Eisenhower's 'autobahn' at 50

Christian Science Monitor ^ | June 28, 2006 | Editorial

[Clemenza]

Ike was an outstanding manager who was excellent at delegating authority. We need such folks in war (and peace).

[Ditto]

Your 20/20 goggles are quite impressive.

Now tell us what a f**k up Lee was at Gettysburg or Grant was at Cold Harbor. And how about that idiot Napoleon at Waterloo -- What an idiot!

[republicanwizard]

Hahaha...Stevenson was a liberal, but you've gotta admit - the guy was funny as hell. I love his joke when Eisenhower questioned his wisecracking - "he met with Joe McCarthy. He's worried about my funnybone. I'm worried about his backbone."

[Rte66]

You realize who owns CSX now, don't you?

[PAR35]

Bet the last 1% cost half that total.

That's probably high, but close.

[PAR35]

Actually, CSX and NS (Norfolk Southern) purchased the Pennsylvania Railway in the mid to late 90's.

No, PRR and NYCentral merged into Penn Central. That entity and a handful of other bankrupt railroads were then swept up into a government bailout called Conrail. Conrail was then split between CSX and Norfolk Southern.

So while CSX and NS purchased assets that once belonged to PRR, they did not purchase the Pennsylvania Railway.

[GOPJ]

As the world's largest public-works project, the Interstate fully transformed Americans into a car-centric, oil-guzzling, and pollution-spewing people.

Nah, back before the interstate people still drove to Florida, went to Californian, and drove to the next town. The difference was it took forever, involeved endless stopping and waiting behind other traffic and took much more gas. The good old days weren't that good.

[Larry Lucido]

and, possibly, mass evacuations of cities during the cold war

Well, it sure emptied out Detroit.

[Smokin' Joe]

Instead of taking 10 years and $50 billion to build as envisioned, the 62 routes took nearly a halfcentury to finish and, in today's dollars, cost $425 billion.

So what's that in 1956 dollars?

As the world's largest public-works project, the Interstate fully transformed Americans into a car-centric, oil-guzzling, and pollution-spewing people.

But can anyone imagine the manure piles that many horses would have made???

Soon after the system's first cross-country link (I-80) was completed in 1986, Al Gore declared, hyperbolically, that the automobile's environmental effects is [sic] "more deadly than that of any military enemy we are ever again likely to confront."

Just wait, Al, it ain't over till it's over...You want pollution, just imagine all the runoff from that manure....

And yep, I RTFA'd and I'm wondering by the end of the article if this is about highways or the web...

[Fraxinus]

Thank you for your clarification of my less than totally accurate recall.

[old_sage_says]

I stand corrected.