Remarks on the Present System of Road Making: With Observations, Deduced from Practice and Experience, With a View to a Revision of the Existing Laws, and the Introduction of Improvement in the Method of Making, Repairing, and Preserving Roads, and Defending the Road Funds from Misapplication. Seventh Edition, Carefully Revised, With an Appendix, and Report from the Select Committee of the House of Commons, June 1823, with Extracts from the EvidenceMcAdam, John Loudon
History
Remarks on the Present System of Road Making: With Observations, Deduced from Practice and Experience, With a View to a Revision of the Existing Laws, and the Introduction of Improvement in the Method of Making, Repairing, and Preserving Roads, and Defending the Road Funds from Misapplication. Seventh Edition, Carefully Revised, With an Appendix, and Report from the Select Committee of the House of Commons, June 1823, with Extracts from the Evidence
McAdam, John Loudon
Macadam roads; Roads -- Great Britain
Were these the whole of your observations on the state of the roads?—No.
It is not very easy to explain to gentlemen, exactly, the particulars
that I know to be wrong in roads; I found the water-ways, and things
connected with keeping the roads dry, exceedingly neglected in the
country.
Be so good as to state what defects you observed in the construction of
the roads, besides those you have already mentioned?—I think the
water-ways were extremely neglected, and the roads in general were
covered with water, and many of them standing in wet. It was a practice
formerly to dig a trench when they made the new road. There was a hollow
way, and a great deal of the bad quality of roads in general was owing
to the circumstance that the road was standing in water. I think that
was one very great error formerly; but the roads were made upon no
principle; there seemed to be no object; the persons who made them did
not seem to understand there was some object to be gained; they had no
other idea of mending a road than bringing a great quantity of material,
and shooting it on the ground. When a road got into entire disrepair,
the next thing was to bring a quantity of the same kind of unprepared
material, and to shoot it upon the road.
Did you find that they made use of bad material when a better was to be
procured?—I found that to be very universally the case, that the tops of
the quarries, and that to be easily procured, was taken in general, and
the best stone left behind. I am afraid that is too much the custom in
the country still.
Did you find they put these materials on the road in an unprepared and
unfit state?—I did; they were not broken, nor in many cases cleaned.
Have you any thing further to state with regard to the construction of
the road?—No; I do not recollect any thing further I can state.
What inquiry did you make into the management of the funds of the
different trusts?—I made it a business to inquire generally of the
surveyors, workmen, and people on the roads, as to the expense of
materials, cartage, day-labour, and then I took what pains I could with
gentlemen of the country, to inquire into the state of the funds: with
surveyors and other officers of trusts, I found a jealousy and an
unwillingness every where to give me information. An unauthorized
individual finds it extremely difficult to procure information of that
sort, and I found it so; a very great unwillingness to inform.
What class of persons did you find in the situation of surveyors on the
road?—Always, I think, almost without exception, very low people, many
of them old servants, ruined tradesmen, people without that kind of
energy and character which I think is absolutely necessary for such a
service.
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