For this weeks assassigned blog I have the Interstates Highway System. On june 29, 1956 President Eisenhower signed the Interstate Highway Act. The Act gave $25 billion dollars to construct 41,000 miles of interstate highways in the span of 20 years. A highway trust fund was set up tp pay for 90% of the construstion cost and the other 10% was suppost to be paid by the states through new fuel taxes,cars, trucks, and tires. It is the largest public works project in history as well as the lagrest highway system in the world.
The American Association of State Highway and Transport Officials has set a standard that all new interstates have to meet such as speed limits and traffic lights. Origanlly the main reason for the interstates was to improve the ablity to get troops to and from airports, seaports, rail teminals, and other military bases.
Eisenhower was in support of this act because of the U.S. Army’s first Transcontinental Motor Convoy across the U.S. on the Lincoln highway, which I-80 is apart of. The best thing I think I found while researching is that the urban legend is “that one out of every five miles of interstate can be used as an airstip duing war time”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_Highway
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Aid_Highway_Act_of_1956
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