Post-Interstate: The next 50 years

As we commemorate the founding of our Interstate Freeway system, it's time to look to the future.

For all intents and purposes, the Freeway system is finished. A few spurs and beltways are under construction, but all the original freeway routes are complete. Other than widening some roads and general maintenance, the greatest public peacetime construction project in the history of the United States is done. Now what?

As our urban freeways clog up with traffic, air pollution increases and oil prices become more unstable, it's time to do for public transit what we did for cars 50 years ago. The federal government threw money at freeways, providing 90% of construction costs for each project. Meanwhile, cities and states have to fight tooth and nail to get, maybe, 50% federal funding for transit projects. Washington love spending money, so let's at least throw some in the right direction.

America needs a high-speed interstate rail system to connect our major cities. And each state would benefit greatly from intercity and regional rail systems to take the pressure off their crowded roads. Most of us only have one way to move. Our public transit systems are underfunded, and our communities are built in a way that discourages walking or using transit. By supporting transit today in the same way the government supported highways 50 years ago, we can give all Americans a real choice in how to get around.

And at the same time, we can still improve the freeway system. Too many neighborhoods, especially poor black ones, were devastated to build freeways. These roads cut through our cities like great asphalt scars. Wherever possible, we need to bury these roads and rebuild the urban fabric.

Some freeways run below street level in cities, such as portions of I-83 in Baltimore, and can be covered up, or "capped." New development can then be built over them. Essentially a tunnel after the fact. Others, when feasible, ought to be re-routed through tunnels to free up land above for urban redevelopment.

In this way, we can have the best of both worlds. A freway system admired the world over, and a public transit system of equal merit.