care of bond service and maintenance. But other States, particularly those that had become accustomed to diverting large amounts of highway revenue to nonhighway purposes, underwent severe financial embarrassment. Highway officials and road user organizations that had preached for years against diversion viewed the predicament of these States with considerable relish, best express by the Engineering News-Record, a long-time foe of the diversionists.
Where reserved for highway purposes these declining funds are still relatively proportionate to requirements. But in those States where legislatures have made diversions to the general fund, relief, the school system or oyster propagation, the present decline in revenues has brought retribution that is harsh as it is just. The legislatures that avoided finding money for relief or for their school systems must now find money to keep their roads from going to pieces.[1]
Amidst the gloom of war, the shortages of everything and the wartime restrictions there was one piece of cheerful news. Motor vehicle traffic accidents dropped materially in 1942, not only in number but in the rate per 100 million vehicle miles of travel.[N 1] This was due to a combination of factors—reduced exposure, lower speeds and, probably, greater emphasis on safety as a contribution to the war effort.
By October 1948, the Alaska Highway was ready to serve as an overland route, maintaining the U.S. link with Alaska.
Defense Road to Alaska
After the Pacific Fleet was crippled at Pearl Harbor, it seemed possible that the United States might be cut off from Alaska except by air. The U.S.–Canadian Permanent Joint Board on Defense recommended that a military road be built through Canada to Alaska, and the United States offered to build it. By mid-March 1942, the two countries agreed that Canada would supply the right-of-way and waive customs duties and the United States would build and maintain the road during the war and for 6 months afterward. The 1,400-mile plus route from Dawson Creek, British Columbia, to Big Delta, Alaska, was intended primarily to connect and supply a chain of strategic military airfields and provide an all-weather overland supply route to Alaska. As soon as the agreement with Canada was negotiated, the War Department requested the help of the PRA for locating and building the road.
Within a week of the agreement, U.S. engineer troops began cutting a pioneer road through the Canadian wilderness. During the season of 1942, the Army placed seven regiments on the project and, with the assistance of PRA location engineers and contractors, pushed the pioneer road through the entire distance to Big Delta. Meanwhile, the PRA was working as rapidly as possible on reconnaissance, survey, and plan preparation for the proposed all-weather road. In addition the PRA was busy mobilizing engineers, contractors and equipment for the huge job.
Time did not permit the usual procedure of preparing plans and specifications, advertising for bids and letting contracts. Instead, the PRA engaged four engineering firms as management contractors. These firms recruited American and Canadian construction contractors for the work, and by the summer of 1942, in a period of only 3 or 4 months, 52 contractors and 7,000 construction workers were mobilized in working
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