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INTRODUCTION HIGHWAY TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS

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By legislative acts in the several states, roads and streets have been separated into "systems." Authority over each of these systems rests with an appropriate legislative or administrative body. It, in turn, makes provision for the planning, design, construction, maintenance, and operation of its particular group of highways. Table 2-1 classifies the mileage of roads and streets in the United States by states and by systems.

In the United States, 85% of the highway mileage, some 3,190,000 mi, lies in rural areas. Its distribution over the country varies with population and development; it ranges, excluding Alaska, from 0.40 mi of road per square mile for Arizona to 4.2 mi of road per square mile for New Jersey. Before 1890 this rural mileage was without system or classification. Responsibility for its establishment and upkeep was in the hands of local government; counties, town-ships, and towns took care of the roads. In general their condition was poor.
New Jersey, in 1891, first initiated state aid for rural roads, and by 1910 about half the states had set up state highway departments with varying degrees of authority. Finally, the Federal-Aid Act of 1916, which made participation in federal aid contingent on having a state highway organization, caused the remaining states to establish departments; in similar manner, the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1921 (to be discussed subsequently) brought the concept of highway systems for rural roads to all the states.


The remaining 18% of the country's roads (694,000 rrv) is in urban areas. Here the ratio of mileage to area is large; for example, Washington, D.C. has 16.5 mi of streets per square mile. As with rural roads, early responsibility for streets rested solely with local governments. However, in contrast to the situation with rural roads, state support for city streets did not begin in substantial amount until 1924. Not until 1934 were any city streets included in a state highway system.

The distinctions between highway systems, if merely "on paper/' would be unimportant. However, they reach far deeper, particularly in the area of finance. Funds for highways are appropriated from designated sources to specific systems. Thus, funds for improvements to one system may be quite readily available while those for another are extremely scarce.
Figure 2—1 offers comparisons for mileages and traffic volumes among different highway systems. The contrast is particularly marked between the Interstate System and principal arterials with low mileage and heavy use on the one hand, and local roads and streets for which the reverse is true.

Title Post: INTRODUCTION HIGHWAY TRANSPORTATION SYSTEMS
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Author: aditya