Show LOWER EXPENSE TO FARMERS good roads reduce greatly trouble of transporting crops to market cause of distress before the war in europe affected the rates at sea it cost the american farmer more to haul a bushel of at wheat nine and a half miles to the railroad d station for shipment than it cost the buyer to ship the same bushel of wheat from now new york to liverpool a distance ot of miles according to a bulletin issued by the american nit Ilig hway association tho the average cost of hauling a ton of farm produce or a ton of anything else over the average country road is about twenty three cents a mile 70 years ago the cost of at the same earno service was 17 cents tho the cout of hauling over the railroads railroad s is less lesi than ono ninth as much as it was CO 60 years ago the cost of at hauling haulon 9 by railroad has almost reached the vanishing point the cost of at hauling on the country roads has gone up as the roads have bavo gone down by careful calculation logan waller page director of the united states office of public roads has reached tho the conclusion that with wise and equitable road laws and good business management it would be entirely practicable tor for the people to save themselves on the two items of hauling and administration the enormous sum of yearly the railroads in the united states wry about tons of freight annually and of 0 this vast tonnage at least tons are hauled over the country roads to the railroad station or to the canals tor for shipment the immense volume of mining products aggregating millions of tons is not included in this estimate but only the agricultural forest and miscellaneous products hauled by wagon over the public roads nor to is the cost of hauling back and forth between the farms and the mills the main cause of agricultural distress says the bulletin a subject of perennial alarm to popular favorites Is not so much the wages of the workers or the infertility of the soll soil or the prices of the products but the enormous drain of getting the stuff to market the tha waste of at the roads in the wear and tear of machinery the sacrifice of teams the inefficiency of service compelled by impassable highways tributary to every market town or railroad station there are what mr bir pago eally call bonesi zo nesi of production from tho the first of able zones all products can be delivered to market at A a e Z I 1 ax vm i k y y i si s i wy 5 y aaa X ii i 4 shaded road in the west profit and from the rest one class of products after another must be eliminated because of the prohibitive cost of hauling and beyond lie ile vast territories that cannot be cultivated wit without h the building and constant mat maintenance n of roads suited stilted to whatever traffic there may bo be developed it has been demonstrated that hs as the roads from the market towns havo lia vo been improved Imp rived there has been a great increase In creaso 0 0 their business and a corresponding sp improvement in the condition and aid opportunities of at the rural population larger prosperity of the individual farmer greater traffic tor for the rati railroads roads better supplies and lower prices tor for the consumer it doea doci not pay to raise crops that cannot be ba marketed readily and cheaply millions of dollars worth of field and orchard crops have been utterly wasted because of expensive and inadequate facilities for marketing this is ono one of the hard problems with which tho the united states department of agriculture Is trying to deal through the tha greatest experts in the land and they ther have found that the building of good roads Is essential to the success of their plans |