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The Good Roads Movement

Cover of a colored brochure titled Quebec The Good Roads Province brochure. The illustration shows a coastal village on the Gaspé Peninsula. In the foreground, a young couple seems to be coming back from fishing, the man carries and de woman an oar. Behind them, a car passes through the village and in the background some rustic houses are clustered around a church at the foot of a mountain. The words Fishing, Bathing, Hunting and Resorts are found at the top and bottom. The credit reads Provincial Tourist Bureau Department of Highways and mines Quebec, Canada.

Brochure

Quebec The Good Roads Province, 1933

Provincial Tourist Bureau, Department of highways and Mines

Les Amis des Jardins de Métis Collection

The Good Roads Movement pushed the government of Quebec to invest in its road network. Born in the 1870s in the United States to encourage local, state and federal governments to improve roads – the movement was started to provide safe by-ways for cyclists. It became a powerful force for the extension and improvement of roads to help farmers get their produce to market and improve driving conditions for the cars and trucks coming off assembly lines across America.

The Quebec government embraced the movement in the first guidebook published to encourage American motorists to visit the province. Describing its intent to push forward with road construction rapidly and ambitiously, the guidebook stated: “the Good Roads Movement has gradually evolved with years and has increased in magnitude. The Quebec highway system is now considered one of the best and most complete in America. Enthusiasm for good roads still runs high among the population. And the greatest enthusiast of all is certainly the Minister of Highways, the Hon. J.L. Perron.”