Neglected Roads and Road Repairs.
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The absorption of labour for the purposes of the war, both in the lines of the combatant and active forces and of the services which are necessary to keep those forces efficient, threatens to have harmful yet unavoidable effects upon the roads of the United Kingdom. Anybody who has lately been in the vicinity of the great training camps will have observed the gradual deterioration of the a:Jade in those areas during the past few months. They were almost im
passable, in not a few instances, by reason of the heavy traffic demands upon them, and the apparent
impossibility of scraping them, before the period of flooding caused not a few of them to disappear entirely from view. These traffic causes of road trouble in the future are, however, merely incidental. We do not wish to minimize them, but it is questions of labour and materials which have to be considered.
It has been the practice of many road authorities to give a preference to granite from the Quonast quarry in Belgium, and from certain Norwegian quarries, instead of using granite from the best English, Scottish or Welsh quarries. This known preference for foreign material has been partly due to lower prices, but also very largely due to the fact that most of the foreign granites which were popular with road surveyors and their committees were less dense than the home granites, and therefore coated a larger area of highway for the same weight. Charges for home transport were frequently unfavourable in their effect upon the purchasing powers of various counties, and particularly of those adjoining the seaboard, and this incidence of freight had to be regarded. The broad fact remains, whatever the causes, that Belgian and Norwegian granites were frequently preferred. The cessation of supplies from Belgium, and the practical suspension of supplies from Norway, are factors which have now to be taken into account, and which will, in conjunction with the shortage of labour and the dislocation of our railway companies and other carrying undertakings in respect of mineral traffic, exert an unfavourable influence for an indefinite period upon the resumption of normal maintenance.
Neglect of our roads and of road repairs has for the time being to be admitted as a direct consequence of the war, and it is one that will have to be accepted. We fear that the turn of affairs which will permit the Road Board and road authorities generally to take matters in hand on a comprehensive plan. will not come about until the absence of due maintenance has allowed many of our principal highways to suffer beyond all estimate. This is extremely regrettable, having regard to the wonderful progress which has been achieved in this country in the matter of road improvement during the past five years. Users must be prepared to find their fuel bills higher, so long as theSe conditions prevail or grow worse, and those of them who use steam wagons must be preratred to pick up water at shorter intervals.
The only consolation which we can draw from the difficulties by which road authorities are confronted is this : that tens of thousands of men will be absorbed for long terms, after the conclusion of neace, in overtaking arrears. No such extra. concentration will, unfortunately, make good the deficiencies which are now accumulating, nor will the extra workbe effected other than at considerable extra cost. There
may prove to be an excuse, after all, for that id. toll per motorbus-mile, concerning which we had occasion to write so strongly last summer. The money will not be wanted, however, because of any fault or default of the motorbus owners, and paved roads will not suffer. Broad views will have to prevail in the future, and indirect methods of compensation or recoupment for road authorities may be expedient.