Page:Report from the Select Committee on Steam Carriages.pdf/200



Mr. J. McAdam. 25 August, 1831. the injury to the road from the horses' feet, more especially upon gravel and flint roads, arises particularly in dry weather from the knocking up and displacing the materials upon the surface, and each succeeding journey adds to the evil, and were it not for the effect of the wheels following the horses in mitigation of that evil, we should have the flint and gravel roads all loose throughout the whole summer.

But the wheels of the Carriage do not actually follow in the track of the horses?—But in roads of much thoroughfare, especially near the Metropolis, other Carriages do.

On the Metropolis Roads have you made any new regulations as to the mode of charging tolls by weight or otherwise?—In the last Act passed for the Metropolis Roads, the toll was put upon the horse drawings and a regulation as to the formation and breadth of the wheels expressly enacted, by which all wheels were required to be not convex, but a perfectly flat surface, with no projecting nails; but by the powers granted to the Commissioners in that Act, that perfectly flat surface was mitigated to a surface not exceeding a quarter of an inch from that flat surface, to meet the practical effect arising from the wear of the wheels upon the road; and to prevent litigation at the several gates, by applying a guage, a toll of 3d, per horse for each seven miles is payable upon a six-inch wheel so constructed; a quarter more upon a wheel so constructed of four inches and a half in breadth, and a half more upon a wheel less than four inches and a half. Those additions do not apply to Stage Coaches or Carriages with springs. The toll upon all horses drawing Carriages and Coaches with springs is 3d, a horse for seven miles, whatever may be the breadth of the tire.

You have had no reference to the weight of the Carriage drawn in your rate of the tolls?—There is no reference to the weight drawn in any Waggon or such like Carriage, provided the wheel is of the construction required by the Act, and the result of some years' experience proves that no injury whatever is sustained upon a well-made road, from any weight