THE GRAND BOULEVARD A direct road will be built between Nice and Paris, which will be reserved mainly for automobiles. Its route will be as close as possible to a straight line, because we are in an era where it is not a question of wasting time on useless detours. But it will also be the triumphant route of tourism, because it will straddle picturesque sites, provinces, cities, like a prodigious roller coaster developed over eight hundred kilometers in length. From now on, the automobile will have its track, as the locomotive has its own. In this Race for perfection, it is therefore still the land route that has the last word, as it did in the time of the Romans. They were masters in establishing road networks. They too traced a magnificent route from "Nicæa" to "Lutetia": it made a right angle at Arles, then went back up without deviation towards Lyon, Chalon, Paris. Work of art and solidity where cement, stone, sand formed a surprisingly resistant whole, where were arranged the milestones, the relays, the hotels, all the conveniences that accelerated services include.
Since Caesar, we have driven on the railway; we have inaugurated the air routes. Finally, the latest cry of locomotion is the roadway. Bitumen replaces the massive slab; the "thirty horses" has replaced the ancient chariot; on the edge, kilometer markers, garages, palaces are built. But it is always the dirt road.
That is how progress goes. When it has finished, it begins again.

LOUIS SIMON.