June 10, 2025 • 27 mins
Louis and Chris dive into seven American highways that should be removed to improve city life and reconnect communities divided by urban renewal projects of the past.
• Kansas City's North Loop divides downtown from the historic River Market area, destroyed hundreds of homes and businesses
• Syracuse's I-81 removal project is moving forward with plans to replace the downtown viaduct with a boulevard
• New Orleans' Claiborne Expressway displaced 1,500 people and continues to harm adjacent neighborhoods
• Baltimore's "Highway to Nowhere" spans just 14 city blocks but demolished 900 homes and serves no transportation purpose
• Portland Maine's I-295 occupies valuable waterfront property that could be reclaimed for public use and housing
• Oakland's 980 freeway runs through downtown at below capacity and sits on land that could address the housing crisis
• Milwaukee's I-794 removal proposal has state support and would reconnect neighborhoods to downtown and the waterfront
If you'd like to support the show directly, you can do so via our Patreon or by checking out our merch store. Let us know in the comments if there are other highways you think should be removed.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Doors are closing.
Public transit that's my way toroll On a metro.
I'm taking control my stop'strain tracks, it's my daily
grind, daily grind.
Public transit, it's the rhythmof my life.
This week, on Transit Tangents,we discuss seven highways in US
(00:21):
cities that should probably beremoved.
We'll discuss cities such asMilwaukee, oakland, baltimore,
portland, maine and more comingup on Transit Tangents.
Hey everybody and welcome tothis episode of Transit Tangents
.
My name is Lewis and I'm Chris,and today we are going to be
talking about seven highways inthe United States that I think
(00:45):
could be removed and it wouldnot be a big deal at all and in
fact it would make those citiesmuch, much better places to live
yeah, that's a, and that's acontroversial topic it is in a
lot of places.
It totally is a controversialtopic.
A lot of places there aremovements and cities across the
United States for removinghighways.
We've talked about one herelocally in Austin which has been
(01:06):
contentious, but there isalready construction underway on
continuing to make that highwaywider, unfortunately.
But yeah, in this episode Ikind of went through and spent
some time just mostly justlooking on Google Maps at first
and then being like, oh, thatone seems interesting.
And then looking to see, inmost cases, a movement in those
(01:27):
cities where, uh, there is apush to do it.
So these will be kind of in noparticular order.
Um, and just at the outset, the, the story of the building of
these highways is pretty similarin every single case.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Yeah, um I think it's been pretty well documented.
Uh, especially in the last, I'dsay, five years, it's really
been publicized to the fact thatthe the highway systems, as
they were built in the UnitedStates Initially, weren't really
supposed to go through citiesbut cities.
When they received the federalgrants, they they took this
opportunity to Continue thehighways through their downtown,
(02:03):
through these neighborhoodsthat they felt were dilapidated
neighborhoods or deserved urbanrenewal.
And what actually happened isthey displaced hundreds of
thousands of black and brownpeople, poor people, kicked them
out of their neighborhoods,demoed the blocks and built a
highway.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
And this story is true in almost every single
American city, right, yes, andwe story is true in almost every
single American city, right,yes, and we both read a book and
we actually got to go to anevent about a year ago.
The book City Limits talksquite a bit about this,
specifically in Texas, but theauthor, megan Kimball, does a
good job of.
She went to the EisenhowerPresidential Library and found,
like you know, there's likenotes from Eisenhower talking
(02:43):
about how he was disappointed inhow the states were using the
funds, because the highways weremeant to go and connect between
the cities, not go through them.
Essentially, um, definitelyhighly recommend the book to go
check it out.
Um, but yeah, in general we'lltouch on some of the history of
some of these, but we may kindof move a little bit quickly
through the list and talkbroadly, because it is a similar
story in a lot of these places.
(03:05):
Um, if you have other highwaysthat you think should be removed
as we're going and you we'veleft them out, let us know in
the comments below.
Um, as we'll, we'll check themout and maybe we'll do another
one.
And, yeah, for folks too whoare like this will never happen.
Blah, blah, blah, blah.
Uh, we've done an episode abouta year ago talking about three
highway removal projects in theUnited States that actually each
went very, very well.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
We'll make sure that video is linked Seattle,
rochester and San Francisco.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
Yes, exactly, and the yeah I mean all three of those
have been big successes.
Some of them and they're allvery different stories too, so I
think it's it bodes well forthe future, and some of these
projects that we're going tohighlight too, actually are
underway and are being removed.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
And I'm excited about this list because we've
actually been to a lot of thecities, if not all of them,
definitely to most of the citiesthat are on this list, starting
out with one that we've beentalking about a lot lately on
the podcast, which has beenKansas City.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Missouri, Absolutely.
And while we were in KansasCity we got to see this section
of the highway.
I did not know before we weregoing there that there was a
movement to remove this.
We kind of figured it out as wewere arriving, I think.
But this is the North Loop inKansas City.
It currently separates thedowntown area from the River
Market area.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
And Kansas City is notable for having a ridiculous
amount of highway miles percapita.
Yes, they joke there that theyhave the highest highway miles
per capita in the country.
I don't know if that's true,but it's definitely high.
It feels like it.
It's definitely out there.
This particular highwayseparates downtown from this old
market area which was sort ofwhere Kansas City started.
(04:41):
In this region the streetcargoes over, connects to this
little market square.
It's a very nice area, but youhave this giant highway that's
sort of separating this downtownand this other area.
That really could be used for alot more development and infill
.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
Right and kind of restoring the area to what was
there.
I mean, there were hundreds andhundreds of homes and
businesses destroyed to buildthis just like fully tearing
apart the urban fabric of thissection of Kansas City.
There's a group there calledNorth Loop Neighbors that is
pushing forward the proposal toremove this and they've done a
(05:18):
fantastic job with some of theirmedia.
There are some absolutely wildrenderings showing the same
building back before the highwaywas built today, how the
highway is now showing the exactsame building and then showing
what it could be in the future.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
And Kansas City has a unique resource there, where
they have this archive of photosof people standing in front of
each parcel in the city showingthe parcel number yes, so you
can actually see what thislooked like in the early 1900s,
for every property in the city,including the ones that were
demoed for this highway.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Yes, yes, and thank you to our friends at Urban Lab
in Kansas City who kind ofshared that with us while we
were there.
We'll link to our interviewwith them, where we actually
talked a little bit about thisproject with them in detail
there.
So Kansas city gets get somemore love on the show with our
our first on the list ofpotential highway removals.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
Well, the next one on the list.
I have not been to.
I have not spent any time in.
I guess do you consider thisupstate, new York?
But Syracuse, I say upstatesometimes and people in New York
are like that.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
I think Rochester is both upstate New York and
western New York.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
I thought everything upstate was basically everything
north of the Bronx, likeSchenectady.
I feel like yeah, yeah, yeah,yeah, it's upstate.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Yeah, I would.
Yeah, I mean, Syracuse mightnot be western New York, but
it's definitely upstate.
Okay, I have spent some time inSyracuse.
I've driven this section ofhighway quite a few times
through Syracuse.
This is a plan that is actuallygoing forward, which is nice.
This would be to remove asection of Interstate 81 running
(06:58):
right through Syracuse.
It's a section where thehighway runs up on a viaduct
above the street it is currently.
The plan is to essentially havethe highway reroute around
Syracuse on an existing highway,which is currently highway 481.
The idea would be to make 481just 81 and then have the
(07:21):
existing corridor be turned moreinto a boulevard.
That would be 81 business.
Essentially it would runthrough Syracuse and then it
would reconnect with Highway 690and then eventually rejoin back
up.
But really positive to hear thatthis one's actually going
forward, which is nice.
There's also some really greatrenderings of what this could
(07:45):
have looked like.
So the plans that were up therewere either to a improve the
highway or go with thisboulevard model, and both of
them were fully rendered out andone of these is a clear winner
and I'm glad that the rightdecision was made.
This got a lot of attention inNew York.
The current governor, KathyHochul, was very positive
(08:08):
towards making this visionactually happen.
So we've given Kathy Hochulsome shit on the show before,
but more as recent she's kind of.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
She's had a redemption arc.
She's come around the corner.
Yeah, she's had a redemptionarc from transit villain to well
, I'm not going to say hero, butto transit meh.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
Yes, yep.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
I also like this idea that both of these have been
rendered out.
Honestly, this is going back toour Urban Labs conversation in
Kansas City, but I think morepeople should take time to look
at corridors in their city,whether it's in a highway or
whatever, and create a renderingand just start passing it
around Totally, because I thinkthat's such a good way to get a
movement going.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
People got to see it, everyone's visual.
Yeah, and it's hard to envisionan area that has just had like
a giant highway bridge runningthrough it for so long as being
a place that could be like aspot you might even want to hang
out in.
You know what I mean.
Yeah, I'd say we quit our jobsand just make renderings all day
long?
Speaker 2 (09:03):
I would love to.
That would be pretty cool.
I don't know how we're gettingpaid.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Yeah, we'll figure that out later.
Yeah, out later, yeah, uh.
Next on our list, though, is acity we've been to as part of
the show.
Uh, we did a new orleans usingonly public transit video.
Uh, early on, this is about ayear ago at this point.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Um, this is the clayborne expressway this is a
highway that I have ridden onfor all of my life, um going
between mobile and new orleans.
It is really the main connectorof I-10 to downtown and when
this was originally built thiswas like 1960s era.
I-10 came into the city sort ofdipped down towards the west
(09:42):
into the CBD, went back out ofthe CBD up and then out toward
the western half of New Orleans.
Later on they they added 610,which is sort of a northern
version of this, that goesthrough city park and connects
back into i-10, sort of on thenorthern part of new orleans.
It's actually kind of like moredirect if you're just trying to
(10:03):
drive through it's way it's moredirect, it's faster if you're
going through the city, to justgo through now, the thing about
new orleans is that if you don'tgenerally just drive through
the city, new Orleans I-10 isalready separate from I-12,
which runs through the northernpart of Lake Pontchartrain.
So if you're in this areayou're probably going to New
Orleans, but this highwayconnecting into the CBD really
(10:26):
may not be necessary, right.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
Because if you're going into the CBD, I mean
you're going to get off thehighway and be on the surface
streets anyway.
So you can either you knowyou'd still be able to like this
section where I-10 comes inwhere we're talking about this
is the Claiborne ExpresswayThere'd still be a road, there
be a boulevard concept of somesort, so you could drive in that
way, or you can keep going on610 and then drive in more so
(10:48):
from the west side coming in.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
There are going to be people who are really against
this one.
I can already tell, because itdoes.
It is the the easiest connectorgoing in from the east to the
west, but also it it skirts thetop of the french quarter um
during mardi gras season.
It's like a primary corridorgetting people in and out.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
I I can see people having opposition to this yeah,
I mean I think that peopleoppose a lot of things that they
like afterwards.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
I don't disagree, I'm just saying it would definitely
met with with some resistance Iagree um I, I fully, I would
fully support um the removal ofthis highway or finding a way to
make that corridor better.
Yeah, because as it stands now,you're driving through and you
are really zooming along rightat second floor and like third
floor windows of houses thatthis went up right next to.
(11:36):
Yeah, you know, when this wasbuilt similar story to other
places 500 homes and businesseswere destroyed.
It created the scar through thecity.
Property values drop.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
Nobody wants to be near this now elevated highway
Right, and this is somethingthat has been studied for a
while.
Actually, the Obama era therewas studies funded for the
removal.
Fast forward to the Bidenadministration more studies,
more money for studies.
My complaint there is like, ifwe studied it during the Obama
(12:08):
era, why did we need to study itagain during the Biden era?
Couldn't we have just actuallytried to put some federal
dollars towards removal at thatpoint?
Speaker 2 (12:14):
yeah, um, but uh, currently there are no plans
directly set in stone here yeah,so, uh, I wanted to keep a keep
an eye on um to see if anythingcomes of it.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
No, absolutely there has been a group that has been
kind of pushing for the removalhere.
It's the clayborne avenuealliance.
So if you're interested inlearning more or getting
involved, if you're in that area, definitely check them out up.
Next on our list is inbaltimore, and this one is
pretty unique.
Uh, it looks visually it's wildif you're listening.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
It's going to be hard for us to explain, so you're
going to have to go back andlook this up on a map.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
Yeah, so this is i-70 slash the like mulberry
franklin expressway.
So what happened here is, as theinterstate highways were being
developed around baltimore andthis happened in a lot of other
cities too there was pushback tothese being built in a lot of
cities across the us.
Um, a lot of cities, you know,successfully managed to limit
(13:08):
the number of urban highwaysthat were built.
Um, baltimore kind of succeededin this area, but also not
fully.
So there was a section of I-70.
It was going to approachBaltimore going through Gwynn's
Falls Park and then it wouldconnect into downtown along the
Franklin and Mulberry corridors.
Now, there was a lot ofopposition to this at the time
(13:31):
and they were successful inpreventing the highway from
going through gwynn's falls park.
But at the same time thefranklin mulberry section had
already been, was beingconstructed or already been
constructed, and now we're endedup with this really bizarre
situation where you have i-70heading towards baltimore, you
have this huge cloverleafinterchange and the highway is
(13:54):
like literally like a stub thatgoes right to the edge of this
park, but it's just they'veturned that little stretch into
a parking lot.
It almost looks like they sat itthere just biding their time,
like we're going to get thiseventually, Eventually right,
and so in addition to that,though the Mulberry and Franklin
side, you have a highway thatjust starts and ends and it's
(14:16):
only, it's not even two mileslong, I don't think.
Yeah, it spans like 14 cityblocks, basically.
So less than two miles, yeah,and it just starts and ends and
it's trenched down in and it'sfully divided this community,
but it's a highway that goesnowhere, like it's fully divided
this community, but it's ahighway that goes nowhere, like
it's fully useless.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Yeah, and then, in the process, around 900 homes
destroyed, 1,500 peopledisplaced, all for a highway.
That didn't really happen,which again, is fine the highway
didn't happen.
It's still really sad thatpeople got displaced.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Totally.
And today, I mean, folks arestuck with this thing there.
You still have a lot of thenegative effects associated with
highways, from, you know, noisepollution to air pollution, to
having a literal trench dug,splitting this neighborhood in
half.
But there is a movement to tryto eliminate this section as
(15:09):
well as actually like to get ridof the giant cloverleaf
intersection that doesn't doanything to.
There's been a some talk aboutremoving that and kind of doing
some enhancements to the park.
But, um, the franklin mulberrysection here, yeah, it's pretty
annoying what is being proposedat the moment when you told me I
was a little, I was a little inshock too.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
If you look at this map, um, like you said, it's not
a huge, it's not a longdistance, it's not a huge area.
It's also not super well builtup.
It's mostly residential.
Yeah, um, but yeah, instead ofwhat would I think would be the
logical solution of maybe, maybeand I hate to say this maybe
widening the two streets oneither side of the.
You might not even need to, butyeah, of the freeway and uh,
(15:47):
then filling in this trench andmaking developable land parkland
, whatever, no, whatever.
No, they have a different plan.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
Yeah.
So right now, what seems to bebeing pushed forward is capping
sections of this, which feelslike in some of it too, they're
saying, well, the long-termvision is to get rid of this.
But there is a I'll link thearticle.
There's some from BaltimoreBrew, it's a multi-part series
about this.
They're saying the long-termvision is to remove it.
(16:17):
But they want to cap it.
But by putting the cap inyou're making it so much more
difficult to remove.
Like this thing is a gianttrench in the ground.
Fill it in with dirt or do somesort of hill or valley or
whatever you want to do, dosomething with it.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
But capping this super unnecessary highway is the
dumbest possible thing you cando, and I'm a big fan of cap and
stitch programs, but Not on ahighway.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
That doesn't Not this one.
It goes from surface streetsback to surface streets spanning
14 blocks.
It does not make any sense atall.
So the West Baltimore UnitedProject is what this kind of
falls under, and the project wasactually granted $2 million
(17:02):
from the Biden administrationunder the Reconnecting
Communities Grant for this cap.
So kind of wild, I don't know,not the best solution there.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
The exciting thing is we will be in Baltimore in June
.
We're going to come by takingthe Acela down from the
northeast, so we're going to endin Baltimore and maybe we'll
get a chance to go and check outthis ditch to nowhere.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
Up next on our list is in Portland, maine, which, if
you haven't had the pleasure ofvisiting, it's a lovely little
city, very nice Maine.
It's the most New England vibesever.
It makes sense where you are,but although not new england.
What maine?
Maine is not new england.
100% maine is new england.
What we're keeping this in,just so that people in the
(17:46):
comments can decide.
I, I mean I, I lived in newengland for for years and okay,
I guess it does include maine.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
I think of new england as like the historic,
like colonies, but I guess itwas part of New Hampshire, right
.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
It was part of Massachusetts, I think,
Originally yeah, it might havealso been part of New Hampshire
at a certain point too, butregardless we can set that aside
.
This is for 295 running throughPortland, maine.
So you've got 95 runningnorth-south through the area.
295 is a spur that comes off,goes through Portland and kind
(18:24):
of runs more so along the coastfor little ways.
Um, there are other connectorsthat go from 95 to 295 further
up and the concept of runningthis highway still today through
portland main, literallyrunning alongside the ocean for
part of it, just feels like theworst use of land ever.
We love building highways onwaterways, which is just it's
wild and I guess you know togive them some credit not credit
, I don't know to put somethought towards this during the
60s and 70s, like, a lot of likerivers and whatnot in the US
(18:47):
were pretty gross.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Industrial and gross.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
So if you're trying to not displace people, sure you
built it on waterways, buttoday, when we care about that
sort of thing, and like I meanthis, this section of the ocean,
there's trails and whatnot thatgo around it and right, you
know, separating downtownportland on the west side from a
cove, um is this highway, um,it also has made it so that you
have, uh, franklin street, umacts as like a, basically just a
(19:13):
feeder road into the highway.
It's really wide, cars aredriving fast on it, um, and it's
annoying to cross it.
If you're in downtown portlandon foot or on a bike, it still
sees a good bit of traffic on295, which is, um, you know,
worth noting, but it's not anamount of traffic that you
couldn't handle with a boulevardconcept of some sort and also
(19:34):
seems like, if you are lookingat the larger map, if you go up
the main highway, there isanother connector a little
further north.
That's a full-fledged highwaythat really could absorb any
traffic for this sort ofnorth-south connection right and
I think some of the complaintwith using that and this isn't a
valid complaint is that roadhas a toll.
If you're concerned about thetoll, buy out the toll.
(19:55):
But people in Maine and NewHampshire are used to paying
tolls anyway.
It's like pretty commoneverywhere on roads there not
everywhere, but along majorroads in New Hampshire and Maine
folks are used to paying tolls.
So I've spent a lot of time inPortland.
I have friends who live there.
I think it'd be great to seethis removed and I know that
housing in Portland is a majorissue and utilizing some of that
(20:16):
extra space to build housingwould be a major benefit to the
area because there are someproposed developments and
whatnot.
But there's a lot of nimbyismfrom going on and I think it
makes sense to to preserve thelike cute historic nature of the
core of portland.
But there is a hundred percentroom for development in areas
(20:37):
right around that kind of urbancore.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
And if you're trying to protect, you know the quaint
part of Portland.
This is a great part that's notquaint, that you can redevelop.
Exactly, take out the eyesore,give the beachfront property
back.
Yes, all right, we have thelast two on our list.
The first up is the Oakland 980downtown.
Now, I haven't spent much timein Oakland, but we did take a
little bit of time to look atthe overhead view of the map,
(21:02):
and this is another one thatreally seems like an unnecessary
sort of spur to the highway.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Totally and, from what I can tell, at one point
like this was going to continuefurther and it didn't.
So now it just is like a littlecutoff that cuts like right
through downtown Oakland.
Very easy to reroute aroundthis via 580 and 880.
You also have kind of parallelhighways running close to each
other, so it likely would makesense that you don't maybe even
(21:28):
need to do this kind of bypassgoing around and it would free
up a ton of really, reallyvaluable real estate, both from
like a financial perspective butalso just from the perspective
of.
This is the Bay Area and ifanywhere in the United States
has a housing crisis, it's here.
This is land that is walkingdistance to BART stations, is
(21:49):
already served well by transit,it can get folks between Oakland
and San Francisco and otherplaces throughout the area and
feels like a massive no-brainerand I don't know if Oakland is
the same as San Francisco andother places throughout the area
and feels like a massiveno-brainer and I don't know if
Oakland is the same as SanFrancisco.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
I know San Francisco sort of suffers from this
historic preservation mindsetwhere they sort of refuse to
build their belt, sometimes likevery not, sometimes basically
like all the time.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
Yeah, very very nimby .
Speaker 2 (22:12):
I don't know if Oakland is the same way, but I
feel like if you are removing ahighway, this is prime
opportunity to build highlydense yes, walkable
neighborhoods in the footprintof the old highway.
So a really good opportunitythere, and this one actually
seems like it's feasible.
It's been studied by Caltrans.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
There's a political will to get it done, so this is
also one to keep an eye onTotally and Connect Oakland has
been a group that's really beenleading the charge on pushing
this and, as you said, I meanthey've had some success in
getting the backing from somecity leaders, state leaders and
whatnot.
So I think, on a scale of like,could this one actually happen?
It?
(22:48):
You know, when you first lookat it it's like ooh, I don't
know, like that seems like it'dbe necessary to have, but the
highway was was is runningcurrently, uh, at way less
volume than it was designed for.
Um, it really feels like thisone could happen.
So, um, we'll keep an eye onthat one in oakland.
Speaker 2 (23:05):
Last but not least, though, we've got milwaukee and
the home of laverne, and surly,yes, I don't know why that
popped in my head.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
Uh, this one actually has a fighting chance at
happening as well.
Um, the wisconsin department oftransportation uh, has they
initially had several differentoptions that they were floating
for this?
Um, the options have dwindleddown to two now, and one of
those two options is fullyremoving this section of i-794,
(23:33):
downtown.
Yep, um, which is prettyamazing.
The other is improving it, um,but it does seem like you can
tell how I feel about thatoption.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Yeah, um, it go ahead oh, so this is another
waterfront highway too so yeahanother opportunity to reconnect
to the waterfront right andit's.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
it's like there's one neighborhood in particular and
I'll pull up the name of it herebut there's one neighborhood in
particular just south ofMilwaukee that it's cut off by
the highway, both from downtownand from the waterfront, and
this would do a great deal inreally reconnecting this part of
downtown.
Milwaukee has been growingquite a bit.
(24:11):
There's a lot of developmentgoing on, there's a lot of
emphasis on bringing folks backdowntown and the political will
is in in this case, just like incalifornia is also totally
there.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
so if you're in the area, you want to learn more
about this highway removal orconnect with people who are also
interested in this.
There's groups like rethink 794.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
They're sort of leading the charge for this
removal, so check them out, yeaha lot of really great
renderings and whatnot on theirwebsite and, like the, I love
when places do these.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
The little slider bar back and forth where you?
Speaker 1 (24:41):
can like peek of, like what it is today and what
it could be in the future andit's really impressive what the
potential there you knowactually could be.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
So um, check them out , get involved.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Make milwaukee a city that laverne and shirley be
proud of In general, though Imean it can seem like a crazy
idea to remove a highway forfolks who don't look too much at
it and like it.
It is crazy in the sense thatlike it is a big undertaking to
do but the results are so worthit.
(25:12):
I mean I just remember havinggone back to Rochester, new York
, where I actually grew up, andI remember what the Interloop
Highway was like, and thenseeing the sections that have
been removed and are done.
Today.
There is still a small sectionthat is yet to be done.
It is night and day.
It is a place where people livenow.
There are new restaurants there.
It's making the area around theStrong Museum, which is a big
(25:34):
draw for folks to go downtown,so much nicer to be in.
In an area that was just atrench in the ground, surrounded
by like parking lots and somehouses that were facing a
highway, it's now just like avery cute, vibrant part of the
area which is.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
It's just like such an improvement so, and if you
want to see other cities wherethis has been a success, I mean
you can go back and look at ourepisode where we talked about
highway removals.
But if you've been to Seattleand been on the waterfront where
the Alaska Viaduct was sort ofrecreated, you have access to
the waterfront now.
Or if you are in downtown SanFrancisco and you are on the
Esplanade, like the changesthere are, just it's made the
(26:15):
cities so much nicer and moreinviting to be in.
Speaker 1 (26:17):
Right, and it's.
It's I think it's important tosay too.
It's like personally, like I'mnot against highways in general,
but like highways inside of theurban part of your city, right
at your downtown.
It just made like the reasonyou go to downtown is because
you can walk around and thingsare close and you go and you
enjoy the time.
It's not so you can drivearound, yeah, in downtown.
So you know, make it easy toget to the edge of downtown and
(26:41):
then, once you're there, youknow if you want to drive there.
Great, ideally you have goodtransit to get there for folks,
but like you don't need to go 70miles an hour through downtown.
That's just like not how any ofthis is meant to work and do it
the way eisen planned.
Yes, yeah, exactly, exactly.
So, with all that being said,if there are other highway
removals that you'd like us tocheck out in the future,
(27:03):
definitely let us know in thecomments below.
If you haven't liked this videoalready, please consider doing
so.
It helps us out quite a bit.
If you want to support the showdirectly, you can do so via our
Patreon or checking out ourmerch store below.
Uh, we'll hopefully go checkout more of these in person.
Um, the baltimore one inparticular will be in the area
fairly soon, but uh, with allthat being said, thank you all
so much for watching and enjoythe rest of your transit.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
Tangents tuesday yeah , I'm saving that dough watch me
go.
Doors are closing.
Public transit that's my way toroll On a metro.
I'm taking control my stop'strain tracks, it's my daily
grind, daily grind.
Public transit, it's the rhythmof my life.
This week, on Transit Tangents,we discuss seven highways in US
(00:21):
cities that should probably beremoved.
We'll discuss cities such asMilwaukee, oakland, baltimore,
portland, maine and more comingup on Transit Tangents.
Hey everybody and welcome tothis episode of Transit Tangents
.
My name is Lewis and I'm Chris,and today we are going to be
talking about seven highways inthe United States that I think
(00:45):
could be removed and it wouldnot be a big deal at all and in
fact it would make those citiesmuch, much better places to live
yeah, that's a, and that's acontroversial topic it is in a
lot of places.
It totally is a controversialtopic.
A lot of places there aremovements and cities across the
United States for removinghighways.
We've talked about one herelocally in Austin which has been
(01:06):
contentious, but there isalready construction underway on
continuing to make that highwaywider, unfortunately.
But yeah, in this episode Ikind of went through and spent
some time just mostly justlooking on Google Maps at first
and then being like, oh, thatone seems interesting.
And then looking to see, inmost cases, a movement in those
(01:27):
cities where, uh, there is apush to do it.
So these will be kind of in noparticular order.
Um, and just at the outset, the, the story of the building of
these highways is pretty similarin every single case.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Yeah, um I think it's been pretty well documented.
Uh, especially in the last, I'dsay, five years, it's really
been publicized to the fact thatthe the highway systems, as
they were built in the UnitedStates Initially, weren't really
supposed to go through citiesbut cities.
When they received the federalgrants, they they took this
opportunity to Continue thehighways through their downtown,
(02:03):
through these neighborhoodsthat they felt were dilapidated
neighborhoods or deserved urbanrenewal.
And what actually happened isthey displaced hundreds of
thousands of black and brownpeople, poor people, kicked them
out of their neighborhoods,demoed the blocks and built a
highway.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
And this story is true in almost every single
American city, right, yes, andwe story is true in almost every
single American city, right,yes, and we both read a book and
we actually got to go to anevent about a year ago.
The book City Limits talksquite a bit about this,
specifically in Texas, but theauthor, megan Kimball, does a
good job of.
She went to the EisenhowerPresidential Library and found,
like you know, there's likenotes from Eisenhower talking
(02:43):
about how he was disappointed inhow the states were using the
funds, because the highways weremeant to go and connect between
the cities, not go through them.
Essentially, um, definitelyhighly recommend the book to go
check it out.
Um, but yeah, in general we'lltouch on some of the history of
some of these, but we may kindof move a little bit quickly
through the list and talkbroadly, because it is a similar
story in a lot of these places.
(03:05):
Um, if you have other highwaysthat you think should be removed
as we're going and you we'veleft them out, let us know in
the comments below.
Um, as we'll, we'll check themout and maybe we'll do another
one.
And, yeah, for folks too whoare like this will never happen.
Blah, blah, blah, blah.
Uh, we've done an episode abouta year ago talking about three
highway removal projects in theUnited States that actually each
went very, very well.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
We'll make sure that video is linked Seattle,
rochester and San Francisco.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
Yes, exactly, and the yeah I mean all three of those
have been big successes.
Some of them and they're allvery different stories too, so I
think it's it bodes well forthe future, and some of these
projects that we're going tohighlight too, actually are
underway and are being removed.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
And I'm excited about this list because we've
actually been to a lot of thecities, if not all of them,
definitely to most of the citiesthat are on this list, starting
out with one that we've beentalking about a lot lately on
the podcast, which has beenKansas City.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Missouri, Absolutely.
And while we were in KansasCity we got to see this section
of the highway.
I did not know before we weregoing there that there was a
movement to remove this.
We kind of figured it out as wewere arriving, I think.
But this is the North Loop inKansas City.
It currently separates thedowntown area from the River
Market area.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
And Kansas City is notable for having a ridiculous
amount of highway miles percapita.
Yes, they joke there that theyhave the highest highway miles
per capita in the country.
I don't know if that's true,but it's definitely high.
It feels like it.
It's definitely out there.
This particular highwayseparates downtown from this old
market area which was sort ofwhere Kansas City started.
(04:41):
In this region the streetcargoes over, connects to this
little market square.
It's a very nice area, but youhave this giant highway that's
sort of separating this downtownand this other area.
That really could be used for alot more development and infill
.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
Right and kind of restoring the area to what was
there.
I mean, there were hundreds andhundreds of homes and
businesses destroyed to buildthis just like fully tearing
apart the urban fabric of thissection of Kansas City.
There's a group there calledNorth Loop Neighbors that is
pushing forward the proposal toremove this and they've done a
(05:18):
fantastic job with some of theirmedia.
There are some absolutely wildrenderings showing the same
building back before the highwaywas built today, how the
highway is now showing the exactsame building and then showing
what it could be in the future.
Speaker 2 (05:35):
And Kansas City has a unique resource there, where
they have this archive of photosof people standing in front of
each parcel in the city showingthe parcel number yes, so you
can actually see what thislooked like in the early 1900s,
for every property in the city,including the ones that were
demoed for this highway.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
Yes, yes, and thank you to our friends at Urban Lab
in Kansas City who kind ofshared that with us while we
were there.
We'll link to our interviewwith them, where we actually
talked a little bit about thisproject with them in detail
there.
So Kansas city gets get somemore love on the show with our
our first on the list ofpotential highway removals.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
Well, the next one on the list.
I have not been to.
I have not spent any time in.
I guess do you consider thisupstate, new York?
But Syracuse, I say upstatesometimes and people in New York
are like that.
Speaker 1 (06:28):
I think Rochester is both upstate New York and
western New York.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
I thought everything upstate was basically everything
north of the Bronx, likeSchenectady.
I feel like yeah, yeah, yeah,yeah, it's upstate.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Yeah, I would.
Yeah, I mean, Syracuse mightnot be western New York, but
it's definitely upstate.
Okay, I have spent some time inSyracuse.
I've driven this section ofhighway quite a few times
through Syracuse.
This is a plan that is actuallygoing forward, which is nice.
This would be to remove asection of Interstate 81 running
(06:58):
right through Syracuse.
It's a section where thehighway runs up on a viaduct
above the street it is currently.
The plan is to essentially havethe highway reroute around
Syracuse on an existing highway,which is currently highway 481.
The idea would be to make 481just 81 and then have the
(07:21):
existing corridor be turned moreinto a boulevard.
That would be 81 business.
Essentially it would runthrough Syracuse and then it
would reconnect with Highway 690and then eventually rejoin back
up.
But really positive to hear thatthis one's actually going
forward, which is nice.
There's also some really greatrenderings of what this could
(07:45):
have looked like.
So the plans that were up therewere either to a improve the
highway or go with thisboulevard model, and both of
them were fully rendered out andone of these is a clear winner
and I'm glad that the rightdecision was made.
This got a lot of attention inNew York.
The current governor, KathyHochul, was very positive
(08:08):
towards making this visionactually happen.
So we've given Kathy Hochulsome shit on the show before,
but more as recent she's kind of.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
She's had a redemption arc.
She's come around the corner.
Yeah, she's had a redemptionarc from transit villain to well
, I'm not going to say hero, butto transit meh.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
Yes, yep.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
I also like this idea that both of these have been
rendered out.
Honestly, this is going back toour Urban Labs conversation in
Kansas City, but I think morepeople should take time to look
at corridors in their city,whether it's in a highway or
whatever, and create a renderingand just start passing it
around Totally, because I thinkthat's such a good way to get a
movement going.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
People got to see it, everyone's visual.
Yeah, and it's hard to envisionan area that has just had like
a giant highway bridge runningthrough it for so long as being
a place that could be like aspot you might even want to hang
out in.
You know what I mean.
Yeah, I'd say we quit our jobsand just make renderings all day
long?
Speaker 2 (09:03):
I would love to.
That would be pretty cool.
I don't know how we're gettingpaid.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
Yeah, we'll figure that out later.
Yeah, out later, yeah, uh.
Next on our list, though, is acity we've been to as part of
the show.
Uh, we did a new orleans usingonly public transit video.
Uh, early on, this is about ayear ago at this point.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Um, this is the clayborne expressway this is a
highway that I have ridden onfor all of my life, um going
between mobile and new orleans.
It is really the main connectorof I-10 to downtown and when
this was originally built thiswas like 1960s era.
I-10 came into the city sort ofdipped down towards the west
(09:42):
into the CBD, went back out ofthe CBD up and then out toward
the western half of New Orleans.
Later on they they added 610,which is sort of a northern
version of this, that goesthrough city park and connects
back into i-10, sort of on thenorthern part of new orleans.
It's actually kind of like moredirect if you're just trying to
(10:03):
drive through it's way it's moredirect, it's faster if you're
going through the city, to justgo through now, the thing about
new orleans is that if you don'tgenerally just drive through
the city, new Orleans I-10 isalready separate from I-12,
which runs through the northernpart of Lake Pontchartrain.
So if you're in this areayou're probably going to New
Orleans, but this highwayconnecting into the CBD really
(10:26):
may not be necessary, right.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
Because if you're going into the CBD, I mean
you're going to get off thehighway and be on the surface
streets anyway.
So you can either you knowyou'd still be able to like this
section where I-10 comes inwhere we're talking about this
is the Claiborne ExpresswayThere'd still be a road, there
be a boulevard concept of somesort, so you could drive in that
way, or you can keep going on610 and then drive in more so
(10:48):
from the west side coming in.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
There are going to be people who are really against
this one.
I can already tell, because itdoes.
It is the the easiest connectorgoing in from the east to the
west, but also it it skirts thetop of the french quarter um
during mardi gras season.
It's like a primary corridorgetting people in and out.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
I I can see people having opposition to this yeah,
I mean I think that peopleoppose a lot of things that they
like afterwards.
Speaker 2 (11:14):
I don't disagree, I'm just saying it would definitely
met with with some resistance Iagree um I, I fully, I would
fully support um the removal ofthis highway or finding a way to
make that corridor better.
Yeah, because as it stands now,you're driving through and you
are really zooming along rightat second floor and like third
floor windows of houses thatthis went up right next to.
(11:36):
Yeah, you know, when this wasbuilt similar story to other
places 500 homes and businesseswere destroyed.
It created the scar through thecity.
Property values drop.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
Nobody wants to be near this now elevated highway
Right, and this is somethingthat has been studied for a
while.
Actually, the Obama era therewas studies funded for the
removal.
Fast forward to the Bidenadministration more studies,
more money for studies.
My complaint there is like, ifwe studied it during the Obama
(12:08):
era, why did we need to study itagain during the Biden era?
Couldn't we have just actuallytried to put some federal
dollars towards removal at thatpoint?
Speaker 2 (12:14):
yeah, um, but uh, currently there are no plans
directly set in stone here yeah,so, uh, I wanted to keep a keep
an eye on um to see if anythingcomes of it.
Speaker 1 (12:26):
No, absolutely there has been a group that has been
kind of pushing for the removalhere.
It's the clayborne avenuealliance.
So if you're interested inlearning more or getting
involved, if you're in that area, definitely check them out up.
Next on our list is inbaltimore, and this one is
pretty unique.
Uh, it looks visually it's wildif you're listening.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
It's going to be hard for us to explain, so you're
going to have to go back andlook this up on a map.
Speaker 1 (12:48):
Yeah, so this is i-70 slash the like mulberry
franklin expressway.
So what happened here is, as theinterstate highways were being
developed around baltimore andthis happened in a lot of other
cities too there was pushback tothese being built in a lot of
cities across the us.
Um, a lot of cities, you know,successfully managed to limit
(13:08):
the number of urban highwaysthat were built.
Um, baltimore kind of succeededin this area, but also not
fully.
So there was a section of I-70.
It was going to approachBaltimore going through Gwynn's
Falls Park and then it wouldconnect into downtown along the
Franklin and Mulberry corridors.
Now, there was a lot ofopposition to this at the time
(13:31):
and they were successful inpreventing the highway from
going through gwynn's falls park.
But at the same time thefranklin mulberry section had
already been, was beingconstructed or already been
constructed, and now we're endedup with this really bizarre
situation where you have i-70heading towards baltimore, you
have this huge cloverleafinterchange and the highway is
(13:54):
like literally like a stub thatgoes right to the edge of this
park, but it's just they'veturned that little stretch into
a parking lot.
It almost looks like they sat itthere just biding their time,
like we're going to get thiseventually, Eventually right,
and so in addition to that,though the Mulberry and Franklin
side, you have a highway thatjust starts and ends and it's
(14:16):
only, it's not even two mileslong, I don't think.
Yeah, it spans like 14 cityblocks, basically.
So less than two miles, yeah,and it just starts and ends and
it's trenched down in and it'sfully divided this community,
but it's a highway that goesnowhere, like it's fully divided
this community, but it's ahighway that goes nowhere, like
it's fully useless.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Yeah, and then, in the process, around 900 homes
destroyed, 1,500 peopledisplaced, all for a highway.
That didn't really happen,which again, is fine the highway
didn't happen.
It's still really sad thatpeople got displaced.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
Totally.
And today, I mean, folks arestuck with this thing there.
You still have a lot of thenegative effects associated with
highways, from, you know, noisepollution to air pollution, to
having a literal trench dug,splitting this neighborhood in
half.
But there is a movement to tryto eliminate this section as
(15:09):
well as actually like to get ridof the giant cloverleaf
intersection that doesn't doanything to.
There's been a some talk aboutremoving that and kind of doing
some enhancements to the park.
But, um, the franklin mulberrysection here, yeah, it's pretty
annoying what is being proposedat the moment when you told me I
was a little, I was a little inshock too.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
If you look at this map, um, like you said, it's not
a huge, it's not a longdistance, it's not a huge area.
It's also not super well builtup.
It's mostly residential.
Yeah, um, but yeah, instead ofwhat would I think would be the
logical solution of maybe, maybeand I hate to say this maybe
widening the two streets oneither side of the.
You might not even need to, butyeah, of the freeway and uh,
(15:47):
then filling in this trench andmaking developable land parkland
, whatever, no, whatever.
No, they have a different plan.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
Yeah.
So right now, what seems to bebeing pushed forward is capping
sections of this, which feelslike in some of it too, they're
saying, well, the long-termvision is to get rid of this.
But there is a I'll link thearticle.
There's some from BaltimoreBrew, it's a multi-part series
about this.
They're saying the long-termvision is to remove it.
(16:17):
But they want to cap it.
But by putting the cap inyou're making it so much more
difficult to remove.
Like this thing is a gianttrench in the ground.
Fill it in with dirt or do somesort of hill or valley or
whatever you want to do, dosomething with it.
Speaker 2 (16:31):
But capping this super unnecessary highway is the
dumbest possible thing you cando, and I'm a big fan of cap and
stitch programs, but Not on ahighway.
Speaker 1 (16:42):
That doesn't Not this one.
It goes from surface streetsback to surface streets spanning
14 blocks.
It does not make any sense atall.
So the West Baltimore UnitedProject is what this kind of
falls under, and the project wasactually granted $2 million
(17:02):
from the Biden administrationunder the Reconnecting
Communities Grant for this cap.
So kind of wild, I don't know,not the best solution there.
Speaker 2 (17:12):
The exciting thing is we will be in Baltimore in June
.
We're going to come by takingthe Acela down from the
northeast, so we're going to endin Baltimore and maybe we'll
get a chance to go and check outthis ditch to nowhere.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
Up next on our list is in Portland, maine, which, if
you haven't had the pleasure ofvisiting, it's a lovely little
city, very nice Maine.
It's the most New England vibesever.
It makes sense where you are,but although not new england.
What maine?
Maine is not new england.
100% maine is new england.
What we're keeping this in,just so that people in the
(17:46):
comments can decide.
I, I mean I, I lived in newengland for for years and okay,
I guess it does include maine.
Speaker 2 (17:52):
I think of new england as like the historic,
like colonies, but I guess itwas part of New Hampshire, right
.
Speaker 1 (17:57):
It was part of Massachusetts, I think,
Originally yeah, it might havealso been part of New Hampshire
at a certain point too, butregardless we can set that aside
.
This is for 295 running throughPortland, maine.
So you've got 95 runningnorth-south through the area.
295 is a spur that comes off,goes through Portland and kind
(18:24):
of runs more so along the coastfor little ways.
Um, there are other connectorsthat go from 95 to 295 further
up and the concept of runningthis highway still today through
portland main, literallyrunning alongside the ocean for
part of it, just feels like theworst use of land ever.
We love building highways onwaterways, which is just it's
wild and I guess you know togive them some credit not credit
, I don't know to put somethought towards this during the
60s and 70s, like, a lot of likerivers and whatnot in the US
(18:47):
were pretty gross.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Industrial and gross.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
So if you're trying to not displace people, sure you
built it on waterways, buttoday, when we care about that
sort of thing, and like I meanthis, this section of the ocean,
there's trails and whatnot thatgo around it and right, you
know, separating downtownportland on the west side from a
cove, um is this highway, um,it also has made it so that you
have, uh, franklin street, umacts as like a, basically just a
(19:13):
feeder road into the highway.
It's really wide, cars aredriving fast on it, um, and it's
annoying to cross it.
If you're in downtown portlandon foot or on a bike, it still
sees a good bit of traffic on295, which is, um, you know,
worth noting, but it's not anamount of traffic that you
couldn't handle with a boulevardconcept of some sort and also
(19:34):
seems like, if you are lookingat the larger map, if you go up
the main highway, there isanother connector a little
further north.
That's a full-fledged highwaythat really could absorb any
traffic for this sort ofnorth-south connection right and
I think some of the complaintwith using that and this isn't a
valid complaint is that roadhas a toll.
If you're concerned about thetoll, buy out the toll.
(19:55):
But people in Maine and NewHampshire are used to paying
tolls anyway.
It's like pretty commoneverywhere on roads there not
everywhere, but along majorroads in New Hampshire and Maine
folks are used to paying tolls.
So I've spent a lot of time inPortland.
I have friends who live there.
I think it'd be great to seethis removed and I know that
housing in Portland is a majorissue and utilizing some of that
(20:16):
extra space to build housingwould be a major benefit to the
area because there are someproposed developments and
whatnot.
But there's a lot of nimbyismfrom going on and I think it
makes sense to to preserve thelike cute historic nature of the
core of portland.
But there is a hundred percentroom for development in areas
(20:37):
right around that kind of urbancore.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
And if you're trying to protect, you know the quaint
part of Portland.
This is a great part that's notquaint, that you can redevelop.
Exactly, take out the eyesore,give the beachfront property
back.
Yes, all right, we have thelast two on our list.
The first up is the Oakland 980downtown.
Now, I haven't spent much timein Oakland, but we did take a
little bit of time to look atthe overhead view of the map,
(21:02):
and this is another one thatreally seems like an unnecessary
sort of spur to the highway.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Totally and, from what I can tell, at one point
like this was going to continuefurther and it didn't.
So now it just is like a littlecutoff that cuts like right
through downtown Oakland.
Very easy to reroute aroundthis via 580 and 880.
You also have kind of parallelhighways running close to each
other, so it likely would makesense that you don't maybe even
(21:28):
need to do this kind of bypassgoing around and it would free
up a ton of really, reallyvaluable real estate, both from
like a financial perspective butalso just from the perspective
of.
This is the Bay Area and ifanywhere in the United States
has a housing crisis, it's here.
This is land that is walkingdistance to BART stations, is
(21:49):
already served well by transit,it can get folks between Oakland
and San Francisco and otherplaces throughout the area and
feels like a massive no-brainerand I don't know if Oakland is
the same as San Francisco andother places throughout the area
and feels like a massiveno-brainer and I don't know if
Oakland is the same as SanFrancisco.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
I know San Francisco sort of suffers from this
historic preservation mindsetwhere they sort of refuse to
build their belt, sometimes likevery not, sometimes basically
like all the time.
Speaker 1 (22:10):
Yeah, very very nimby .
Speaker 2 (22:12):
I don't know if Oakland is the same way, but I
feel like if you are removing ahighway, this is prime
opportunity to build highlydense yes, walkable
neighborhoods in the footprintof the old highway.
So a really good opportunitythere, and this one actually
seems like it's feasible.
It's been studied by Caltrans.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
There's a political will to get it done, so this is
also one to keep an eye onTotally and Connect Oakland has
been a group that's really beenleading the charge on pushing
this and, as you said, I meanthey've had some success in
getting the backing from somecity leaders, state leaders and
whatnot.
So I think, on a scale of like,could this one actually happen?
It?
(22:48):
You know, when you first lookat it it's like ooh, I don't
know, like that seems like it'dbe necessary to have, but the
highway was was is runningcurrently, uh, at way less
volume than it was designed for.
Um, it really feels like thisone could happen.
So, um, we'll keep an eye onthat one in oakland.
Speaker 2 (23:05):
Last but not least, though, we've got milwaukee and
the home of laverne, and surly,yes, I don't know why that
popped in my head.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
Uh, this one actually has a fighting chance at
happening as well.
Um, the wisconsin department oftransportation uh, has they
initially had several differentoptions that they were floating
for this?
Um, the options have dwindleddown to two now, and one of
those two options is fullyremoving this section of i-794,
(23:33):
downtown.
Yep, um, which is prettyamazing.
The other is improving it, um,but it does seem like you can
tell how I feel about thatoption.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Yeah, um, it go ahead oh, so this is another
waterfront highway too so yeahanother opportunity to reconnect
to the waterfront right andit's.
Speaker 1 (23:50):
it's like there's one neighborhood in particular and
I'll pull up the name of it herebut there's one neighborhood in
particular just south ofMilwaukee that it's cut off by
the highway, both from downtownand from the waterfront, and
this would do a great deal inreally reconnecting this part of
downtown.
Milwaukee has been growingquite a bit.
(24:11):
There's a lot of developmentgoing on, there's a lot of
emphasis on bringing folks backdowntown and the political will
is in in this case, just like incalifornia is also totally
there.
Speaker 2 (24:21):
so if you're in the area, you want to learn more
about this highway removal orconnect with people who are also
interested in this.
There's groups like rethink 794.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
They're sort of leading the charge for this
removal, so check them out, yeaha lot of really great
renderings and whatnot on theirwebsite and, like the, I love
when places do these.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
The little slider bar back and forth where you?
Speaker 1 (24:41):
can like peek of, like what it is today and what
it could be in the future andit's really impressive what the
potential there you knowactually could be.
Speaker 2 (24:49):
So um, check them out , get involved.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Make milwaukee a city that laverne and shirley be
proud of In general, though Imean it can seem like a crazy
idea to remove a highway forfolks who don't look too much at
it and like it.
It is crazy in the sense thatlike it is a big undertaking to
do but the results are so worthit.
(25:12):
I mean I just remember havinggone back to Rochester, new York
, where I actually grew up, andI remember what the Interloop
Highway was like, and thenseeing the sections that have
been removed and are done.
Today.
There is still a small sectionthat is yet to be done.
It is night and day.
It is a place where people livenow.
There are new restaurants there.
It's making the area around theStrong Museum, which is a big
(25:34):
draw for folks to go downtown,so much nicer to be in.
In an area that was just atrench in the ground, surrounded
by like parking lots and somehouses that were facing a
highway, it's now just like avery cute, vibrant part of the
area which is.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
It's just like such an improvement so, and if you
want to see other cities wherethis has been a success, I mean
you can go back and look at ourepisode where we talked about
highway removals.
But if you've been to Seattleand been on the waterfront where
the Alaska Viaduct was sort ofrecreated, you have access to
the waterfront now.
Or if you are in downtown SanFrancisco and you are on the
Esplanade, like the changesthere are, just it's made the
(26:15):
cities so much nicer and moreinviting to be in.
Speaker 1 (26:17):
Right, and it's.
It's I think it's important tosay too.
It's like personally, like I'mnot against highways in general,
but like highways inside of theurban part of your city, right
at your downtown.
It just made like the reasonyou go to downtown is because
you can walk around and thingsare close and you go and you
enjoy the time.
It's not so you can drivearound, yeah, in downtown.
So you know, make it easy toget to the edge of downtown and
(26:41):
then, once you're there, youknow if you want to drive there.
Great, ideally you have goodtransit to get there for folks,
but like you don't need to go 70miles an hour through downtown.
That's just like not how any ofthis is meant to work and do it
the way eisen planned.
Yes, yeah, exactly, exactly.
So, with all that being said,if there are other highway
removals that you'd like us tocheck out in the future,
(27:03):
definitely let us know in thecomments below.
If you haven't liked this videoalready, please consider doing
so.
It helps us out quite a bit.
If you want to support the showdirectly, you can do so via our
Patreon or checking out ourmerch store below.
Uh, we'll hopefully go checkout more of these in person.
Um, the baltimore one inparticular will be in the area
fairly soon, but uh, with allthat being said, thank you all
so much for watching and enjoythe rest of your transit.
Speaker 2 (27:23):
Tangents tuesday yeah , I'm saving that dough watch me
go.
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