Jamestown weekly alert. [volume] (Jamestown, Stutsman County, D.T. [N.D.]) 1882-1925, 1913-06-19
POINTS ON sAK|NG
OF EARTH ROADS
THE NEED OF A CROWN THE
FIRST THING TO BE
CONSIDERED.

The federal government is making
an effort to spread information
throughout the various states in the
matter of road improvement, and the
Office of public roads, under the de-
partment. of agriculture, furnishes
reports on various experiments tried
by the government. The average
resident of the rural districts knows
full we'll the causes of poor roads,
but is often inclined to forget the
principal points in. the work of road
making on earth roads. The repair
and maintenance of earth roads has
usually been done in a hasty, slip
shod manner-anything to get
through with the job and pay the
road taxes. The money is often
wasted in the construction of roads
that are soon in a worse condition
than before. The following points
in regard to the repair of earth roads
are we'll worth repeating, even if
they are known to many who are
charged with the work of repairing
the public highways.
If you look at the ordinary coun-
try road after a shower you will see
small puddles along the wheel ruts
and sometimes larger pools. This
water stays on the road surface be-
cause it cannot drain away into the
side bitches. If you look closely you
will see side bitches which have
grown up with bushes and weeds in
many cases, and which are so far
from the travelled part of the road
that the rain water does not drain
into them. That part of the road
way where the wagons travel is
called the travelled way. To prevent
water standing on the travelled way
the road should be raised in the cen
ter aud should slope Sentiy tnt9
broad shaiIe ftches. II Is Their
said to have a crown. If it is ten
feet from the center of the road to
the side ditch, the surface at the side
ditch should be at least ten inches
lower than it is at the center where
the horses travel. The road then
has a ten inch crown. The rain that
falls on a road properly crowned
will run quickly to the side and will
Sn&1 form
pools. The side bitches for surface
water should run parallel to the
right of way, and should be open at
every low point SO that the water
can run out of them into neighbor-
ing brooks or streams. If the ditch
es merely collect the water from the
road surface and it cannot run away
large pools will be formed along the
road side, which will gradually soak
into the soil beneath the road and
make it so soft that the wheels of
wagons will cut through the road
surface and soon destroy it.
Sometimes water runs from land
along the road into the road and
forms little stream down the
wheel tracks or in the middle where
the horses travel. When drive ways
into farm yards are built across the
side bitches, they frequently form
channels for water to run from the
farm yard into the road. The pipes
under driveways become filed with
leaves or rubbish and the water can
no longer run away. If the drive
ways that stop the ditch water were
rebuilt so that no pipes were neces-
sary and the ditch could be left open
much trouble from surface water
would be stopped.
Sometimes a road runs across low
ground or through q swamp where
the road cannot be drained by side
bitches alone. II the road were
built higher, like a railroad embank-
ment across such low land, and made
with a crown, it would be dry and
hard. Sometimes q road passes
through what Is called a cut. This
Is place where the earth has been
dug out so that the road can go over
4 hill without being too steep. The
water which always flows quietly
under ground on hillsides is known
rs ground water. In road cuts such
water sometimes makes the road very
muddy and the road then needs
what road builders call underdrain-
age. "A good kind Of undertakings
ls q trench to go along under the
side drain, and about three feet deep
and q foot and q half wide. In this
trench a pipe is laid near the bottom
and covered with loose stones no
bigger than an egg. When the
trench is completely filled with loose
stones the ground water, instead Of