Can Removing Highways Fix America’s Cities?

[Admiral Beez]

Highways radically reshaped cities, destroying downtown neighborhoods. Some cities are taking them down, but rebuilding the communities won’t be easy.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive...tion=click&module=Top Stories&pgtype=Homepage

This NYT article made me think of the Gardiner, but I don't think we rammed the highway through downtown neighbourhoods.

 

[vic]

Not quite downtown, but parts of South Parkdale got razed for the Gardiner.

The lost streets of South Parkdale - Spacing Toronto

No Toronto neighbourhood paid for the Gardiner Expressway quite like Parkdale. Before construction of the lakefront highway in 1958, the land south of Springhurst Avenue and the rail tracks was just like the rest of Parkdale: residential, consisting of mostly detached homes on spacious lots. At...

spacing.ca

 

[Admiral Beez]

Not quite downtown, but parts of South Parkdale got razed for the Gardiner.

The lost streets of South Parkdale - Spacing Toronto

No Toronto neighbourhood paid for the Gardiner Expressway quite like Parkdale. Before construction of the lakefront highway in 1958, the land south of Springhurst Avenue and the rail tracks was just like the rest of Parkdale: residential, consisting of mostly detached homes on spacious lots. At...

spacing.ca

Ouch. It's amazing how we're a waterfront city but we surrendered the waterfront to first trains and then cars.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Toronto got away with remarkably little freeway damage, all things considered, especially considering that we managed to build three major highways into the old core of the city (well.. 2.5 highways).

I believe the Allen demolished a few residential areas north of Eglinton as well.

 

[someMidTowner]

Toronto got away with remarkably little freeway damage, all things considered, especially considering that we managed to build three major highways into the old core of the city (well.. 2.5 highways).

I believe the Allen demolished a few residential areas north of Eglinton as well.

Correct, here's a 1956 aerial. Dufferin and Eglinton at the lower left:

Eloquent Systems Inc - JPEG 2000 Viewer

 

[Northern Light]

Toronto got away with remarkably little freeway damage, all things considered, especially considering that we managed to build three major highways into the old core of the city (well.. 2.5 highways).

I believe the Allen demolished a few residential areas north of Eglinton as well.

We lost less in the way of built heritage and neighbourhoods that many communities, to be sure; though we certainly lost some.

We did create serious barriers to connectivity in many places, which were often less of an issue at the time of construction, but more of one now.

But certainly, in the case of the Don Valley Parkway, a great deal of ecological damage was done.

The most southerly portion of the valley had industrialized or built up to in previous generations, but from north of Pottery Road, a fair bit of nature was destroyed.

More nature was also wiped out when the Bayview extension was pushed through.

Sugar Loaf Hill was removed.

The hill to the right of the viaduct:

From: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bloor_viaduct_and_sugarloaf_hill_1917.PNG

 

[innsertnamehere]

Correct, here's a 1956 aerial. Dufferin and Eglinton at the lower left:

Eloquent Systems Inc - JPEG 2000 Viewer

Thanks. Looks like Marlee originally had a jog at Roselawn too - I had no idea. They demolished a ton of homes in that area both for the Allen and the apartment blocks there.

The scale of demolition is also greater for the Allen than I remembered. Looks like about 60% of the highway's original planned damage actually occurred. All that was really saved from the cancellation was a bit of the Annex around Spadina Avenue.

I often wonder if they politically could have gotten the highway built if they had pulled it pack to end at Dupont & Davenport or something instead of Harbord. I know that the last iteration before cancellation had pulled it back to Dupont with two large 4 lane 1 way arterials running through the Annex instead of a full freeway south to Harbord, but still.

It would obviously never fly today but is an interesting thought experiment for the politics of the early 1970's.

 

[Northern Light]

Thanks. Looks like Marlee originally had a jog at Roselawn too - I had no idea. They demolished a ton of homes in that area both for the Allen and the apartment blocks there.

The scale of demolition is also greater for the Allen than I remembered. Looks like about 60% of the highway's original planned damage actually occurred. All that was really saved from the cancellation was a bit of the Annex around Spadina Avenue.

I often wonder if they politically could have gotten the highway built if they had pulled it pack to end at Dupont & Davenport or something instead of Harbord.

It would obviously never fly today but is an interesting thought experiment for the politics of the early 1970's.

You really are the anti-Jane Jacobs.

 

[innsertnamehere]

You really are the anti-Jane Jacobs.

Did I say that I wanted the highway? No. Just a political thought experiment for the time in which it occurred. My understanding of the cancellation at the time was mostly about the demolition involved in ramming the highway through the Annex to south of Bloor Street. I was just musing if the highway could have happened if they had pulled it north to end where it started to do major damage.

 

[vic]

And then this guy happened.

 

[Northern Light]

Did I say that I wanted the highway? No. Just a political thought experiment for the time in which it occurred. My understanding of the cancellation at the time was mostly about the demolition involved in ramming the highway through the Annex to south of Bloor Street. I was just musing if the highway could have happened if they had pulled it north to end where it started to do major damage.

The major damage would have included running it right through what is now Cedarvale Park; then the Nordheimer Ravine.

****

I would add, a good deal of damage was done to these spaces anyways, in the name of the highway, Castlefrank Creek was buried through Cedarvale, and is today confined to a pipe below ground.

But a highway through there would have been infinitely worse.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Toronto got away with remarkably little freeway damage, all things considered, especially considering that we managed to build three major highways into the old core of the city (well.. 2.5 highways).

I believe the Allen demolished a few residential areas north of Eglinton as well.

In terms of damage to the urban fabric, yes - but in terms of natural features, maybe not. The worst is DVP in that regard (though that choice probably spared the eastern part of old Toronto).

AoD

 

[ssiguy2]

In terms of removing freeways from American cities help fix them, well yes but only help marginally.

They maybe replaced by some parks which is always better but the sad reality is that most of the damage is permanent. These downtown freeways not only displaced people and broke up communities but also led to the death of the communities that were left. Most of the damage to the urban fabric was done long after the freeways were built. They were uniformly black neighbourhoods that were destroyed to make way for the freeways but also led to whites being able to flee the cities for their nice safe white suburbs and they took their consumer spending, taxes, and political clout with them.

There is also another problem that will make this more challenging in the US...........a lack of alternative transportation option to get downtown. With only a very few exceptions, transit in the US is absolutely dreadful and has a horrid social stigma that simply isn't found in Canada. Tearing down the freeways would be an option if they had decent transit but the vast majority of American cities don't and hence instead of people taking transit instead of driving downtown, they will have little choice to simply not go downtown at all unless absolutely necessary. Considering most US cities are dead after 5, this will not help matters.

Tearing down freeways to help undo the damage is only a small part of the equation.