Page:Needs of the Highway Systems, 1955–84.pdf/6

2 Advance decision as to financial feasibility of meeting needs has also been an influence in some needs studies. Such an adjustment, in the interest of producing a “realistic” estimate of needs, should be made after the estimate has been derived. It should not be made by arbitrary reduction of standards or other means beforehand.

STUDIES IN RECENT YEARS

To greater or lesser degree the foregoing factors have been involved in the estimates of needs developed both statewide and nationwide in recent years. It is important that this be clearly understood, lest erroneous conclusions be drawn when making general comparisons.

Provision of adequate highways has never been abreast of demand. Needs were mounting prior to World War II. During the war, curtailment of construction resulted in a further lag. Since 1946 traffic has increased with each succeeding year, but highway construction has not kept pace.

In needs studies made during the immediate postwar pane (1946–50), the rapid increase in highway usage was viewed by many as a tempo phenomenon—a leveling-off was anticipated in the predictable future. Even so, estimates of needs showed construction requirements of great magnitude.

Since then, economic studies based on the wealth of data made available by the 1950 census have indicated that other elements of the Nation’s economy were also enjoying vigorous growth patterns, and that they are likely to so continue, It has become evident that the continuing increase of highway travel is not an isolated trend.

The shortage of current revenues for highways existing since 1946, in the face of needs known to be large, has posed a dilemma to highway agencies. On the one hand there is the basically sound policy of serene as much money as possible into high-type improvements with long service lives—a policy that generates dissatisfaction when badly needed improvement of some roads is held in abeyance while a substantial portion of available funds is concentrated on other roads.

The alternative is an across-the-board “make-do” program characterized by short-term, stopgap work done in lieu of needed major improvements. Such programs provide temporary relief rather than cures for the problem; they rarely reduce the ultimate need for large-scale improvement.

INITIATION OF STUDY

By 1954, when Congress requested an estimate of ney needs, a large body of fact was available to the States, and the technique for making such an estimate had advanced materially. The Bureau of Public Roads sought the cooperation of the 48 States, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico, and the basic estimates of needs and costs presented in this report represent the data furnished by them.

It is recognized that some tendency to understate needs still exists. Lack of full supporting evidence of need may cause the paring down of estimates to the point where they cannot be questioned; this is probably true in greater degree in the estimates for urban areas. Additionally, the true needs in many cities are exceedingly great in