colorado the
question of good roads as movement
of nationwide importance has taken
its proper place at the top of the list
of live problems of the day, and it Is
there to stay.
Months of publicity and almost 4
years notice of this, the annual meet
ing of the Colorado Good Roads CO.
ference, failed to arouse much inter-
est in the convention or its doings un-
til it came to be realized that South
ern Colorado, that section of the state
which had ceased to build roads on
paper, but which had taxed its various
counties and raised money to, build
roads on dirt and rock, had reached
stage in road development SO f'r-
ahead Of almost every section OF Col
orado as to place the Santa Fe trail
and Rainbow route so far in advance
of the construction of other sections
of a proposed Colorado link in a
transcontinental highway that Denver
and its immediate vicinity awcke an
found that they We're likely to be
found asleep at the plow and scraper
when the convention opened, that fin
ally caused the convention to become
one of the most exciting and iteresting
OF any similar convention ever held IN
the United States.
The truth of the whole matter is
Just this: Southern Colorado has ex-
pended hundreds of thousands of dol
lars in building roads in all direc-
tions, and the money and work thus
expended, particularly IN that section
of the state from Holly to Grand juno
ton and from Pueblo north and south,
has given this section OF the state
more and far better roads than any
other portion of Colorado. and thru
a country which is Garden of Eden
and the Switzerland of America. Sui
denly realizing this. and having IN
mind the forthcoming meeting at
Washington of the National Good
Roads convention, Denver and few
other Colorado counties sought not
only to prevent Southern Colorado
from placing the Centennial state on
the map as the mountain link in great
sranscontinetal highway, but the truth
of the matter is Denver actually de-
,nanded by its action in the convention
that Pueblo and Southern Colorado
halt in the development and advertis-
ing OF its roads until Denver ald
Northern Colorado could catch up i'll
the procession.
This Southern Colorado firmly re-
fused to do. and in taking the position
that it was entitled to reap the bene-
fits of its efforts during the last two
or three years to build roads inste I'd
of air castles, and in refusing to 1e
halted by the demands of Denver, Pu-
eblo and Southern Colorado accom-
Dlished more TO stimulate the building
of good roads in all parts of the state
than II Southern Colorado had agreed
to compromise its position in the con-
vention just ended.
Pueblo and Southern Colorado have
been placated and sidetracked by
Denver for the past ten years or moro.
and If the future had anything similar
in store for Pueblo to that which has
so often taken place in the past then
Pueblo and Southern Colorado were
entirely justified in holding the al
vantages which years of effort and
thousands of dollars expended 10