Webster City freeman. [volume] (Webster City, Hamilton County, Iowa) 1884-1946, 1914-06-16

trust dlSplSeS 1t is concrete or any
other paving not controlled by a
trust or a combination. Hence when
city council is disposed to play in
to the hands of the trust the result,
of course, is poor concrete paving
when that material is selected. The
contractors do not want to do a good
Job. They want to give concrete a
black eye. All they care for is to
put down a pavement that will stand
during the life of the guarantee and
the sooner it goes to pieces after
that the better it suits the contract
or, for then he can say, 81 told you
So" 1t is evident, however, that the
Sioux City council is working in the
interest of property owners and that
the contractors out that way are do
ing honest work at fair prices. Here
is what the Sioux City Journal says
to the doubling Thomases:
The doubling Thomas is abroad in
Iowa when it comes to concrete as
the ideal cheap pavement.
1t is source of surprise to GER
tain municipalities that Sioux City
should have had such great success
with concrete highways that it is
inclined not only to brag about
them, but even sends out the word
that it would be delighted to have
other cities look them over.
"Why is Sioux City able to make
this boast when here in Des Moines
what concrete has been laid has
been the most effective argument
against concrete for any roadmaking
purpose?" demands the Des Moines
Tribune.
eff Sioux City has learned the
trick of keeping concrete pavements
from cracking, we wish it would
teach our contractors how to do it,
for cracking means inevitable deter
ioration," declares the Cedar Rapids
Republican, skeptically concluding,
There may be something in con-
crete, but many of us still have to be
shown"
It must be confessed that some Of
Sioux City's early paving experien-
ces were not of the happiest. Per-
haps the less said about our old
block pavements the better. But ev-
en- the more modern sarcolithic job
on Fifth street was not so much bet
ter. AS to the concrete pavement,
however, Sioux City makes no apol-
ogies. If the commission plan had
nothing else to it's credit besides CIV
ing it twenty miles of concrete pave
ment-nearly all of it good-Sioux
City would feel kindly toward it for
that. The pavement is not only
cheap as compared with asphalt, for
which property owners long had
been paying a fancy figure, but it is
durable and likewise slightly. And
it had to make good in the face OF
considerable prejudice and dire pre-
dictions of disaster.
Whether or not the contractors
who lay concrete pavements in Sioux
City have some patented process
which they insist on keeping to
themselves, the fact remains that
they deliver the goods, and so we'll
pleased is the municipality with the
twenty miles of such pavement it
already has laid, it proposes to keep
laying more and more from year to
year until Sioux City becomes one
of the best paved cities in the middle
west.
The Commercial clubs invitation
to neighboring cities to send delega-
tions to Sioux City to inspect its
concrete pavements still holds good
now as to Des Moines
and Cedar Rapids, in view Of their
expressed dubiousness.
In commenting upon the forego-
ing from the Sioux City paper, the
Council Bluffs Nonpareil observes:
The makers of other paving ma
terial have fought valiantly to mys-
tify and prejudice the minds of peo-
pie on this paving question. And
for a long while they have held a
grip on business and induced them
to pay almost double the price of
good concrete paving for something
that was no better. The administra-
ton at Sioux City has lifted the veil
on this business and let in food of
light. Henceforth the increase in