Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 November 1892 — A Transportation Scheme. [ARTICLE]

A Transportation Scheme.

Tn an article on ooun ry roads and electricity in the Electrical World by William N. Bhck, a scheme for covering the country with a network of electric roads is outlined. The plan is to build electric lines through every part of ths country connecting the various lines of railroad and placing the farmers in close communication with the cities and markets. Of course, this would bo practicable only in the more thickly settled portions of the United States, and could hardly apply to the grpat prairies of the West. The farmer would thus have rapid transportation for all his farm products, for any kind of freight and for himself and family. In addition to this, power could be taken from the lines so harvesting, ploughing, or any other of the numerous forms of work which are now done by slower and more expensive means. It might be argued that such a system would never pay ’ interest on the capital invested in it, which is probably true. But the same can be said of the building of country roads. The expense of constructing such a network of electric lines would not be greater, and wo.ild probably be considerable less than that of building first class roads. The present wretched condition of the country roads is a well known fact, and it is only a question of time when an immense amount of money must be expended in improving them, or the same must be devoted to the construction of some such system as that outlined by Mr. Black.—[New York Herald.