Josh Stephens reviews Big Roads by Earl Swift, which profiles Thomas MacDonald and Frank Turner, the civil engineers who made the Interstate Highway System a reality.
Recently chosen as a Top 10 Urban Planning Book of 2012 by Planetizen, Earl Swift's The Big Roads: The Untold Story of the Engineers, Visionaries, and Trailblazers Who Created the American Superhighways explains that the Interstate Highway System didn't just magically appear after Eisenhower proposed it.
Stephens writes:
"Though the Interstate Highway System bears Eisenhower's name and is generally credited to him, Swift gives credit to the forgotten engineers who envisioned a national road system while Ike was scarcely out of Basic Training."
Stephens says the book takes a fairly neutral tone to the project, explaining all sides of the story, including how the new highways divided cities along racial lines:
"All told, the government committed 750,000 eminent domain takings in the construction of the interstates."
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