The Sisseton weekly standard. (Sisseton, Roberts County, S.D.) 1892-1929, 1919-04-11
What Good Roads Will Do

all absorbing topic of those who
are interested nthe upbuilding
of the state, and while much has
been said about the good feat
ures these roads would bring
about so far as bringing the coun
try and the city together, there
has scarcely been any attention
given to the finer points in the
game" and one of these might
be the saving in gasoline as be-
between running over good drag
ged roads, macadamized roads or
the hard surface roads, and the
figures of an official test recently
made in Ohio to determine the
consumption of gasoline on all
kinds of roads, not only is inter-
esting but tends to furnish some
definite information.
To determine how much gaso-
line is required to pull a given
load over roads Of carrying sur
faces, five two-ton trucks were
Griven,-both loaded and empty
over seven different types of
roads on practically level ground
The greatest care was taken to
eliminate every unfair PROPOSE
tion in order to make a test that
could be depended upon. The five
trucks were new Army Standard
A. trucks, and on the seven types
of roads all five registered prac-
tically alike.
The following is the result in
terms of miles per gallon of gaso-
line consumed: 5:7S miles over
earth roads in good condition !;
7.19 over fair graveled roads;
9:39 over good gravel road; 9 ::48
over fair bituminous lnacadam !;
9:88 over fair brick roads; 11.44
over extra smooth brick roads;
and 1873 over good concrete
road.
One of the remarkable feat
ures of the test disclosed the
fact that putting the two-ton
load an the empty truck made
seven times as much difference in
gasoline consumed on a dirt road
as on a smooth hare, surface road
The zziiiiAois ,,iAn Of building
good roads includes a proposition
to issue bonds for sixty million
dollars to build five thousand
miles of paved roads. 1t has been
figured out that if five hundred
trucks were operated over these
roads three hundred days of the
year, the saving in gasoline
would amount annually to about
fifteen million dollars, or enough
to retire the bonds in four years.
The estimate does not include the
saving of wear and tear on tires
and machine, nor the added bene
fit to the state of the increased
traffic, due to the better kind of
road.
The results of the test are of
particular interest to South Da-
kota at the present time. Since
there is practically only one kind
of road in this State-pure hon.
est-to-goodness dirt-a compari-
son only between this kind and
the hard surface kind need be
made in order to show the enor-
NOUS amount of gasoline that
could annually be saved in the
state as between running OH good
dragged roads and the hard sur
faced kind.
The figures of the recent test
show that but 5.7S miles were
secured to the gallon on earth
road in good condition (and re-
member we have hundreds of
miles of this earth road that is
never in good condition) while
11.78 miles per gallon were secur-
ed over the hard surface roads,
or over twice as much mileage
could be gotten on the paved
roads.
Let's figure that South Dako-
ia this year has 10000 automo-
biles (ther were nearly that
number last year). Probably the
average car is driven at least
5000 miles a year, or total of
100000 miles. Figuring on the
basis of the above test, it can
readily be seen that only half the
gasoline would have been requir-
ed to run South Dakota cars if
the 'joy-riding' was on the hard
surfaced roads. The number of
gallons of gasoline purchased to
run South Dakota cars is some
thing we should hate to try to
figure out, but there is no ques-
ton but that John D. is the guy
who reaps the benefits because
we haven't the paved roads.