Democratic Sentinel, Volume 17, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 May 1893 — Will Good Roads Pay ? [ARTICLE]

Will Good Roads Pay ?

Mr. Stephen Favill, of Madison, Wis., in an article on highways, says: “But the question of whether or not it will pay to build and care for our country roads is fortunately not all theory. But the practical demonstration has been worked out. England, France, Germany, and many other of the European countries have solved this problem to their entire satisfaction, and some parts of our own country have tried this matter far enough to prove that as a business venture it is one of the very best for the farmers. There bas been no general taking hold of this matter in this country as in European countries, but some of the States have laws allowing counties to bond and borrow money to build roads. My time will allow me to give only one or two of the many good results that have come from good roads. In Union County, N. J., the road improvement fever got hold of the people, and they expended $350,000 in macadamizing their roads, and the testimony of those best qualified to knew is that the increased valuation of their lands would more than six times pay the cost. Just one case of a man owning 123 acres that he valued at $65 an acre and could not find a buver at that, had, since the advent of good roads, refused S2OO an acre for the whole tract. I do not claim that all land would be advanced in price at that rate, but I am confident that the iucrease in the value of our farming lands that would follow the advent of good roads in our State would very much more than pay all the cost of building them, to say nothing of the convenience and luxury of having a road that could be used at any season o f the year.”