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
Having heard the evidence of the two last witnesses does your judgment
in all respects confirm the testimony which they have given, in regard
to the improvement which has taken place upon your roads, and the
advantages derived from them?—Most assuredly. I have witnessed these
roads for more than twenty years, in a variety of forms as a
commissioner. I have observed, the failure of two or three different
sets of coachmen and coach concerns down below, all of whom are now
saying, that if this system continues they shall require a horse less.
All these parties were originally much prejudiced against the new
system.
_John Martin Cripps_, Esquire, called in; and Examined.
You are a magistrate of the county of Surrey, and commissioner of the
roads upon the Epsom trust?—I am.
Can you inform the Committee what was the state of the roads within your
trust, previous to the year 1818?—They were very bad, having no
attention paid to the formation of the road; having the water, in many
places, going over the road; and great inattention paid to the breaking
of the materials, and to the expense attending the carting of them.
At what time did you commence the alteration in the system of
management?—At the latter end of December 1817, when the roads were put
under the superintendence of Mr. MᶜAdam, senior, and when his son
commenced the management.
What alterations have since taken place in the state of the roads?—By a
newer formation of the road; the materials being properly broken; and
the water carried under the road by trunks, or drains, with proper
gratings.
Referring to the particulars of the expenditure given by Mr. MᶜAdam,
jun. in his evidence this day, can you confirm the accuracy of those
accounts?—Yes; and I can explain that the items for tradesmen’s bills
include the wharfing and repairs of Bridges in each year; I can add,
that the statute labour for 1815, 1816, and 1817, amounting to one
hundred pounds each year, which Mr. MᶜAdam has not availed himself of in
their improvements.
Had the system of management pursued by Mr. MᶜAdam proved the means of
giving employment to labourers in the district, and thereby lessening
the poor’s rates?—Very much so; and they have occasionally employed from
twenty to thirty persons, stout able-bodied men, who otherwise would
have been obliged to have been supported out of the parish rates.
Have you in consequence had any persons who were able to work who have
been out of employ?—Between twenty and thirty persons have been employed
for the last three months in breaking flints, and in repairing and
improving the roads, who otherwise must have come upon the poor’s rates;
and all the persons who have been enabled to work have found employment
in consequence of this improvement; that has been the means of greatly
relieving our poor’s rates.
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