Highways and Highway Transportation

by George R. Chatburn

Highway Transportation from Farm to Local Market.

—The table indicates that the highway transportation amounts to about 6 cents per bushel. Had the cost been based on all team hauling it would have been 8¹⁄₂ cents; on truck hauling, 4¹⁄₄ cents. The grand total cost of production would be the

Cost of growing;
Cost of transportation;
Cost of marketing.

Taking up only the transportation from the farm to the local market point, the question arises, what, if any, effect would a change in it have on the character and amount of farm production?

Let there be considered a zone around a local market point; suppose the width of this zone limited the distance from the market at which wheat can be grown profitably when the hauling is all done by horses. Since it can, according to government authority, be hauled at half the cost by motor truck, other things being equal, the zone of profitable productions would be widened to twice its former width with no greater expense to the wheat grower. Or, looking at it another way, the size of the farm could be somewhat lessened and the farmer still make the same gross sum on his crop. This latter would allow a few more people to live in the same territory as formerly. If again by means of paved roads the cost was further reduced one-half the zone could again be doubled; it is then four times its original width. Also, since a living could be made on smaller farms the tendency would be to increase the rural population. But it is not likely that all farmers under increased advantages would continue to raise wheat. Other crops, more perishable but more profitable, would venture forth.

Such perishable crops as vegetables, head lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, cantaloupes, watermelons, etc., require dependable marketing facilities. They must be harvested and put on the market at just the right time or they deteriorate in quality and price very rapidly. Crops that could be hauled by team only 4 or 5 miles could be hauled by truck over a hard road easily 20 miles. Near the large cities truck gardeners by virtue of the truck and the good roads have been able to go out 15 to 20 miles and secure land at a very much lower rent, or purchase it on an amortization scheme at no more annual expense for double or treble the amount of land than they formerly paid in rent near the city for the smaller tract. According to Norton outside the large cities of the East market gardening extends back 25 to 30 miles. That it is not uncommon to haul vegetables to market in trucks 40 miles, and that a New Jersey fruit farmer was accustomed to make a 65-mile trip daily to market his fruit in New York City.[191]

Likewise small fruit farming. One acre of land highly cultivated this year, 1922, produced more than $1000 worth of strawberries, which were brought to the railway station every day on a small truck a distance of 15 miles. Raspberries and blackberries will give almost as good returns. Vegetables of all kinds, and cantaloupes and watermelons in favorable localities, will probably bring larger returns. Even potatoes sometimes give a gross return of from $100 to $300 per acre.

It should be remembered that in every case there must be a keen, avid market and adequate transportation facilities. The market, since more than half the people of the United States live in the cities, is likely to be sufficient if the marketing machinery is ample and properly functioning. Horse-drawn wagons may answer the purpose in some places, in others the motor truck, but other crops cannot be marketed without access to the steam railway. For instance, could trucks carry cantaloupes from the Imperial Valley in California to New York City? This requires the steam railway and refrigerator cars drawn in rapid trains. The trucks will greatly widen the zone of cantaloupe culture near the shipping point. The same may be said of citrus fruits from Florida and California, tomatoes and watermelons from Texas, plums from Idaho, apples from Washington, grapes from New York and Michigan, and, indeed, some product from nearly every state of the Union, to say nothing of the non-perishable products.

Stock Raising.

—Marketing facilities and road transportation is greatly changing the character of stock raising. Not so very many years ago the great western plains were covered with large herds of cattle whose owners and caretakers were known as ranchers. The ranch usually consisted of the owner’s residence, which he also used as an office, sleeping and eating quarters for the cowboys, a corral or two for the horses and possibly cattle during the round-up and branding season, though this latter was usually on the open. The cattle ranged and fed upon the wild grass, the cowboys riding around the bunch daily in order to keep track of them. The round-up was held in the late summer while the calves were still running with their mothers and could be identified. The cattle of several ranches ran together and at branding periods had to be cut out—separated. Then the unbranded calves and mavericks were roped, thrown and branded; the bull calves were altered and the herd again turned loose upon the prairies. A little later in the fall they were again rounded-up and those to be sold selected and cut out. These were driven to the nearest railway track and shipped to market, sometimes a train load from one shipping point. During the winter season and in violent storms there were many hardships as well as loss of cattle. The cowboys also had to be on the lookout for “rustlers”—thieves who stole the cattle outright, branded unbranded mavericks they knew did not belong to them, or mutilated brands by placing their own over the rightful one.