PUBLIC ROAD MILEAGE AND REVENUES, 1914. 7 
and became in the end the foundation of the present-day system of 
highways. It was not until 1676 that any attention was given to 
the proper construction and maintenance of roads. As the State was 
all apportioned when the Government took up the town, township, 
and section method of laying out public lands, nothing was done in 
this line in New Jersey. In the early days private companies built 
turnpikes, many of which were laid straight without regard to grade. 
Consequently, the rebuilding of these roads hi recent years so that 
they will be wide and straight, with good grades, has been a heavy 
expense. . 
The first public work on roads appears to have been conducted 
by local committees and gave risejbo the general practice of working 
out the poll tax. This system of working out poll tax, however, has 
been abandoned during recent years. 
In the county of Essex a small amount of county road work appears 
to have been done about 1868 to 1870. Nevertheless, the inhabitants 
of New Jersey traveled mostly on township roads until a general move- 
ment for county roads began in Union County in 1888. 
New Jersey holds the distinction of being the first State to adopt 
the policy of State aid. The first State-aid work was done in 1892, 
and the first appropriation for State aid was $75,000. At first the 
State paid 33 J per cent of the cost of State-aid roads, but at present 
it pays 40 per cent. Up to July 1, 1914, the total outlay by the 
State aggregated $5,800,000 and 1,833 miles of State-aid roads had 
been completed. 
The collection of road mileage statistics and its division into 
classes was made under the direction of the division highway engi- 
neer, acting as United States collaborator, who was assisted in his 
work by other employees of the department of public roads of New 
Jersey and by county engineers and other county officials. The 
data upon which the expenditure and bonding tables were com- 
piled were furnished by the office of the comptroller of the treasury 
of New Jersey, and the tables were made up from these data by 
employees of the Office of Public Koads and Rural Engineering. 
Maps were obtained of all sections of the State and the length of 
the roads scaled by the State collaborator. Where these lengths 
were later checked by actual measurement, the results were very 
close. From most of the counties the engineers furnished accurate 
information of the work under their charge. In a few cases the 
townships had these data, but in most cases the best posted citizens 
indicated on the roads of their districts the general class and quality 
of pavement, if any, upon which the estimates for each township 
were based. In a few townships, however, the classes of roads had 
to be averaged with the classes of the adjoining townships. In 
order to complete the total mileage figures of roads and streets, 
45963°— 16 2 
