Motor Transportation - A Forward View: A Symposium: Joint Responsibility of the Automotive and the Civil Engineer

A number of years ago the writer was making a motor trip in Kentucky running some tests, and had gone far off the main road. The map did not show any roads leading away from the place it was so small . It was late in the afternoon and he wanted to return home before dark. Driving a long a little stream bed (which was the only road there was) he overtook an old gentleman driving a donkey hooked to a stone boat loaded with milk cans. Question: “Neighbor, what is the best way to go to Cincinnati from here?” Answer: “Go right up to the forks in the road. Now, it don't make much difference which fork you take but, to tell you the truth, Stranger, if I was going to Cincinnati I wouldn't start from here.” Sometimes people get to thinking like the old Kentuckian; but they must first recognize that, whatever their destination, they must start from where they are.

The leaders of the automobile industry have never been able to predict what the industry will offer the public two years in advance. If they knew what the car of ten or twenty-five years in the future was going to be like they would be making it now. To afford some idea of what the future might bring without taking all the responsibility upon his own shoulders the writer asked a number of men, holding responsible positions in the automobile and allied industries. On some questions they were almost unanimous in agreement; on others, they had entirely opposite ideas . All the various prophecies and predictions made in the past have been studied and, with these, the writer has tried to present, in some kind of complete picture, the requirements that will be demanded of those who will supply roads for the automobile of 1960.