Imperial Valley press., 1914-05-29
WORK ON HIGHWAYS
ADVANCING RAPIDLY


| Following requests from many mo-
torists, officials of the Automobile
Club of Southern California have pre-
pared a resume of the work actual
ly accomplished in Southern Califor-
MIA by the state highway commits
sion.
Just how many miles of state high
way are finished and where are they?
are two of the questions which have
! been answered from the data gath
cred at Automobile Club headquar-
ters.
Motorists who are often blocked in
their tours are impatient with what
they consider to be the slow work
on the state highway, and the Auto
Club shows that in reality the work
has been progressing rapidly and eff
ficiently.
"There are 14O miles of completed
state highway south of the Tehach-
epi," said France Geary of the en-
gineering department of the Automo-
bile Club yesterday. "Of this total,
the longest single stretch is near
Oceanside on the coast road to San
Diego. Here there are twenty-five
miles of continuous paved highway"
That motorists fail to realize the
labor connected with the building Of
even one mile of the new highway, is
stated by Mr.. Geary. "In many in
stances, after the contract is let for
a bit of road, the work has to begin
at the beginning with a new survey"
he said
"After the survey. comes new grad
ing, leveling and culvert work. This
is followed by the shipment of roc,
cement and other materials, which
must come up to a specified grade or
be sent back. There is a great deal
of time consumed in giving it time
to harden, even before it is surfaced
Motorists should realize all this when
they complain that the work seems to
be slow.
Frank Jordan of the touring infor-
nation department of the Auto Club
has estimated, from reports of con-
tractors, that the work to be done
on the state highway in TETON pass,
running south from Lebec on The
summit of the ridge west of Quail
lake, a distance of twelve and one
half miles will consume just one
year in the doing.
At no time during the course Of
construction will the TETON route be
closed, he states. The cost of the
work will be approximately $16S,000
to ghe state and $4,000 barrels Of
cement will be used. More than $50
men and $50 head of stock will be
employed in the undertaking to make
this twelve miles of road one of the
finest stretches in the world.
The average haul for the materials
will be forty miles, and the equip
ment will include one steam shovel
In the excavation process $4,000 GU
bic yards of earth will be removed
This gives an adequate idea of the
largeness of the undertaking which
the state commission has assumed in
preparing Southern California high
ways for 1915.
In showing on map just what
| has been finished, France Geary esti-
mates that 140 miles are completed
for LEGAL motorists. There are 25
miles near Oceanside, seven miles be-
tween Anaheim and Santa Ana, three
miles between Anaheim and Fuller
| ton, and two miles north of Fuller
ton.
North of Los Angeles there are
twenty-three miles completed on the
route to Santa Barbara. On the Foot
hill boulevard east of Los Angeles
there are six miles. Between Wine
vile and Riverside there has beeu
completed a stretch nine miles in
length ,and between Ontario and Po-
mona seven miles. In addition to
these pieces, there are other bits which
have been added to the total, which
are completed but not yet in use.