Governor Roume believed railroads actively repopulated and enriched African regions

Evidence

A dirt road [route d’etapes] creates a void; a railroad or steamboat brings the population back, and with it a fecund and joyous activity. This phenomenon, which was so strikingly apparent on the Dakar- Saint-Louis line, is recurring in exactly the identical fashion on the Kayes-Koulikoro line; on the finished part of the line from Conakry to the Niger, a new town, Kindia, has sprung up at the temporary terminus, and the figures confirm what a simple glance appears to reveal. -Governor General Ernest Roume 1 In 1902, the dynamic and experienced Ernest Roume was appointed governor general of French West Africa. — Alice L. Conklin, A Mission to Civilize_ The Republican…, 132

Categorization

• DEFINE: Illustrates the French colonial equation of infrastructure (railroads over dirt roads) with population vitality and prosperity — a core assumption underlying mise en valeur doctrine.