The Interstate Highway System
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President Dwight D. Eisenhower arrives in Atlanta in 1952. President Eisenhower is credited with authorizing the construction of the interstate highway system.
Courtesy of Georgia State University. Libraries, Lane Brothers Commercial Photographers Photographic Collection, 1920-1976.
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Photograph from 1952 looking south along a newly constructed expressway in downtown Atlanta, which would later become part of the Downtown Connector.
Courtesy of the Atlanta History Center, Atlanta History Photograph Collection.
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This aerial photograph from 1953 shows what downtown Atlanta looked like before the construction of the Downtown Connector.
Courtesy of Georgia State University. Libraries, Lane Brothers Commercial Photographers Photographic Collection, 1920-1977.
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This aerial photograph from 1962 shows how the construction of Interstate 20 impacted the urban fabric of downtown Atlanta.
Courtesy of the Atlanta History Center, Atlanta Blue Print and Graphics Company Photographs, 1961-1962, undated.
As a result of the increasing suburbanization of American cities and increases in automobile ownership, city leaders became concerned about the accessibility and viability of downtowns. The 1946 Lochner Report, Atlanta’s seminal expressway study, proposed a system of arterial expressways running through downtown Atlanta. These efforts were assisted by the passage of the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956, also known as the National Interstate and Defense Highways Act. This legislation, signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, authorized the construction of over 41,000 miles of interstate highways across the United States. In Atlanta, the I-75 and I-85 expressways, which were already under construction in the 1950s, were integrated into this new system. While these urban expressways increased the convenience of commuting into the city, they also fueled urban sprawl and directly displaced several neighborhoods and residents. In particular, the construction of I-75, I-85, and I-20 destroyed several downtown street grids and divided neighborhoods. The neighborhoods that were demolished for the construction of downtown expressways consisted of mostly low-income Black residents, contributing to a need for new public housing projects to rehouse those residents.