Items of Interest July 28, 1917 Issue

Items of Interest

The Republic of Costa Rica has an area of 18,400 square miles and a population officially estimated at 441,342. Agriculture is the principal industry, and bananas and coffee are the chief exports. Electricity, derived from water power in the highlands, is widely used for propelling machinery, lighting, and domestic purposes, and there are said to be more kilowatts per capita than in the United States. Two railroads connect San José with the Atlantic port of Limon and the Pacific port of Punta Arenas. The products of Costa Rica are diversified on account of climatic conditions. The soil is generally fertile. The seasons are variable; the Pacific side of the divide has dry weather from December to May and rains the rest of the year, but the Atlantic side has no distinctly wet or dry season.

To meet any possible coal shortage in the West next winter, more extensive use of fuel wood from the national forests is urged by the Government's foresters. The supervisors of the 153 national forests will afford all possible facilities to local residents wishing to obtain cordwood, which settlers may obtain free for their home use, and which is sold at low rates to persons cutting and hauling in order to sell to others. During the last fiscal year more than thirty thousand permits for the free use of national forest timber, mainly in the form of fuel wood, were taken out by local residents. The amount of timber involved approximated two hundred and fifty thousand cords.

The United States secretary of commerce announces the appearance of a publication of the Coast and Geodetic Survey entitled "The Use of Mean Sea Level as the Datum for Elevations." The pamphlet discusses the desirability of having a single plane for the whole country to which all elevations would be referred,—the mean sea level. For a number of years the Coast and Geodetic Survey has been extending a network of elevations of high accuracy inland from the coasts, with the elevations of its monuments all referred to mean sea level. The publication of the present report is to encourage the adoption and use of mean sea level as the datum for elevations by all civil engineers and surveyors.

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