Few public works projects have shaped the United States like the interstate highway system. Born during the postwar economic boom, an age of abundance and optimism, this once-futuristic project reimagined how Americans would live, work and move goods. These uninterrupted high-speed roads collapsed distances, linked remote towns with major cities and tied the country together in ways nobody could have predicted, though not without harm or unintended consequences. Nearly 70 years later, the system is aging, crowded and expensive to maintain. How did we get this far? Here’s the breakdown.
—VALERIE BRAYLOVSKIY
Ike’s 62-Day Hike
In 1919, Dwight D. Eisenhower crossed the continent in a military convoy on the old Lincoln Highway, averaging 6 mph for two months on mostly unpaved roads, logging 230 accidents and damaging 88 wooden bridges. Later, as a general in World War II, he saw the civil and military benefits of Germany’s autobahn, an efficient nationwide system of controlled-access roads. He brought that idea home as president, signing the Federal-Aid Highway Act in 1956. The interstate was born.
7 Deaths
That was the toll among the 2,000-worker crews who spent 11 years drilling the 1.7 mile Eisenhower-Johnson Memorial Tunnel Complex, where Interstate 70 passes through the Continental Divide in Colorado. At 11,158 feet, the tunnel is the system’s highest point. Nationwide, the interstates took over three decades to build and cost more than $300 billion in today’s dollars. The largest public works program in U.S. history used enough concrete to erect a wall around the equator, 50 feet thick and 9 feet tall.
18% Exodus
Cities lost nearly a fifth of their population whenever a new interstate arrived between 1950 and 1990, while metropolitan areas (read: suburbs) grew by 72 percent. Nearly half a million homes were razed to make room for the new roads. More than a million people, disproportionately Black and low income, were forced out. From 1967 to 1968, 123 popular “freeway revolts” halted or interrupted construction; some highways were rerouted in response.
698.4 Hours
A theoretical driver could go 70 mph for 29 days straight if today’s 48,890 miles of interstate highway ran end to end. Ten primary routes cross the lower 48 states, labeled with one- or two-digit numbers ending in zero (east-west) or five (north-south), increasing from south to north (I-10 to I-90) and west to east (I-5 to I-95). Beltways and spurs add a third digit before the parent route’s code (Salt Lake City’s I-215 is a branch of I-15).
1.3 Million Jobs
Within 10 miles of I-80, roughly 84,000 freight hubs — warehouses, distribution centers and cargo terminals — support nearly as many employees as the agriculture industry. In 2024, I-80 logged more truck miles than any other highway. Interstates carried more than half of long-haul truck traffic, linking small towns to global supply chains and fueling $127 billion in domestic and international trade. From 2000 to 2019, freight traffic on interstates grew twice as fast as overall travel.
We didn’t build the interstate system to connect New York to Los Angeles because the West Coast was a priority. No, we webbed the highways so people can go to multiple places and invent ways of doing things not thought of by the persons building the roads. — Neil deGrasse Tyson
1/4 of All Traffic
Interstates carry this load despite making up just 1.2 percent of the nation’s roads. Car ownership quadrupled from 1950 to 1970, populating daily commutes and traffic chokepoints. Urban interstate lane miles were expanded by 42 percent from 1993 to 2017, yet delays rose 144 percent. Economists call this induced demand — widening roads invites more driving. Drivers now waste 63 hours a year in traffic.
$2,000 Per Household
That’s the estimated taxpayer cost to sustain the Highway Trust Fund over the next eight years — about $250 billion by 2033. The federal gas tax, fixed at 18.4 cents per gallon since 1993, has lost much of its value to inflation; electric vehicles are largely, if unintentionally, exempt. Many highways built to last 20 years are now over 50 years old. About half of interstate bridges are past midlife.
This story appears in the March 2026 issue of Deseret Magazine. Learn more about how to subscribe.