🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <FAIGIN.94Apr14130836@soldan.aero.org>,
Daniel P. Faigin <faigin@aero.org> wrote:
>On Thu, 14 Apr 1994 18:24:59 GMT, hatunen@netcom.com (DaveHatunen) said:
>
>> The three movements converged, with politicians manouevering to get
>> their urban highways made part of the Interstate system so that the
>> feds would pick up 90% of the costs, and pay to get rid of the slums.
>> By the mid-1960s, the Interstate Highway program was being used to rip
>> the heart out of central cities, taking with them a lot of neat old
>> bars and restaurants as well as inexpensive, if rundown, housing.
>
>I think you're making a goal out of a side-effect. I certainly doubt that
>ripping the heart of out cities was the goal of federally funded highways;
>rather, I would believe that the stated goal would have been the growth of
>commerce in those areas.

I didn't mean to say it was the only goal, nor, ncessarily the only
goal, but it was one of the factors in some areas. The freeways didn't
go through slums for economic reasons alone. In fact, slums were some
of the most expensive land around, due to the high rents that could be
charged the blacks who had no other options. And the number of people
who could be squeezed into one apartment with the rent dependent on the
number of people, in the manner that landlords near univrsities charge
their student tenants.

The debates at the time of Urban Renewal were quite acrimonious over
the racial implications. And Urban Renewal was definitely a goal which
was fortuitously coincident with the highway program, even leaving
aside any racial motivation: slums were considererd ugly, and the fact
that they serve a social function was forgotten. In that sense,
"ripping the heart out of cities" is fairly accurate, if somewhat
hyperbolic.

>It is true that emminent domain was easier to apply to people with less
>political clout, but highways were (back then) often seen as good things that
>would help improve an area (just as the coming of a streetcar line would
>improve an area back in the 1910s).

Of course. No question. Although it didn't work quite as intended. The
central city politicos forgot that freeways run both ways, and made it
easier for business to leave the central city for suburbs.

But be careful if you're experience is mostly LA. There was a different
situation in the cities east of the Rockies.

[...]

-- 
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