New Britain herald., 1922-11-03
GOVT. PLANS GREAT
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
In Next 15 Years Will Construct
 tSO,OOO Miles

Washington. Nov. s.-A program for good roads construction during the next 15 or 20 years which will make the road transportation facili- ties of the United States far exceed those of any other nation, in tho world. past or present. ia the aim oi the federal government. The high ways of Rome, even, whose fame has come down through the centuries will pale by comparison, officials de- clare. Under the program. there will be built. during the period, 1s0,0o miles of improved highways, which will constitute the federal-aid high way system, and an equal or greater mileage of state and local roads.
 Conference On Plans
 Details of this vast program will be placed before the conference of the highway education board, meeting here from October 26 to 2S, by state highway engineers and officials of the bureau of public roads, of the United States department of agriculture. to whom has been entrusted the work of planning and supervising the con-
 
 ways.
 The plan will be presented especial ly to enable the board to proceed ah- thortively with its work of devising aids for schools and colleges to which the road-builders of the country are turning for competent highway en- gineers.
 Officials of the bureau place the aggregate cost of the federal-aid pro- gram alone at about ss,00O,o00. 900, spread over the period. They base their estimate on an average cost of $17,o00 per mile. The average cost in turn, takes into consideration all classes of improved highways from the cheapest to the most expensive. Approximately one third of the pro. posed system, or 60,000 miles of i'm proved highways already are either built or building.
 New Program
 The program is new one. Up to comparatively recent years, the bureau declares road buildings insthe United States has been conducted without special regard to national system. Highways had been con- structed where needed without con- sidering whether they would link up in the most effective fashion with the whole network of roads projected to spread over the entire country. En- gineers had sought more to meet inn mediate and local demands than the broader requirements of the states and the nation.
 The federal-aid program, officials said, will contemplate the construc- tion of only such roads as fit into the national program and contribute to the national system. At the same time the roads will be so selected as to serve the most important local re- quirements. With marked modified tions the system adopted in building the railways of the country will be borne in mind in. the construction of the nations new highways. There will be main lines of. highway com munication between centers and thousands of miles of feeder roads, reaching back into the more sparsely settled regions and into the rich agri- culture sections to tap areas whose population and product will flow over the new system.
 New roads will be built-thousands of miles of them where they will fit in most advantas seously with the en- tire program. The bureau at pres ent is engaged in research work in- to the most efficient methods of road building, including the character and wearing power of materials and re- c;r{,, oT o~{A ,~+, and has already amassed a great store of valuable information which will be available to the highway en-,