Building More Highways

There's a dispute about new highway construction near Birmingham, Alabama. This ten-minute video offers a well-balanced view of the issue.

A nearly 45-year-old program, the Appalachian Development Highway System (ADHS) was originally intended to bring modern infrastructure to the most impoverished parts of Appalachia. According to many critics, the ADHS has morphed into a pork program which offers perverse incentives for building unnecessary and wasteful highways.

Birmingham Mayor Larry Langford, among others, argues that the highway money should instead be spent on transit and improvement projects for the central city. Indeed, as the demand for urban living increases, it is difficult to see why the money shouldn't go toward enhancing Birmingham (and other already-built communities). New highways tend to encourage decentralized, low-density development, while investments in mass transit help create the types of high-quality central cities which are increasingly in demand.