Excerpt from Transactions of the Institution of Civil Engineers of Ireland, Vol. 34: Seventy-Third Session, Nov. 1907, to May 1908

Have become very onerous, the land having now to be bought in fee-simme, as for a railway; both owner and occupier have to be compensated, and large costs incurred for proving title and conveyancing. It seems to me that unless the main roads are taken up by Government, as in France, and the cost charged on the whole country, with assistance from the Imperial Exchequer, there is no pm pect of any material extension or improvement. The ia creased use oi motor vehicles on roads has brought the question to the front. As the roads have improved, im proved vehicles are brought into use to travel at higher speeds or carry heavier loads, and these in turn cause a demand for further improvements in the road. The same thing exactly has happened with the railways. A demand has been made in England that should be expended in improving, widening, and straightening the existing main roads. Something of the kind is re quired here. The use of steam-rollers to consolidate the materials is slowly but surely extending, but at first its introduction was looked on with grave suspicion by the dish'ict Councillors, who thought they were being taxed for the rich man's pleasure cars. It is, however, begin ning to dawn upon them that they derive benefit them selves from the improved surface, and that the use of the rollers, so far from being an extravagance, is an economy, and that the system of spreading stones to be ground in by the traffic is wasteful and barbarous. I have no doubt that ere long it will be illegal to spread broken stones an a road unless there is a roller ready to roll them in. The same result may he arrived at by bringing actions against District Councils for damage done to vehicles or animals by loose patches of stones.

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