The 50th Anniversary of the Interstate System: Where Have the Big Roads Taken Us?
Travel Blog • Michael Yessis • 06.26.06 | 7:25 AM ET
Robert Sullivan, author of the upcoming book Cross Country, takes a look at the impact of the U.S. Interstate Highway System in Sunday’s New York Times magazine. In its 50 years of existence, the Interstate System has not only changed the way Americans travel, but the way we live. “In building it during the 60’s, the U.S. destroyed nearly as much public housing as it put up,” Sullivan writes. “Then again, in a backhanded way, the Interstate System helped spawn the modern environmental movement, with the battle over I-40 through Overton Park in Memphis, for example, and with the fight over I-75 though the Everglades. It gave us historic preservation, after wiping out middle-class black neighborhoods in New Orleans. It also gave us sprawl. It gave us Atlanta. It gave us the modern South.”
Email to friend
Twitter
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Furl
Ma.gnolia
Mixx
Reddit
StumbleUpon
Yahoo! Buzz
Michael Yessis is the cofounder and coeditor-in-chief of World Hum.
