The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser., 1913-08-15
Statement of 0. Z. Weller about
Foreign Trip

rOTelSn HIP
commissioner Miller and myself
spent about three weeks on the other
side,- one in London attending the
International Road Congress and the
other two in an automobile, examin-
ing perhaps 1900 miles of roads in
France, England and Wales The re-
suit of our observation is not unfav6r-
able to our roads The best foreign
roads are not better than the best
American roads. There are simply
more of them. That is the difference
In Great Britain and Continental
Europe, the bad read is the exception,
while in the country, the bad road is
the rule. This is because the United
States is in a comparatively new and
formative period Of its development
and with an enormous road mileage of
2,250,000 miles, to the improvement of
which we have only been recently de-
voting our energies.
During the last year, have attended
the American Road Congress at Allan
tic City, the American Road Builders
Association at Cincinnati, the Federal
Aid Road Convention at Washington
and the recent International Road Con-
gress in England. These gatherings
afford an interchange of ideas and ex
periences of road builders and engineers
and are very instructive and benefi-
cial. The problem OF modern road
building has not yet been worked
out, but it will be solved in America
and not in Europe. Our country has
taken hold of the job in earnest; and
we have the money, the brains, the
energy and the courage to work it
out. This fact is recognized by France,
which has had M. de Pulligny, the
Chief Engineer of Roads and Bridges
of that country, in the United States
for nearly year with corps of as
sistants to secure the best and latest
practice on this important question.
No intelligent comparison of the
European roads and ours can be made
without taking into consideration the
difference In conditions, which are
much more favorable there than here.
The first point to be considered is that
there is practically no new construction
on the other side Their roads have
been in progress of building for hun
dreds of years, and their problem is
almost exclusively now one of proper
maintenance. We were surprised to
find in France, whose patrol system
has been held up to the world as
model, that lutte care is being paid to
the maintenance of their State Roads
according to modern standards. The
only oiled roads we saw in France
were within radius of Is or 20 miles
of Paris where the motor traffic is
heavy and where the macadam roads
are full of holes and rapidly going, to
pieces. In the 500 miles of rural
French roads we covered in days, we
did not see single road that had been
oiled, not one road roller at work, rare
ly ever culvert,' very little wheel
traffic, not half dozen motor trucks,
perhaps not more than a dozen auto
mobiles day, nearly ali filed with
Americans, and only 4 patrolmen at
work, and these were shaping up the
shoulders and not repairing the road.
The only reason the roads of France
are good is because they have not been
subjected to such heavy automobile
traffic as we have in Maryland, and
even as it is they already show signs
of deterioration. Ii they are not pro-
tected by proper top dressing within
the next year or two, they will begin
to ravel and rut and will degenerate
badly.
In England the roads are much bet
ter than in France, but even there as
much care is not given to prompt main
tenrnce as we are endeavoring to use
in Maryland. When hole appears IN
an English macadam road it is not at
once filled up with patch, but the
holes are permitted to increase until it
is necessary to rebuild the road, which
is then done in sections of generally
from one quarter of a mile to mile in
length In other words, they
rebuild their roads rather than
maintain them. This means a great
waste of money and is system we
could not afford in our State. 1t should
be borne in mind that England and
France are practically as rich as the
whole United States and that each of
these countries is smaller than some
of our States. This means that they
can afford to spend and do spend many
times more than we do on the main
tenance of their roads, while their
cost of construction has already been
paid for
Among the many advantages they
have over US are: An equal climate
without extremes of heat or cold, and |
without much frost or hot weather; a |
rainfall which is just about sufficient |
to keep macadam road in good shape; |
no violent storms or heavy rainfalls; |
simple draining problems; level and |
uniform country; good soil foundation
for roads; cheap labor; more money; |
lower freight rates on road material:
cheaper stone; light motor and wheel |
traffic; road beds many Of which have
been in process of up-building since the |
daVS of the Romans, proper traffic reg
llations; better observance Of the
avs relating to roads; small territory
and road mileage, etc.
Mr. Crowley Withdraws from Regis
ter of Wills Race
Landover, Md, Aug. y, 1913.
Mr.. Editor:
After carefully weighing the politi-
.aI SituatiOn 7 have concluded that the