The controlled-access highway system is a fantastic innovation for our automobile-based transportation system in America. It dramatically increases safety, fuel-efficiency, and throughput.
This issue is that the controlled-access highways should have never been placed inside cities, but that precludes the automobile becoming the de facto mode of transportation.
It's important to remember that many of Robert Moses's city-splitting projects were started before WWII. I suspect that some of the worst aspects of what resulted from his legacy were based on vain attempt to use suburbia as defense mechanism to better survive a nuclear exchange.
The irony is that the existing controlled access highways could be fairly easily repurposed to rail if we wanted to, it's just that the automobile addicts that we are would collectively lose our mind if we actually converted some of redundant urban highways into railways.
This issue is that the controlled-access highways should have never been placed inside cities, but that precludes the automobile becoming the de facto mode of transportation.
It's important to remember that many of Robert Moses's city-splitting projects were started before WWII. I suspect that some of the worst aspects of what resulted from his legacy were based on vain attempt to use suburbia as defense mechanism to better survive a nuclear exchange.
The irony is that the existing controlled access highways could be fairly easily repurposed to rail if we wanted to, it's just that the automobile addicts that we are would collectively lose our mind if we actually converted some of redundant urban highways into railways.