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However objectionable from the point of view of orderly, economic and technically sound development the work of the trail organizations may have been in a large proportion of cases, it must be very clearly understood that they met and to some degree filled a public demand. Their number, and their increasing number, are a certain indication of this. The public was apparently willing to pay a considerable sum annually for certain definite results which were sought in connection with the road program considered on broad interstate lines. These results were not being secured by any authorized official agency, and the successful, continuous bids for support that were made by trails organizations and responded to generously by community interests indicated that the public opinion favored strongly the systematic planning, development, and construction of the connected route and the correlated system of highways.
These conditions, although not applying to all marked trails, did characterize the trails situation as a whole, and it was becoming apparent from complaints received by state highway organizations that unless some official agency undertook the systematic correction of existing conditions surrounding the marked trails, it might be undertaken unofficially with results that would be embarrassing and perhaps seriously detrimental to the road program of the country.
It was apparent, therefore, to officials familiar with road conditions that the matter of selecting and designating through routes of transcontinental and interstate character was timely and important.
If this task were to be undertaken, it would furnish, moreover, an unsurpassed opportunity for taking some desirable steps in the direction of promoting the safe use of the highways by introducing uniformity among danger, caution, and directional signs. This is a matter that had been receiving much attention from a number of cooperating agencies. Among these agencies were:
The Bureau of Standards
The Conference on Street and Highway Safety
The National Safety Council
The Council of National Research
The American Engineering Standards Committee
The Bureau of Public Heads
The Westinghouse Company
The General Electric Company
The American Association of State Highway Officials.
Much had been done by these bodies in studying the question of a color code for signals and signs, of devising shapes, symbols, sizes, color combinations and general design of warning devices for use in connection with traffic.
