Changing lanes : visions and histories of urban freeways / Joseph F.C. DiMento and Cliff Ellis.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

DiMento, Joseph F., author.

Contributor:

Ellis, Cliff, 1951-

Series:

Urban and industrial environments

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Express highways--United States--History.

Express highways.

Express highways--Government policy--United States--History.

Express highways--Government policy.

History.

United States.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xiii, 361 pages) : illustrations, maps.

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, [2013]

System Details:

text file

Summary:

The story of the evolution of the urban freeway, the competing visions that informed it, and the emerging alternatives for more sustainable urban transportation.Urban freeways often cut through the heart of a city, destroying neighborhoods, displacing residents, and reconfiguring street maps. These massive infrastructure projects, costing billions of dollars in transportation funds, have been shaped for the last half century by the ideas of highway engineers, urban planners, landscape architects, and architects--with highway engineers playing the leading role. In Changing Lanes, Joseph DiMento and Cliff Ellis describe the evolution of the urban freeway in the United States, from its rural parkway precursors through the construction of the interstate highway system to emerging alternatives for more sustainable urban transportation.DiMento and Ellis describe controversies that arose over urban freeway construction, focusing on three cases: Syracuse, which early on embraced freeways through its center; Los Angeles, which rejected some routes and then built I-105, the most expensive urban road of its time; and Memphis, which blocked the construction of I-40 through its core. Finally, they consider the emerging urban highway removal movement and other innovative efforts by cities to re-envision urban transportation.

Contents:

1 Urban Freeways and America's Changing Cities 1

2 The 1930s: Forays into the Urban Realm 23

3 Urban Freeways and National Policy, 1939-1945 45

4 Postwar Urban Freeways: Scaling Up for a City on Wheels, 1946-1956 73

5 Changing Visions and Regulations for Highway Planning 103

6 Urban Freeway Tales: Three Cities among Dozens 143

7 Conclusion and Epilogue: Urban Highways and the American City 209.

Notes:

OCLC-licensed vendor bibliographic record.

ISBN:

0262312387

9780262312387

OCLC:

823578214

Publisher Number:

ebr10642822

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license.