New Britain herald., 1927-07-16

cling over a newly paved road, te
 wit:
 There is a newly surfaced road between Cheshire and Waterbury the amount of travel upon it is lit tie. Thousands of autoists travelling ! between New Haven and Waterbury continue to take the longer route through Milldale, possibly because they are accustomed to that route and possibly because they do not take the trouble to read the signs at the new road jutting from Chesh- ire. In time, however they will be- come acquainted with the newer route and will use it to greater ad- vantage to themselves.
 It does not require state bond is sues to provide a large proportion of good roads, however. Indiana is ! noted example. In that state it is | against the state constitution for the ! state to issue road bonds; but that does not prevent the counties from issuing them. So well has this been 1 done that out of total of 73,131 1 miles of highway in the state, 4S,- 125 are surfaced-but that does not mean concrete surfaces, rather any 1 kind of the half a dozen surfaces extant. In the neighboring state of i Illinois, where there are 96,326 miles of highway, and where state 1 bonds to the tune of SS9,000, 900 1 have been issued, there are only l J. 259 miles Of surfaced highways. The attempt to pull Illinois "out of the mud" is of very recent date, only 2.2 per cent Of the bonds so far hay 1 ing been retired. This is little 1 better than in New York state, how ! ever where of the $100, 100000 road bonds on the books, only 2 per cent are retired. The average of retired road bonds the country over is 16.4 per cent.
 Connecticut is comparatively small state, and it can be stated fairly that it has a larger percent age Of improved highways per square mile Of territory than most states. On this basis, improved high ways in many states of large size must 5e rare birds. There is Texas, for instance, with 20,115 miles Of improved highways; but it has 167,- 685 miles of roads. But it isn't well 10 go off half-cocked in this par ticular. Connecticut's roads are one fifth improved; those of Texas are one-eighth. Wealth and density of population overwhelmingly favor Connecticut, so we rather think it logical to think Texas has done a better job of road-building than Connecticut. Texas is one of the states, like Connecticut, which does not issue state road bonds.
 By way of comparison, perhaps, it may be worth while to look up some of the details of road build ing in other representative states.
 New Yorll-Between a third and a fourth of the total mileage sur faced. Ohio-Naarly one-half the mile age surfaced. and no state bonds is sued.
 PennsyIvania-Cne fifth sur faced.
 Rhode third sur faced.
 North Carolina-one-third sur faced.
 Massac chusetts-Between a half and third surfaced. The Bay state has issued s1S,767,oOo in road bonds, of which 61 per cent are re- tired.
 Maire-Orn-fiftb surfaced
 New Hampshire - One-seventh surfaced. This state issued s750,000 in road bonds, and they have been all retired.
 Nermont-One-f fifth surfaced.
 Colo.ado-One-eig surfaced.
 And now we come to few hor- rible examples:
 Montana has SHIT miles of high way, Of which only 1,1S9 miles are surfaced, or about 1-55th.
 Nebraska has S71GS miles of roads, of which 2,501, or less than one-thirtieth, are surfaced.
 Missouri-Cne-tenth surfaced.
 South Dakota-One-f fortieth sur faced.
 North Dakota has only one-six- tieth Of her roads surfaced.
 Compared with these vast and comparatively poor states Connecti- cut has been doing very well. Com pared with some of the others it has not except where quality of surfac- ing is considered In this wn stonl