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76 BULLETIN 393, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
fact in connection with the road improvement was that about 83 
per cent of the tax for the payment of interest on bonds in Beat No. 1 
is paid by the city of Meridian, although none of the roads are located 
within the corporate limits. 
Personal investigation as to the effect of the road improvement on 
land values brought out many specific incidents of increases in values 
from 50 to 500 per cent coincident with the improvement of the roads. 
Lands 5 miles out from Meridian that were held at from $15 to $20 
per acre before the roads were improved sold after the roads were 
improved for $50 per acre. For the purpose of illustrating more 
specifically the remarkable effect of the road improvement on property 
values, the following examples were selected on a single road leading 
out from Meridian: bie 
A tract 44 miles from Meridian, containing 40 acres, cost $1,000 
in 1911, and in March, 1912, was sold for $1,900. 
A tract containing 13 acres cost $1,000 in February, 1911, and 
was sold in the same year, after the road work had begun, for $2,000. 
A tract containing 20 acres, 4 miles from Meridian, cost $500 in 
1907; 13 acres sold in 1912 for $1,500. | 
An estate 4 miles from Meridian, containing 40 acres, was pur- 
chased in 1908 for $400. It was sold in 1911 for $1,700 after con- 
struction started, and was estimated to have beén worth $2,500 in 
1912. | 
A farm 5 miles from Meridian, containing 120 acres, was bought in 
1907 for $900, and was sold in 1912 for $4,200. 
A farm 44 miles from Meridian, containing 200 acres, was esti- 
mated to have been worth $5,000 in 1911, but after the road was 
completed the owner refused an offer of $9,500. 
A farm 4 miles from Meridian, containing 40 acres, was sold in 
1910 for $2,500; in 1912 the owner refused $4,500. 
The total of 473 acres in these tracts before the roads were im- 
proved was $11,300, or an average of $23.89 per acre, while after 
the roads were improved the total value was $26,100, or $55.18 per 
acre, an average increase of $31.29 per acre, or 131 per cent. Many 
small tracts of land, 2 or 3 miles from Meridian on the Poplar 
Springs Road, have sold, since the road was improved, for from $100 
to $3,000 per acre. This property was all in farms before the road 
was improved and could have been bought for from $20 to $50 per 
acre. For 3 miles out this road is now lined with magnificent sub- 
urban homes. 
Estimates of local men versed in real-estate values give the increase 
in land value, on account of improved roads, at from 25 to 50 per 
cent. According to the United States census of 1910, the average 
value of all farm: land in Lauderdale County was about $10 per acre. 
