Dost Of Good Roads

The advantages of good roads are pretty generally conceded now, but the practical work of making them is not progressing as it should. The fear of tremendous expense and bonded indebtedness still abides with the rural population, with which the respousibility for the roads rests. This fear has led to the defeat of road legi slation in the past and will continue to oppose such legislation in the future until it has been allayed, as it inay be when the farmers are educated tounderstand that a really good road is a cheap and not a dear highway. A good educational work has.just been issued by the new department of agriculture of Pennsylvania, apamphlet under the title of "Good Roads For Pennsylvania, " liy John Hamil tori, deputy secretary of the department, remarks the Pittsburg Dispatch iu a receDt editorial. Mr. Hamilton not only tella what a good road is, but how to make it, what machinery ia necessary, and, best of all, that it can be constructed veiy cheaply and inaintained at practically no cost at all. The agricultural department at Washington has also reoently issued several valuable road bulletins for farmers' use, one being a report transmitted by Premier Salisbury on the roads of England, embracing the rules of Macadam, whose name is perpetuated in the style of road he built. Macadam 's first principie was to have a road that would keep the soil under it dry, and he was not particular ■what kind of soil it was. Mr. Hamilton accepts this first principie, together with Macadam 's belief, verified in England and France, fchat no foundatin is necessary for such a road except earth, and that thickness of tho stone bed is less important thanthat it shall be composed of small stone. No stone used in making a roadbed should be too large to go through a ring % inches in diameter, and six inches depth of such stones and sand will ruake au impervious roof for the compacted soil beneath, thereby fulfilliug all tho requiiements of a good road, if laid at proper grade and with drainage properly attended to. The questiou of first cost is the most important, and upon this Mr. Hamilton lays special emphasis. He shows that tho necessary machinery can be secured for from $750 to $1,500, and that with such apparatua as he describes single track rcad eau be macadamized, six inches thick, at a cost of $1.38 per rod, or $441.00 mile. Allowing a fair estimate for grading, drains and other work essential to good roads, the construction account would vary from $500 to $1,000 per mile, certainly a very small cost for the benefits to be derived and the econoniy to be realized in future maintenance. There are 80,000 miles of country roads in Pennsylvania, and the road tax levy for 1895 aggregated $3,622, 708. 76, being au average of $45.28 per mile. Every person at all familiar with the subject knows that practically no permanent improvement was made with this vast sum, while a slight mathematical computation will show that ten times the amouut of last year's road taxes would pay the cost of crushing, distributing and rolling six inches of stone upon every one of the 80,000 miles of roadway in the state. In view of these facts, it is not too much to assume that the ordinary road tax.applied intelligently and systematically, would suffice both for necessary repairs and to pike every road in the commonwealth in 20 years or less. On the other hand, a century of experience with the existiug methods afiords conclusive proof that they will never result iu good roads, though the burden of cost is constant. Tho first essential condition for permanent improvement is system, a system such as was proposed by the road bill of Senator Brown of Westmoreland, which was defeated at the last session of the legislature. Until such legislation is adpoted there is not much hope for better things, though Mr. Hamilton's comprehensive paper should lead some localities to make a demonstrative test of the practicability and cheapness of macadam, and at the same time increase the popular deruand for the uecessary legislation to fully establish the system.