The Interstate System is the only completely planned highway system in the United States.
Fourth, it divided the funds as follows: 45 percent for the Federal-aid system (it was not yet designated as the “primary” system, and the 45 percent could be expended on rural or urban portions at the States’ election); 30 percent for the secondary system; and 25 percent for the routes in urban areas. This 45:30:25 ratio was to prevail until 1973.
Fifth, it authorized the designation of the National System of Interstate Highways, following almost exactly the recommendations of the National Interregional Highway Committee. The system was to be “. . . so located as to connect by routes, as direct as practicable, the principal metropolitan areas, cities, and industrial centers, to serve the national defense, and to connect at suitable border points with routes of continental importance in the Dominion of Canada and the Republic of Mexico. . . .” (Although it was later to become an issue, nowhere did the Congress indicate that the system should be expected to accommodate purely local traffic, such as urban commuting movement.)
Sixth, it provided that on any highway or street thereafter constructed with Federal aid “. . . the location, form, and character of informational, regulatory, and warning signs, curb and pavement or other markings, and traffic signals installed or placed by any public authority, or other agency, shall be subject to the approval of the State highway department with the concurrence of the Public Roads Administration. . . .”
Seventh, it added to the authorization of the 1½ percent highway planning funds the words “and for highway research necessary in connection therewith.” It was the view of the Public Roads Administration that research in the structure and geometries of the highway was proceeding well under State financing or with Public Roads administrative funds, but that not enough effort was being applied to research in the areas of economics and administration. Once research in these areas became established, the restriction was lifted by subsequent legislation, but through the late forties and the fifties Commissioner MacDonald stood firm against the use of any 1½ percent funds for the generally more favorably viewed physical research.
Indeed the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944 stands as landmark legislation; and most of its forward looking provisions stemmed directly from the highway planning efforts so strongly advocated and ably administered by Fairbank and MacDonald. It was a mandate for the future.
Planning in the Postwar Period
Statewide Highway Planning
During the war, highways were officially regarded as expendable, and they were pretty well spent. The most noticeable resulting deficiencies were probably on the State primary systems, and even though Federal-aid funds authorized in the 1944 Act were available, it was soon apparent that funds at both State and Federal levels would not be adequate to stay even with growing needs, to say nothing of recouping the wartime losses. Traffic volumes were greatly depressed by gasoline rationing and the suspension of passenger car production during the war, dropping to about half their 1941 level in 1943 and 1944. It was generally expected that traffic would recover, but slowly, and that time would be on the side of the
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