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The Changing Role Of Highway And Transportation Planning Part 1

Posted by aditya | 10:27 AM | , , , , | 2 comments »

In the United States before 1930 (and in many developing nations today) the primary attention of highway agencies was on rural areas; it focused on "getting out of the mud" by establishing a system of all-weather roads from rural areas to the nearest town. With this objective there seemed to be little need for "plan­ning"; the problem was to get these roads built. Long-distance transport of peo­ple and goods was left to the railroads. Cities were responsible for the construc­tion of their streets; public transportation was carried out by private enterprise, primarily with electric street cars.




About 1930 the attitude of highway agencies toward planning began to change. City streets were in relative distress, and many rural highways were in­adequate. The practice of using all federal aid and the bulk of state highway funds for the improvement of main rural highways and letting urban areas fend for themselves needed examination. To get facts on which to base decisions, the so-called "highway planning surveys" were undertaken. Beginning with the Federal-Aid Act of 1934, Congress authorized expenditures, without matching state funds, not to exceed 1 V2% of federal-aid funds apportioned to each state for making a complete road inventory and for planning, surveys, and engineer­ing investigations of projects for construction in the future. By 1940, all the state highway departments were assembling the facts necessary to develop long- range highway-improvement programs. But this effort and the accompanying federal and state financing continued, until after World War II, to have rural and highway focuses. Intercity transport was still left to the railroads. Cities were re­sponsible for their streets. Public transportation was still largely in private hands, but was shifting from street car to bus. Integrated transportation planning was unknown.

The period from the late 1940s until about 1970 was one of great change in transportation facilities and their use. Motor-vehicle and heavy-truck travel measured in vehicle miles tripled in both rural and urban areas. Public consen­sus was that more and better highways were needed, including the Interstate Freeway System. At the same time, highway agencies expanded their programs to deal with urban congestion. Among the consequences of these practices were the veritable explosion of cities into the suburbs accompanied by decay of near­ down town areas, a two-third's decrease in public transit ridership, and financial distress and public takeover of many privately owned transit operations. Also, railroads lost most of their intercity passengers to the private automobile, buses, and airlines, and trucks assumed increasing importance in long-haul freight transportation. Even so, planning was still primarily directed at accommodating the demands of motor vehicles, with little attention to the interrelationships among modes or the deterioration of public transportation.

Title Post: The Changing Role Of Highway And Transportation Planning Part 1
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Author: aditya