CNU insists that now is the moment to take highway removals seriously, as many of these goliaths of mid-century infrastructure are approaching the end of their useful lifetimes. “With tough decisions on repair and investment looming, American cities have a window of opportunity to reverse decades of decline and disinvestment in these neighborhoods and invest in healthier infrastructure for their communities,” the report reads. At least up until now, there’s been support for such efforts at the federal level; Anthony Foxx, the Secretary of Transportation under President Obama, broadly supported infrastructure fixes aimed at historic disparities.
But some highways on this list are here to stay—and even expand. State highway engineers still love straight, wide roads, and this inertia cannot be underestimated. At the very least, some state DOTs are becoming more sensitive to impacted communities. Lately, “cap parks” have emerged as compromise solutions that restitch neighborhoods bifurcated by highways by literally covering up their air and noise impacts. Denver’s much-protracted fight over I-70 came to a decisive moment last week, when the Federal Highway Administration approved Colorado’s plans to lower the highway below grade, widen lanes from six to ten, and put a grassy “cap” over a small section of it. It will adjoin a local schoolyard. The I-70 saga offers one illustration of the challenges in such highway facelifts: Many residents love the prospect of a grassy cap park, while others fear that hiding the highway beneath it could draw in a tide of gentrification and displacement.
What would happen if the interstate were torn down entirely, as CNU suggests? There are dramatic examples of success; San Francisco, Milwaukee, and Portland have shown that “highway removal is viable—saving tax dollars, adding value to local tax bases, and significantly improving neighborhoods without choking traffic,” as the report states. The economic windfall can indeed be staggering: After Milwaukee removed its Park East elevated freeway, average assessed land values in its old footprint grew by over 180 percent, and a Fortune 500 company set up headquarters there.
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