Posted on 01/14/2013 5:58:54 AM PST by FreedomNotSafety
I understand Ike was also quite interested in the Autobahn.
Much as I love the Superslab — an uninterrupted line of white lines all the way to the coast — I’m a little torn about it. The Interstate is great for commerce and for the traveling public. In fact, out West, most destinations are measured by hours, not miles. When I lived in Utah, Las Vegas was 8 hours away, Denver was 10, Albuquerque was 13, and so on.
But our entire society has become hooked, not just enamored, on the car. Public transportation has withered and possibly killed by our addiction to driving. On most mornings, I’m stuck in traffic jams where EVERY SINGLE CAR has but a single occupant, whereas a single train could eliminate hundreds or even thousands of those shiny metal boxes.
Still, I can’t disparage the Interstate. Heck of a way to drive long distances!
“I understand Ike was also quite interested in the Autobahn.”
I used to think that the Autobahn was his inspiration for the Interstates, until I ran across the military convoy story in a biography.
When I was a boy we traveled across country several times before the Interstates were built. One unfortunate side effect of the Interstate system was the decline of the small towns that lined highways like Route 66. And the other was the disappearance of Burma Shave signs, one of the great, vanished entertainments of America’s highways.
I know that the Germans had designed their autobahns to handle aircraft as early as WWII but I didn’t know that we had done something similar.
The Germans were parking their planes under overpasses to hide them from the USAAF and then wheeling them out and taking off from the autobahn.
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