Why America Is Tearing Down Its Highways

[Music] the cross-country road trip [Music] 106 miles to chicago [Music] we got a full tank of gas it's dark and we're wearing sunglasses it's a quintessentially american tradition that's built upon an historic infrastructure investment the federal-aid highway act of the 1950s laid the groundwork for the backbone of american transportation today but zoom in a bit closer and you'll find towns and cities all across the country that were divided and whole neighborhoods displaced by new highways half a century later many of those freeways are aging and degraded and cities are grappling with the question do we repair the highway or do we tear it down and what do we put in its place we've got a grand narrative of the achievements of the interstate highway system there is not as prominent a reflection of the cost of the interstate highway system historians do say that the tampa bay area has highways that were designed to displace minorities we see this sort of pattern where we are looking at decisions that were made mid-century that really did change this community this became a dividing point for people who often times traverse these neighborhoods back and forth what we see now with this new infrastructure bill we can actually make amends literally mending back neighborhoods to hopefully bring back and revive what were in these areas in the future as far as our interstate it's all important as the railroads were important to the community a hundred years ago historians call the interstate highway system the greatest public works project in american history potentially even in world history the dale windling is working to map the effects of the interstate highway system across america it was intended and was a massive employment and public works project that put labor contractors whether it be concrete like construction contractors to work in cities metropolitan areas states around the country and so like those equivalent of 500 billion dollars of investment went into the pockets of workers now to say the interstate highway system was a massive undertaking is probably underselling it over 48 000 miles of highways were constructed across desert sands farmland mountains and through cities the sheer scale and ambition of the project is astounding and the impact it had on american society is undeniable moving from state to state city to city and to and from rural areas became a whole lot easier travel job opportunities and trade routes all opened up because of the highway system and america's love affair with the automobile got a whole lot stronger today most american towns and cities are still designed to prioritize cars rather than pedestrians the way that the public understands the legacy and the impacts of the interstate highway system is changing [Music] as the highway interstate program expanded into major cities highway revolts began popping up across the country protesting the construction of new roads through urban areas in some cases highway building was used as a tool to reinforce racial segregation and transport people around and out of city centers according to the us department of transportation more than a million people were displaced from their homes in the first 30 years of highway construction half a century later the effects of these projects like environmental and noise pollution are unequally felt by the people who live near them one of those communities split by a highway was rochester new york now they're taking that highway down and in rochester in particular we had what we call an inner loop which was literally a loop around the city which cut off many neighborhoods in particular the neighborhood where i grew up in and so you had this great divide so we lost our resources lost our connections to what we did have in the neighborhood and so that creates a decline rochester's 2.68 mile inner loop was proposed in 1947 and constructed between 1952 and 1965. it wraps around rochester's downtown area and distributes traffic around the core some residents have come to know it as a moat that's divided the city still it's become part of the fabric of daily life here in rochester to talk about a removal it's people like whoa whoa whoa whoa slow down hold your horses what are we going to do what happens in traffic ideas for the removal of the inner loop have been proposed since 1991 taking down part of the highway would give the city an opportunity to prioritize walkability and development for all the neighborhoods around the downtown area by the 2010s the highway was in bad shape its bridge crossings needed continuous investment to keep them functional and the yeast section of the inner loop was operating below capacity carrying just about 2 000 vehicles a day per lane so instead of fixing it the city decided to take part of it down we replaced this highway with generally a two to three lane roadway with on-street parking wide sidewalks and a protected two-way bicycle facility through the entire length eric fresh was in charge of managing the inner loop east project for the city of rochester pre-pandemic we saw a more than doubling of bicycle and pedestrian traffic in this area and that's prior to most of the housing and other development taking place so we know just by removing this highway by providing an environment that people would want to be in people are coming you can see it and it's bringing new life and vitality to this part of town the inner loop east transformation project was one of the first major highway removal schemes in the country project managers said people's travel time has only gone up by a matter of minutes it cost about 20 million dollars to pull off and the project got most of its funding from an obama era federal grant program it took engineering firms stantec nine months to remove 4400 feet of four to six lane expressway and three bridges and clear out six acres of land for development now the empty lands being redeveloped to add new bike lanes businesses and large residential blocks the project's been so successful the city now wants to do it all again and remove the remainder of the highway called inner loop north but this time around the project's bigger more technically ambitious and more complicated the city is proposing to take down a longer stretch of highway creating 20 acres of land for redevelopment with a budget closer to 90 million but of course fixing the damage that's been done by a piece of infrastructure like this is more complicated than just removing a road and building something in its place there's always the risk that redeveloping an area could price out current residents currently on opposite sides of that inner loop you know 500 feet across from one another you have one group that's predominantly black and brown most home sales are for between 65 to 80 thousand dollars and on that other 500 feet you have mostly older caucasians and uh home sales over there are 500 to 750 000 so you've got you've got to figure out how you create this this how do you mend this and bring progress i was pretty inspired to learn that sean had formed a community group with the residents in a neighborhood across the highway to discuss what they wanted to go in the roads place their focus is smaller developments that can support single-family homes for local residents rather than the big mega block developments that are popping up in place of inner loop east we can actually physically try to design and create once again connected neighborhoods and help facilitate home ownership help facilitate community wealth building now rochester isn't the only city tearing down its highways congress for the new urbanism has tracked at least 40 highway removal proposals across the us and while highway teardowns have been talked about by local communities for years the idea is now gaining more traction in washington in an earlier draft of the u.s infrastructure bill democrats set aside 15 billion dollars to fund projects like this through the reconnecting communities act but in the bipartisan bill that ultimately passed that funding was cut down to just one billion dollars now for context just one highway removal that's being proposed in syracuse new york is expected to cost close to 2 billion the reconnecting communities that billion dollars is something we want to get to work right away uh putting to work it's going to be the catchphrase for the next couple of years you know reconnecting communities and rebuilding families it's going to be there and so that's why it takes folks across the country to keep putting hammer to nail and saying hey you said this you've got to adhere to this you've got to adhere to this and that's that's important the next chapter in rochester shows both the potential success and nuance involved in removing legacy infrastructure highway demolitions aren't a silver bullet for a city's problems but rochester's inner loop projects can serve as a sort of test case for other cities as they decide what to do with their aging infrastructure i would just say that the greatest risk would be removal of interstate highway segments without consideration of the most directly affected populations or without planning in the context of a broader set of like urban development considerations including affordable housing including recreational space including considerations of public transit mobility and especially accessibility of course each city's situation is unique but highway teardowns point to a bigger shift in how city planners are now viewing the role of cars we can serve the car but it doesn't need to be the driving force if you will we can create urban communities that you can drive in but that are much more focused on people the interstate highway system forever reshaped america in ways that are still felt today the goods the bad and the ugly the highway teardowns happening now are a powerful reminder of how we can learn from the past to build a better future if you enjoyed this video and you want to get more from the definitive video channel for construction make sure you subscribe to the b1m [Music] you

Channel: The B1M

Views: 1,200,547

Keywords: B1M, TheB1M, Construction, architecture, engineering, The B1M, Fred Mills, building, infrastructure, highways, roads, cars, interstate, highway, eisenhower, segregation, displacement, gentrification, city planning, urban renewal, renovation, green space, pedestrian paths, bike lanes, development, real estate, rochester new york, inner loop east, inner loop north, highway removal, pete buttigieg

Id: IXp4rVZFTVs

Length: 10min 47sec (647 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 16 2022

Reddit Comments

[u/AmericanCreamer]

I love the B1M! Thanks for posting

[u/bucky716]

Neat. Thanks for posting. I remember a small handful who would say "traffic is going to be horrible if it's removed." Well, it hasn't been horrible. It's been a success. Can't wait for the north section to be ripped out and redeveloped.

[u/spacebob]

The NY Times also had an article on cities tearing down highways that predominantly featured Rochester's project.

[u/popnfrresh]

I love how @ 4:34 he speaks of distributing traffic and highlights the rail line from high falls to the rail yard around atlantic ave.

[u/ScotchyScotcher]

I was just going to post this! Awesome seeing this on the B1M.

[u/downtownhobo]

Very cool to see this! Especially on a channel I already follow,

Here is the project website if anyone is interested: https://www.innerloopnorth.com

[u/WhiteNamesInChat]

I didn't realize the city was pitching R1 zoning for the new parcels on the north side. That is an unbelievable waste of an opportunity. I thought the city was desperate for economic growth.

[u/Whyisthissobroken]

Thanks for sharing this - excited to see the progress.

[u/SirBrentsworth]

This was great! Thanks for sharing, I'm gonna sub to this channel