[muawiyah]

Remember, there are minimum standards for asphalt, and "peagravel and tar" ain't it. You also find it a common practice to spray tar on gravel and crushed rock to keep down the dust (not to hold them together). I grew up along such a road, and it's still gravel and crushed rock, and every now and then they'll add peagravel to smooth out the breaks.

After several decades of such treatment a lightly traveled road will begin to take on the appearance of having been paved.

We have several such roads near this neighborhood in Virginia.

[FourPeas]

The gravel roads I'm familiar with occasionally had a liquid sprayed on them but it certainly wasn't tar. In the five years I lived there, the roads never took on anything resembling a paved look. They were good old dirt with a bit of rock. The rock tended not to stay on the road, but found its way to the edge. A month after new gravel was put on, and neighborhood windshields chipped/cracked the ruts and holes appeared and the road became bumpy and dusty again.