Saskatoon Daily Phoenix
January 24, 1907. p.1
The Provincial Department of Public Works have decided and entered upon a vigorous program of road and bridge building throughout the Province and in all the districts settled or in process of settlement generous improvements are being provided for.
The following circular has been issued to the municipal councils and local district officials:
We are preparing our estimates for next year’s public works, and in connection with the grading of roads, we are desirous of adhering, as closely as possible, to the roads that will eventually form the main lines to the various market centres. Even adhering to the main road proposition you will understand that it will be impossible for us to make all the needed good roads at once, owing to the fact that so many roads require our attention.
In order that we may not be working at cross purposes, we have considered it advisable to ascertain, as nearly as possible, which are, or will be, the main roads, and would be obliged if you will indicate on the enclosed township diagram those which you, as a council, consider the most important in your district.
We propose asking for similar information from all the local councils, village overseers and town councils, and we hope to be able to lay down a system of main roads throughout the country on which we can expend what monies we can spare for this purpose, and have a commencement made on the main lines of traffic, that may be taken up and carried to completion by the municipal organisations, which must sooner or later take control of such matters, leaving the Provincial Government to attend to the larger works with which the local councils are unable to cope.
If, in suggesting a main road you will consider the convenience of the districts on each side of you, and endeavor to choose a road with which the local districts, towns and villages will cooperate, it will make the selection easy, but if there is a variety of opinions it will be necessary for us to have a thorough examination made by an officer of the department, and a final selection from the different ones suggested.
You will understand that it will hardly be possible for us to attempt to improve all of the roads that are selected this year. We intend, however, to work on the worst places of the most used ones so far as the monies provided for this purpose will go.
We propose organising road gangs on the same principal as our bridge gangs are worked at present, a competent foreman being placed in charge who will be employed for a whole season; he will be furnished with tools and implements, and instructed to engage a permanent force sufficient to carry on the work independent of local labor, but will be supplied with additional tools in order that he may give work to any local labor that may come to the place of operation. We have found this course almost absolutely necessary owing to the difficulty we have experienced this year in securing tools and labor locally when the foremen, to whom we had entrusted the work, were at leisure to oversee it.
You will assist us very much by presenting this letter to the first meeting of your council and endeavor to have a reply sent to us before the 15th day of February, in order that the question may be thoroughly considered, and a decision arrived at in good time for the commencement of work in early spring.
