ROAD MAINTENANCE INTRODUCTORY. The lack of systematic and efficient methods in maintaining the public roads of the State has been apparent, even to the casual observer, for many years. This has been due in part and perhaps primarily to insufficient funds for initiating and carrying out a systematic plan of maintenance adequate to care for the rapidly increasing motor traffic; and in part, and this in no small degree, to the placing of maintenance work under the direction of inexperienced men, resulting in the employment of "hit and miss" methods and the dissipation to a great extent of the funds available with the accomplishment of indifferent results only. The impression has been more or less general that when a road is surfaced with gravel, stone, bituminous topping or concrete that it is a permanent road and does not require maintenance. This is a grave error and failure to recognize this fact has made it necessary to reconstruct many miles of road at great expense, which had they been properly maintained would have lasted many years longer. Texas is now engaged in carrying out a road building program which will cost more than one hundred million dollars, and it now becomes imperative, if the millions of dollars being spent are properly protected, that systematic and businesslike maintenance methods be adopted. Several attempts have been made to pass legislation inaugurating a definite maintenance system, but due to the more or less radical changes necessary in present methods of handling this work, these attempts have proven failures, and not until the passage of the Davidson-Perkins Patrol Act by the Thirty-seventh Legislature at its First Called Session has a definite system of maintenance been adopted. While the principles of this act are fundamentally sound and its passage was a step in the right direction, it must necessarily fall short in meeting the demands of the situation due primarily to the limitations imposed upon its operations by the State Constitution. "The Patrol System" of maintenance proceeds on the theory that "A stitch in time saves nine." The patrolman in his daily trips over his section is able to detect and repair defects before damage requiring extensive expenditures occur. The American soldier returning from France was deeply impressed with the success of the Patrol System as practiced in that country. In preparing and publishing this bulletin, it is not intended, nor indeed could it be expected, to lay down a set of rules which will cover in detail the methods for doing all kinds of maintenance work, but rather to fully inform those in charge of the maintenance work as to their duties prescribed under the Patrol Act and to briefly outline the fundamental principles of maintenance leaving the details to the judgment, experience and initiative of the road superintendent and patrolman. DAVIDSON-PERKINS PATROL ACT. SECTION 1. That the public roads of each county shall be divided into sections of convenient length and size. That said section shall include not less than eight nor more than twenty miles of public road, and shall be numbered in numerical order, and shall be known on the road map of the county by such number. That the road superintendent, hereinafter provided for, shall locate, outline, and designate the boundaries of each section and all territory subject thereto, which designation shall be approved by the commissioners court, and entered upon the minutes thereof, and such superintendent shall prepare a map as now provided by law, and on which map he shall show the location of the territory and roads embraced within each section. SECTION 2. Before the employment of patrolmen for the different sections of the county, the commissioners court shall make up a budget of its road and bridge fund, making a fair and conservative estimate of the county's income from all sources available for road maintenance. Said budget shall include an item making an estimate to cover the amount of funds necessary for the maintenance of the bridges in the county, including the building or repair of any bridge let by contract, the cost of which would exceed $100. The amount so estimated for the repair and upkeep of bridges shall be deducted from the total amount shown by such budget, and the balance shall constitute a road maintenance fund, to be expended under the patrol system herein provided for. Such sum shall then be divided among the several road sections of the county in proportion to the mileage and classification of such roads. First, second, and third class roads shall prorate in such division at the ratio of one, two, and three; that is, three times as much shall be set aside for the maintenance of a mile of first class road as shall be set aside for the maintenance of a mile of third class road. Provided further, that where any first or second class road is, by nature of its situation and condition, in a high state of repair, or where same may be maintained from local sources, such as local district maintenance fund, so as not to require so great a proportion of the county maintenance fund, then the county commissioners, in conjunction with the road superintendent, may in their discretion prorate a lesser amount to the upkeep of a first or second class road and a correspondingly greater amount to such one or more roads of the inferior class as the conditions may require. That the said road maintenance fund, hereinabove referred to, shall include such funds as shall be derived from moneys paid for the privilege of being exempt from road duty, from the fifteen cents now authorized by law as a road tax, and from the further levy of an additional fifteen cents when voted for road maintenance, and such other funds as may by law become a part of the present road and bridge fund of the county, and that the road maintenance fund, or the road and bridge fund, shall never be so pledged for the future as to defeat the purpose of this act by creating debts against the fund and thus destroying the means of operating upon the annual budget basis in applying the patrol system. Provided further, that where any subdivision of a county may have voted a maintenance tax the funds derived therefrom shall be expended upon the roads within the said subdivision, in accordance with the terms of this act, and same shall continue until a like maintenance tax is voted for the entire county. Where counties have pledged the proceeds of the maintenance tax to the payment of warrants running for a term of years so as to absorb or deplete the road maintenance fund, such warrants, where legally issued, should be, at the earliest practical date, paid off or funded into bonds issued in accordance with law, to the end that the maintenance tax shall henceforth go to the maintenance fund as contemplated herein. SECTION 3. For the purpose of this division, the following classifications shall be substantially observed by the road superintendent and the commissioners courts. First Class Roads.-All roads designated as State highways by the State Highway Commission shall be first class roads. One road leading in the direction of the county seat of each adjoining county shall be a first class road, and such other roads as are subject to a constant and heavy traffic may be by the commissioners court of the respective counties classified as first class roads. Second class roads shall include the main arteries of travel leading to first class roads and such other roads as are subjected to a smaller or lesser degree of travel than first class roads. Third class roads embrace the lesser arteries that connect up with the second and first class roads, and all other ways designated as public roads not included in first and second class roads. The class to which a particular road belongs shall be shown upon the county map herein provided for. SECTION 4. After the roads shall have been sectionized, as above provided, which shall be done before January 1, 1922, the commissioners courts of the several counties shall convene on the first Tuesday in January of 1922, or on some later date not after March 1, 1922, to be named by the commissioners court, and each year thereafter for the purpose of selecting road patrolmen for each section of road in the county, and prior to such meeting the road superintendent shall advertise the letting of the several jobs of patrolmen, which advertisement shall consist of a brief general statement, contained in some paper of general circulation published in the county to the effect that all contracts for patrolmen will be let at said time. That a map showing the different road sections and the amount allowed in the budget to pay for the maintenance of such sections may be seen in the office of the road superintendent at the county site, and posted notices of the letting of such contracts shall also be posted at one or more public places within each road section. A party applying for the position of patrolman shall use substantially the following blank, which may be furnished by the road superintendent: For. . dollars, the amount allowed to Section . . in the road maintenance budget of this county. I will patrol the roads in said section for.... ...days during the year 19...., with split log drag, or such other implement as shall be directed by the road superintendent. I agree to enter into a contract to carry out all the duties of patrolman and to make bond to such effect. Signed.. The contest among the bidders shall be the amount of work proffered for the money on hand, and the one offering the greatest amount of work shall be awarded the contract. Provided, the commissioners court may, for adequate cause, reject all bids and readvertise for a patrolman. Provided, that in case of a vacancy, the said county road superintendent may hire a patrolman for a period of sixty days for any road district, who shall perform as nearly as may be the duty therein imposed, and during the said sixty days the said county road superintendent shall again advertise for a patroiman as in the first instance. The said patrolman, or any hired substitute, upon entering upon the duties, shall execute a written receipt to the county road superintendent for all tools, property and equipments of every kind that shall be delivered to him, and at the end of his term he shall deliver an inventory showing what is on hand for the use of his successor, and until said inventory or report is made the last payment due the said patrolman shall not be made by the county commissioners court. SECTION 5. The said patrolman so employed shall furnish one or more teams, as may be designated by the road superintendent, the compensation for which shall be included in his contract. The said contract shall state the minimum number of days that he shall put in upon the work of the roads during the year, and the minimum number during each month of the year. He shall be furnished with a list of the hands, or persons subject to road duty upon his section, and it shall be his duty |