Page:Toll Roads and Free Roads.pdf/47

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FEASIBILITY OF TRANSCONTINENTAL TOLL ROADS
27

The section of the routes selected on which it is estimated there would have been the largest volume of toll-paying traffic in 1937 is the 65.6 miles from Jersey City, N. J., to New Haven, Conn. It is estimated that 3,508 vehicles would have used that section daily, resulting in a total utilization of 230,125 vehicle-miles.

The lightest 1937 traffic estimated for any section is the 56 daily vehicles corresponding to the 1,169.6-mile section from Spokane, Wash., to Fargo, N. Dak. Although 18 times as long as the Jersey City–New Haven section the vehicle-mileage generated is barely more than one-fourth of the utilization of the most heavily traveled section.

The estimated 1937 tfaffic on all sections of the selected routes, operated as a toll system, is shown on the flow chart, plate 11. Estimates for the section between Richmond, Va. and Boston, Mass. are shown in greater detail in plate 12.

Plate 13
Plate 13.—Map showing location of most important 939 miles of selected system as indicated by estimates of traffic based on operation as a toll facility.

The 10 most heavily traveled sections of the selected routes, as listed in table 2, have an aggregate length of 938.7 miles. The location of these sections is shown in the map, plate 13. It will be noted that these most heavily traveled sections form a continuous route from Washington, D. C., to Portland, Maine, and shorter stretches east of Chicago, Ill., and in the vicinity of Los Angeles, Calif.

Adding eight more sections, as listed in table 2, raises the aggregate mileage to 2,066.4 miles; and, with the exception of a section between Cleveland, Ohio, and the Ohio–Indiana line, completes a route from Boston, Mass., to Chicago, Ill., with a spur to Detroit, Mich. In the West, sections are added near Oakland, Calif., and between Portland and Salem, Oreg., as shown in plate 14.

If, in a similar manner, sections are added successively in groups, in the order of their estimated traffic volume, the locations of the