Citation: An act to amend and supplement the Federal-Aid Road Act approved July 11, 1916, to authorize appropriations for continuing the construction of highways; to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1954 to provide additional revenue from the taxes on motor fuel, tires and trucks and buses; and for other purposes; June 29, 1956; Enrolled Acts and Resolutions of Congress, 1789-1996; General Records of the United States Government; Record Group 11; National Archives
When President Dwight D. Eisenhower took office in January 1953, the states had only completed 6,500 miles of the system improvements. Eisenhower had first realized the value of good highways in 1919, when he participated in the U.S. Army's first transcontinental motor convoy from Washington, DC, to San Francisco. Again, during World War II, Eisenhower saw the German advantage that resulted from their autobahn highway network, and he also noted the enhanced mobility of the Allies, on those same highways, when they fought their way into Germany. These experiences significantly shaped Eisenhower's views on highways and their role in national defense. During his State of the Union Address on January 7, 1954, Eisenhower made it clear that he was ready to turn his attention to the nation's highway problems. He considered it important to "protect the vital interest of every citizen in a safe and adequate highway system."
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Because of the 1956 law, and the subsequent Highway Act of 1958, the pattern of community development in America was fundamentally altered and was henceforth based on the automobile. In urban areas, massive superhighways cut through neighborhoods and destroyed housing, much of it in poorer sections of the city. Elsewhere, the new superhighways followed established railroad routes and so bypassed many small towns and rural merchants. While the construction and routing of the national transportation network evolved in response to community and environmental concerns, the increased mobility Americans enjoyed as a result of the interstate highway system spurred substantial growth in interstate commerce and suburbanization over the next decades.
Part I of the report asserted that the amount of transcontinental traffic was insufficient to support a network of toll superhighways. Some routes could be self-supporting as toll roads, but most highways in a national toll network would not. Part II, "A Master Plan for Free Highway Development," recommended a 43,000-kilometer (km) nontoll interregional highway network. The interregional highways would follow existing roads wherever possible (thereby preserving the investment in earlier stages of improvement). More than two lanes of traffic would be provided where traffic exceeds 2,000 vehicles per day, while access would be limited where entering vehicles would harm the freedom of movement of the main stream of traffic.
The president's political opponents considered the "master plan" to be "another ascent into the stratosphere of New Deal jitterbug economics," as one critic put it. Overall, however, reaction was favorable within the highway community although some observers thought the plan lacked the vision evident in the popular "Futurama" exhibit at the 1939 New York World's Fair. The exhibit's designer, Norman Bel Geddes, imagined the road network of 1960 - 14-lane superhighways crisscrossing the nation, with vehicles moving at speeds as high as 160 km per hour. Radio beams in the cars regulated the spacing between them to ensure safety. In the cities, traffic moved on several levels - the lowest for service, such as pulling into parking lots, the highest for through traffic moving 80 km per hour. Although the "magic motorways" shown in Futurama were beyond the technological and financial means of the period, they helped popularize the concept of interstate highways. With America on the verge of joining the war under way in Europe, the time for a massive highway program had not arrived. However, the president was already thinking about the post-war period. He feared resumption of the Depression if American soldiers returned from the war and were unable to find jobs. A major highway program could be part of the answer. On April 14, 1941, the president appointed a National Interregional Highway Committee to investigate the need for a limited system of national highways. Thomas H. MacDonald, BPR chief, chaired the committee and appointed Herbert S. Fairbank, BPR's Information Division chief, as secretary. Interregional Highways, written by Fairbank and released on Jan. 14, 1943, refined the concepts introduced in Part II of Toll Roads and Free Roads. The new report recommended an interregional highway system of 63,000 km, designed to accommodate traffic 20 years from the date of construction. The report went into detail on urban freeways. MacDonald and Fairbank were convinced that these freeways would exert a powerful force on the shape of the future city. It was important, therefore, for the network to be located so as to "promote a desirable urban development." As consideration of the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944 began, the highway community was divided. Rival apportionment formulas divided the states. Urban interests battled rural interests for priority. And states sought increased authority from the federal government. The result of these disagreements was an inability to agree on the major changes needed in the post-war era to address accumulated highway needs. The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944 primarily maintained the status quo. Its biggest departure was in Section 7, which authorized designation of a 65,000-km "National System of Interstate Highways," to be selected by joint action of the state highway departments:
Although Section 7 authorized the interstate system, it included no special provisions to give the interstate highways a priority based on their national importance. Section 7 did not authorize special funding, increase the federal share, or make a federal commitment to construct the system.
These standards, approved Aug. 1, 1945, did not call for a uniform design for the entire system, but rather for uniformity where conditions such as traffic, population density, topography, and other factors were similar. Designs, which would be based on traffic expected 20 years from the date of construction, would be adjusted to conditions. Most segments would have at least four lanes and full control of access would be provided where permitted by state law. But two-lane segments, limited access control, and at-grade railroad and highway crossings would be permitted where warranted by low traffic volumes. On Aug. 2, 1947, PRA announced designation of the first 60,640 km of interstate highways, including 4,638 km of urban thoroughfares. PRA reserved 3,732 km for additional urban circumferential and distributing routes that would be designated later. Construction of the interstate system moved slowly. Many states did not wish to divert federal-aid funds from local needs. Others complained that the standards were too high. Some of the heavily populated states, finding that federal-aid funding was so small in comparison with need, decided to authorize construction of toll roads in the interstate corridors. Also, by July 1950, the United States was again at war, this time in Korea, and the focus of the highway program shifted from civilian to military needs. The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1952 authorized $25 million for the interstate system on a 50-50 matching basis. These were the first funds authorized specifically for interstate construction. However, it was a token amount, reflecting the continuing disagreements within the highway community rather than the national importance of the system. When President Dwight D. Eisenhower took office in January 1953, the states had completed 10,327 km of system improvements at a cost of $955 million - half of which came from the federal government. According to BPR, as it was again called, only 24 percent of interstate roadway was adequate for present traffic; that is, very little of the distance had been reconstructed to meet traffic expected 20 years hence. Long before taking office, Eisenhower recognized the importance of highways.
The 1954 bill authorized $175 million for the interstate system, to be used on a 60-40 matching ratio. The formula represented a compromise: one-half based on population and one-half based on the federal-aid primary formula (one-third on roadway distance, one-third on land area, and one-third on population). During the signing ceremony at the White House on May 6, 1954, the president said, "This legislation is one effective forward step in meeting the accumulated needs." But he knew it was not a big enough step, and he decided to do something about it. Eisenhower planned to address a conference of state governors in Bolton Landing on Lake George, N.Y., July 12, 1954. Because of the death of his sister-in-law, the president was unable to attend, and Vice President Richard M. Nixon delivered the message from detailed notes the president had prepared. Nixon told the governors that the increased funding authorized earlier that year was "a good start" but "a $50 billion highway program in 10 years is a goal toward which we can - and we should - look." Such a program, over and above the regular federal-aid program, was needed because "... our highway network is inadequate locally, and obsolete as a national system." The vice president read the president's recollection of his 1919 convoy, then cited five "penalties" of the nation's obsolete highway network: the annual death and injury toll, the waste of billions of dollars in detours and traffic jams, the clogging of the nation's courts with highway-related suits, the inefficiency in the transportation of goods, and "the appalling inadequacies to meet the demands of catastrophe or defense, should an atomic war come." What was needed, the president believed, was a grand plan for a properly articulated system of highways. The president wanted a self-liquidating method of financing that would avoid debt. He wanted a cooperative alliance between state and federal officials to accomplish the federal part of the grand plan. And he wanted the federal government to cooperate with the states to develop a modern state highway system.
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