130 
PARK AND CEMETERY, 
park properties, and the foregoing will lead to the 
assumption that Nature has wonderfully blessed 
POINT defiance park, TACOMA, WASH. — PATH THROUGH 
THE FOREST, 
her in one of the most beneficent avenues of com- 
fort and pleasure for her citizens. 
PARK ROADS* 
( Concluded.) 
The materials to be used having been determined 
the only other question is form. The crown of a road 
should approximate as nearly as may be two per cent of 
the entire width. The center, for appearances, should 
run longtitudinally on a regular grade, not rise and fall 
with the gutter as it frequently does on level roads. 
The grade at the gutters should fall not less than one 
inch in twenty five feet. Gutters of harder materials 
than macadam are not required where the grade is less 
than two per cent. The most satisfactory gutter as to 
maintenance is made of paving bricks, though a flat 
cobble stone gutter, where there is no curb, is much 
more pleasing in appearance for a park road. Catch- 
basins should be not to exceed 200 feet apart. In nar- 
row drives and broad drives of sharp grades, they 
*A paper read at the Annual Cunvenliun of the American Ihirk and Out-Door 
Art Association at Chicago, June, 1900. By J. Frank Fo.ster, C. E. 
should be placed at shorter intervals. The foregoing 
details are largely engineering questions which will be 
rightly determined if the building of a road is placed 
in the hands of an engineer who vvill profit by the ex- 
perience of others where his own has been meager. 
What is the proper width of a park road? The point 
of view taken by the person deciding the question, of 
course, will govern. Should he consider the road only 
as a carriage way and give every accommodation pos ible 
to the driving public regardless of appearance he will 
make a broad road fifty or perhaps sixty feet in width. 
Even with that width there will be times when it will 
seem too narrow. On the other hand should he seek to 
subordinate the road feature as much as possible he will 
seldom find it necessary to make a road in the midst of 
a park over thirty-five feet in width. The boulevard 
drives, and some of the large carriage promenades in a 
park may be made much wider than this without harm, 
for in such cases the roadway is the principal feature. 
But the winding drives of a park are undesirable 
intruders into the picture. Keep them as insignificant 
as possible. 
The maintenance of roads is but a very simple 
matter, but like all other tasks the way to do it is to do 
it. But just there is where most corporations or com- 
missioners fail. It is difficult for many to understand 
that the work of maintenance should commence on a 
road the verv day it is completed, the result being that 
more frequently than not the road is left until its con- 
dition demands repair; then will it be continuously 
unsatisfactory, no matter how much care is given it 
until it is resurfaced. The first necessity in the main- 
tenance of a road is proper sprinkling. It should be 
always damp enough to prevent dust but never wet 
enough for mud. It is as essential for the preservation 
of a road as it is for the comfort of those who use it. I 
know of no more difficult thing to do in the maintenance 
of parks than to obtain satisfactory work in sprinkling 
the drives. It is so much a matter of judgment on the 
part of the drivers of sprinkling wagons that they should 
be not only much more intelligent than the ordinary 
laborer, but should also have considerable experience, 
and above all be men who are willing to do whatever 
work is necessary to bring about the desired result. 
Without these qualifications in the men it is absolutely 
impossible to do the work at all well; and in addition 
to this the sprinkling wagons must be properly made 
and the pans or whatever device is used for throwing 
the water adjusted so that the driver can regulate the 
discharge just as he wishes for any condition. To these 
requisites must be added eternal vigilance on the part 
of the person responsible for the manner in which the 
work is done. 
Next in importance is the keeping of the roads clean; 
There are many ways of accomplishing this. The re- 
gular use of the sweeper is probably best, though it 
really matters little so it is accomplished in such a way 
as not to disturb the integrity of the material. The 
patching of a road as it wears into small depressions 
can be quite efficiently done with limestone or gravel, 
and with some trap rocks and soft granite, but with hard 
