MICHIGAN ROADS AND FORESTS 



FARMERS DIDN'NT ENTHUSE. 



The Board of Public Works of Jackson is 

 thoroughly converted to the wisdom of making 

 durable roads. If they can have their way, 

 the unpaved streets in Jackson will be turned 

 into first-class graveled highways. 



Charles Lewis, of Jackson, is one of the 

 most enthusiastic advocates of good roads in 

 Michigan. He purchased a modern road roller 

 last year and built many small stretches of 

 good roads as object lessons, and with the 

 hope of enthusing the farmers in the county. 

 Mr. Lewis says: 



"The good roads have been made; the ex- 

 pense was hardly greater than building the 

 old style of mud highway, good for nothing 

 and which had to be renewed in a year or 

 more. But the enthusiasm hasn't materialized. 



"\Yhy." continued Mr. Lewis, "we held one 

 meeting out in the country, and got signa- 

 tures to an agreement binding the farmers 

 Ip in road making if we would furnish 

 the road roller and engineer. When we came 

 with the roller not a single man was there, 

 and after we hunted them up every mother's 

 -mi wanted pay for the hauling they were 

 to do. We strike opposition which surprises 

 us. The other night Representative Bennett 

 and ex-Mayor Todd, President of the Michi- 

 gan Road Maker's Association, went out in 

 Madden district trying to talk good roads. 

 and they nearly got mobbed. 



"The little town of Henrietta has spent 

 $10.000 for good roads in the past two years. 

 and has more to show for this money than 

 hole city of Jackson. Xow we are hear- 

 ing in the newspapers of objections to the road 

 tax. But when we went out there we got 

 more signatures to good roads petitions than 

 we could get on the paper. And it was after 

 they had paid their road tax, too. But there 

 are a few objectors, I suppose." 



PROFILES UNDER HIGHWAY ACT. 



At a recent institute of the highway com- 

 missioners at Monroe, the Detroit Engineer- 

 ing & Construction Company, of Detroit, ex- 

 hibited a sample profile of survey work that 

 company has just completed for Erie town- 

 ship. Monroe county, under the new highway 

 law. The profile was printed upon blue print 

 linen, drawn to the scale of one hundred feet 

 to the inch, vertical. It was made to comply 

 with the requirements of the State Highway 

 Department in all respects, and is about the 

 best specimen of work that has yet been ex- 

 hibited. 



HIGHWAY ENCROACHMENT LAW. 



An act passed by the recent session of the 

 state legislature will cause telephone and tele- 

 graph companies, especially the former, to 

 sit up and take notice. This is Act Xo. 263. 

 of the Public Acts of 1907. and is intended 

 to regulate the width of public highways and 

 encroachments thereon. 



Hereafter all public highways for w-hich the 

 right of way has been purchased, sixty-six 

 feet wide, rhall remain the same width, and 

 no encroachments by fences, buildings, tele- 

 phone poles or otherwise, which have been 

 made since -the purchase, and no encroach- 

 ments hereafter to be made, shall give the 

 n. firm or corporation so encroaching, 

 any title or right to the land by reason of 

 such croachment. 



It is permitted, however, to set poles along 

 the line of any public highway within twenty- 

 five feet of the center of the highway on 

 either side, provided that the same shall not 

 be set within fifteen feet of the center of the 

 highway, and provided further that the town- 

 ship board consent thereto. 



By the provision of Section 3 in said act. 

 the township highway commission shall order 

 the removal of any such encroachments or 

 poles, and if the same be not removed within 

 thirty days after written demand, the right 

 is priven the highway commissioner to remove 

 such encroachments himself, and charge the 



expense so incurred to the violators of said 

 act. 



Many nice questions of law involving tne 

 title to real property by adverse possession 

 may arise in the attempt to rid the public 

 domain of these unlawful encroachments by 

 telephone and telegraph companies through- 

 out the state. These questions, however, 

 should be left to the arbitrament of the courts, 

 where they properly belong. Highway com- 

 missioners generally will doubtless execute the 

 law as they find it. 



MICHIGAN ROAD NOTES. 



"Do you want the convicts to work for 

 you or for favored contractors?'' That is 

 the question Highway Commissioner H. S. 

 Earle has put up to the grangers of the state 

 of Michigan, in his effort to get "yes" or "no" 

 on the trap rock proposition. 



The question heads a petition blank which 

 also sets forth the alleged benefits to be de- 

 rived by having a prison built in the upper 

 peninsula in the trap rock districts, the con- 

 victs of which would break up stone for good 

 roads. 



A personal letter has also been issued by 

 Mr. Earle to lecturers of the different granges 

 throughout the state and to grange workers. 



The Business Men's Association of Fremont 

 has launched plans for improving the high- 

 ways into Fremont. Fremont's cross-county 

 neighbor, Xewaygo, says she stands ready to 

 meet her half way with the new gravel road. 



The Menominee county council has decided 

 to offer the big steam roller owned by the 

 city to outside parties for $2,000. The city 

 paid $3,500 for it, but the roller is so heavy 

 that it crushes the sewer piping. 



The Alger county road survey has been 

 completed to Chatham, and will be extended 

 to Eben, some four miles further on, and 

 to the Marquette county road. In the survey 

 just completed there is no grade greater than 

 six per cent. 



The Board of Public Works of Cadillac has 

 recommended that the city purchase a stone 

 crusher from the 'Port Huron Engine & 

 Thresher Works. The machine will be in 

 operation by the time the streets can be 

 worked in the. spring, and Cadillac officials 

 will be in a position to do some effective work 

 on some of its streets. With stone for crush- 

 ing, a machine to do the work and a roller to 

 put on the finishing touches, Cadillac should 

 have some excellent roads before another win- 

 ter. Five machines were in competition. 



Company has been engaged in the work of 

 reforestation on the largest scale yet attempted 

 in this country by any corporation or private 

 owner. It is figured that in twenty-five years 

 the company will have its money back with 

 4 per cent interest, and in fifty years it will 

 have : ts investment more than quadrupled. 



The success of this company makes the 

 Xorthwestern attempt a certainty from the 

 start and will give to the upper peninsula of 

 Michigan the reputation of having the two 

 largest forest reserves maintained on the con- 

 tinent by private or corporate enterprise. Its. 

 meaning to the peninsula can be understood 

 from the fact that the Northwestern alone 

 owns more land in Delta, Marquette, Alger 

 and Schoolcraft counties than is now under 

 cultivation in the entire upper peninsula. Leo 

 M. eGismar, superintendent of the upper penin- 

 sula agricultural experiment station, Chatham, 

 Algej county, figures the farm area of the 

 peninsula at 235.247 acres, or 2 per cent of 

 the total area, while the acreage under culti- 

 vation in the lower peninsula is 36 per cent 

 of the total area. 



The maintenance of these two great forest 

 reserves in the upper peninsula means a steady 

 industry for future years, as the companies 

 will conserve the native forest wealth and add 

 to it by constant tree planting, putting a stop 

 to the ravages of forest fires, which leave the 

 land a barren waste and giving an example 

 which will undoubtedly be followed in the 

 restoration of some of the immense pine bar- 

 rens of the lower peninsula. 



Other railroad companies have turned their 

 attention to the growth of tie timber, notably 

 the Illinois Central, which has planted catalpas 

 along its right-of-way from Chicago to Xew 

 Orleans; but the Northwestern is the first to 

 see the value of its remaining timber holdings 

 and to withdraw them' from the market as 

 a constant source of timber supply for future 

 years. 



GROW TIMBER FOR TIES. 



The Chicago & Northwestern Railway Com- 

 pany has withdrawn all of its timber lands in 

 Wisconsin and Northern Michigan, and will 

 use them for the growth of tie and bridge tim- 

 ber for its 7,500 miles of track, following the 

 example of the Cleveland Cliffs Iron Company, 

 which is systematical^' reforesting its more 

 than 1,000,000 acres in the upper peninsula. 



The Chicago & Northwestern Company 

 owns upwards of 250.000 acres of land in the 

 upper peninsula of Michigan and 150,000 acres 

 more in Northern Wisconsin. Not an acre of 

 this land will be sold now at any price. The 

 cutting of the matured timber on the lands 

 will be done scientifically. The brush and 

 refuse will be cleared away and trees will 

 then be planted which will make good tie 

 timber, the planting being done on a plan ap- 

 proved by Gifford Pichot, head of the United 

 States forestry department. Cedar, hemlock, 

 tamarack, oak, maple and elm will be cut for 

 ties, all being treated with the creosote pre- 

 servative process at the company's great plan! 

 at Escanaba. 



In the very near future the company fore- 

 sees that there will be such a great demand 

 for ties that it must grow timber in order to 

 supply its own needs. The Cleveland Cliffs 



FOUR MILES OF GOOD ROADS. 



If plans carry, the township of Bloomfield. 

 Oakland countv, will have four miles of gravel 

 road built partially at the expense of the state. 

 Bids have been asked by the township high 

 way commissioner, George H. Fowler, for the 

 construction of a mile of gravel road on the 

 Franklin road from the Pontiac city limits 

 south, and a mile of road west from Birm- 

 ingham village limits. The bids will be opened 

 February 1. 1908, and the contract let to the 

 lowest bidder. 



Senator Thad D. Seeley agitated a movement 

 in Bloomfield two years ago whereby the 

 township of Bloomfield received an appropria- 

 tion under the new highway act of $500 for 

 two miles of gravel road, providing the town- 

 ship and farmers built a like distance. The 

 proposition was not adopted at' the time, bur 

 recently the township has shown a willing- 

 ness to do its part, and Senator Seeley got 

 the appropriation renewed. 



It is now up to the township to donate about 

 $200, and the farmers residing along the road 

 will have to either subscribe to a popular 

 subscription or get out with their teams and 

 work it out on the road. It is estimated that 

 the gravel road, as laid out by the state high- 

 way commissioner, will cost about $500 a 

 mile. The road will be nine feet wide and 

 eight inches deep. 



Farmington was the first township in Oak- 

 land county to get any of the state appropri- 

 ation for good roads. Two miles of grave! 

 road were built in Farmington, and it is giv- 

 ing good satisfaction. 



A trade has been closed between Bay City 

 parties and U. M. Guilford, of West Branch, 

 whereby the former purchased Guilford's ex- 

 tensive lumbering operations, including a 

 large tract of timber, a partially completed 

 mill, camps, equippage, etc., located just south 

 of Mio in Oscoda county. There is some 

 15,000,000 feet or more of timber, enough to 

 stock the small mill five years. 



