This story is the final installment of a four-part series. To read Part 1, click here. To read Part 2, click here. To read Part 3, click here.
Way back in 1919, when Lt. Col. Dwight D. Eisenhower summed up the U.S. Army convoy’s trip from the East Coast to San Franscisco in his report to commanders, it’s unlikely he could have foreseen what the trip along the Lincoln Highway corridor would mean for the future of America.
Sure, he recognized and pointed out that the trip — to an extent — showed that transcontinental routes were feasible and that they would be a boon both militarily and commercially. He didn’t note what the routes would mean for the average citizen, but as tourism gained strength during the 1920s, the thought had to have crossed his mind.
By the time Eisenhower took the office of U.S. president in 195e, he knew it was time to turn his ideas from 30 years earlier into reality.
Several studies had been completed, the most extensive in 1939, related to connecting the major U.S. cities via interstate highways. The basic layout of these routes was included in the Federal Highway Administrations (FHWA) Yellow Book (so named because its cover was yellow).
Roadblocks to realizing a dream
While the Yellow Book showed relatively detailed routes for the roadways between cities, what it did NOT show were the details of interstate spurs and arterials within the cities; rather, a haphazard line or two was drawn to represent a potential route. As development of the interstates began, these lines were refined — and not to the liking of everyone involved.
Communities divided by racial bias
In the 1950s, racism remained embedded in American culture. Effort to reduce segregation had yet to begin in earnest, and urban areas were particularly racially charged. Many people saw the interstate system as a way to further divide the cities and, in effect, place physical barriers between black and white communities. Highway design was used to intentionally split black communities resulting in the displacement of millions of African Americans. The highways acted as a form of “slum clearance,” setting up policies that destroyed homes, businesses, churches and cultural centers.
While the government implemented its right to eminent domain in the areas, the settlements were hardly fair. The Kennedy Administration offered just $200 for a displaced home and $500 for a displaced business. Millions of these homes and businesses were never rebuilt or relocated.
In some cities, “freeway revolts” were organized to stop the widespread destruction of neighborhoods; these revolts met with some success. Some routes were cancelled or modified, and even one freeway that had already built in San Francisco was removed.
The results of freeway revolts remain a visible scar on America’s landscape today.
Throughout the country, one will find evidence of freeways to nowhere, abruptly terminating highways and other evidence of projects that were never completed. The resulting roadways, and the waste associated with them, became a lasting but often overlooked mark of the freeway system. Proposed routes were considered on a regional basis with little in the way of local input. And on the stretches of highway between cities, almost all routes were designed at the federal level.
Interstates at the center of controversy
While the initial highway protests were seemingly nothing more than a nuisance, as the push for racial equity gained steam and became a massive movement in the 1960s, the interstates took center stage in the civil rights movement.
State governors began to look more closely at interstate routes and what they were doing to their residents and their lifestyles.
Plans scrapped; routes left incomplete
In 1970, Massachusetts Gov. Francis W. Sargent ordered a review of freeway plans around Boston. The result was the cancellation of several interstate spurs, belts and expressways.
In Chicago, the proposed Amstutz Expressway was supposed to be built along the lakeshore to Waukegan. A large portion was never completed, and the road exists in two short segments rendering it essentially useless. It’s known locally as “The Highway to Nowhere.”
Freeway revolts and public outcry against routes being built through urban areas was particularly effective in San Francisco. With the publishing of a map of proposed routes through the city in 1955, public upheaval began in earnest as residents realized what the routes would mean in terms of dividing the community. Fully a dozen freeways or portions thereof were cancelled due to negative public sentiment.
One of the most bitter fights involved the elevated Embarcadero Freeway. While portions of the freeway were completed, in 1985, local lawmakers voted to cease further construction. A large portion of the route collapsed during the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake and was removed in short order.
Some freeways through urban centers that displaced minority residents and businesses still stand, a testament to the ability of what was intended to be a positive public works project negatively shaping socio-economics and geography whether intentional or not. Interstate 10 through New Orleans was constructed along Claiborne Avenue, a route through a poor African American portion of the city. Many considered the interstate route to be racially motivated, but protests did not stop its completion. The outcry did cause local officials to reconsider other routes throughout New Orleans, especially those planned through historic neighborhoods.
Arkansas city divided on north/south lines
Finally, a relatively latecomer to the racial division caused by interstates came along the Interstate 630 corridor, which essentially bisects Little Rock, Arkansas, on an east-west route. Not fully completed until the mid-1980s, I-630 pushed development north and south along its route — the most productive of the development being along the north side of the interstate.
The south side, which at one time contained stately manors, slowly devolved into decay and poverty, and crime became a major issue during the 1990s. Coincidentally, Central High School, Little Rock’s symbol of desegregation (or segregation, if you will), is located just a couple of blocks south of the interstate.
Ultimately connecting a nation
Looking back at the more than 100 years that have passed since the 1919 military convoy across America, many would agree that Eisenhower’s vision was a necessary improvement to tie the nation together as transportation and interstate commerce came to drive the American economy.
Prior to the interstate system, a trip between Texas and Maine could take a week for the average traveler with a good road map. Today, interstate highways line the entire route, and the same trip can be made in two days if a driver is ready for a long haul.
In an era when commercial trucking has effectively replaced the railroad and Americans’ taste for adventure involves traveling throughout the country, the completed interstate system is a testament to how one man’s vision can change a nation. In the process, it can also help build that nation’s freight logistics system.
Since retiring from a career as an outdoor recreation professional from the State of Arkansas, Kris Rutherford has worked as a freelance writer and, with his wife, owns and publishes a small Northeast Texas newspaper, The Roxton Progress. Kris has worked as a ghostwriter and editor and has authored seven books of his own. He became interested in the trucking industry as a child in the 1970s when his family traveled the interstates twice a year between their home in Maine and their native Texas. He has been a classic country music enthusiast since the age of nine when he developed a special interest in trucking songs.
