The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1915-08-03
Building Permanent Roads.
From the Christian Science Monitor.

How much the tax payers of the United States
have lost in the last fifty years through the prac-
tice of make-shift road building it would be impos-
sble to say. 1t would probably amount to the
enormous total expenditure roadway rebuild
ing, to say the least, and such method of figuring
would take no account OF the cost or time, Oh de-
lays of the wear and tear vehicles. In the be-
ginning settlers were obliged to do the best they
could with the means and materials on hand, and
probably reasonable person in these days will
critcise them for the crudity of their processes If
farmers they had to have roads of some kind to
the market towns, and for anything in the nature
of trail or a lane over which they could drive
a yoke of oxen a team of horses they were
grateful But, speaking of the greater part of the
country all this of more than fifty years ago.
Since the close of the civil war, at least, means
and material for better road building have been
in the hands of public bodies. There has been
great improvement in highway construction dur
ing the half century, or course, but 1t mas been
improvement accompanied by enormous waste, and
throughout great the roadways of today, laid
at great cost and presenting in most cases, per-
haps, an inviting appearance, are of merely tenn
porary construction They lack the foundations that
will demand more than careful maintenance
in the future In most cases they are destined
to crumble and to call for reconstruction.
protest against this kind of road building and
a demand for work that will deserve to be called
permanent are heard in Minnesota, state that in
recent years has been striving toward thoroughness
in all directions. The authorities of the county in
which Minneapolis is situated have recently made
some appropriations for the construction of
roads. These are to be graveled or macadamized
roadways. They are, in other words, to be make
shifts. They will do to bridge the present
need. In few years they will have to be rebuilt.
What they certain to cost for reconstruction
later on, added to what they cost now, would pay
for the building of roads of lasting quality This is
the occasion of the protest and demand. Mantle
nance of poorly constructed highways means
slant drain the public funds. Roads laid
substantial foundations the most economical in
the long run, matter how much higher the cost,
because they are laid to stay Ordinary will
preserve them in good condition for years.
casional top dressing will carry them not merely
through decades but through centuries.
The English roads and most of those the
continent built The construction of their
foundations in many instances dates back to Ro-
man times. Neither in Minnesota in any other
state of the American union is there any real
sity for the kind of curtament of expenditure that
compels resort to the makeshift and the tempo
rary. The obligation of this generation to build
for the future, not altogether for ITSELF should be
recognized. 1t is not economy to persist in pub
lie work construction of any kind that must be
done again periodically. Whatever is done
should be done we'll If this shall be accepted as
the motto of communities in road building and
lived up to there will be less occasion few years
hence to apologize for the condition of the city
street of the rural highway.