may be built in successive years, as funds become available. On a projected divided highway, the second roadway may be built some years after the first roadway was completed.
By way of contrast, toll roads are usually built in long stretches and the time from beginning to completion of construction is relatively short. Since toll roads are commonly financed by revenue bonds (which make all of the needed funds available at once), it is vital to financial success that the road be opened to revenue-producing traffic as quickly as possible.
In this study, all improvements were included irrespective of length, provided they met the other criteria set forth in section 114.
Location
The general locations of the Interstate System routes, to the extent of the 40,000 miles authorized by the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944, had been selected and approved in 1947 and 1955. Selection of detailed locations of these routes by the States, completed by September 1957, revealed that the extent of the approved system totaled only 38,548 miles. It is upon these routes and this mileage that the two reports called for by sections 108 (d) and 114 of the 1956 act have been based.
In October 1957, action was taken with respect to new routes in the amount of 1,102 miles within the original 40,000-mile limitation, and of 1,000 miles authorized as an expansion of the system by the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956. The 2,102 miles involved in this action were not included in this study.
Portions of routes in this report were classified as being either on “specific” or “tentative” locations depending upon whether or not the locations had been established by engineering studies and approved by the Bureau. Inasmuch as 93 percent of the mileage covered by this study was on “specific” location, the data for both types of locations were combined in this report.
Completion; completion dates
Section 114 relates to construction “completed subsequent to August 2, 1947, or which is either in actual use or under construction by contract, for completion, awarded not later than June 30, 1957.” (The date August 2, 1947, was specified in the act because it was the date of original designation of the Interstate System pursuant to section 7 of the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1944.)
The foregoing phraseology raised certain questions as to the meaning of the term “completed.” In many cases, some elements of roads eligible for consideration were already completed and in use, whereas other elements had not yet been constructed. A common example illustrating this point is the present existence of only 2 lanes of an ultimate 4-lane facility. In this case, a considerable amount of construction had been completed but the portion of road, as a whole, was only partially complete. Such partially completed portions were included in this study and are separately identified in this report. The following specific criteria were employed with respect to defining the term “completion” and the completion dates in this study:
Contracts completed prior to August 2, 1947.—Contracts completed (date work accepted or opened to traffic, whichever was later) prior to August 2, 1947, were excluded. In the case of acquisition of right-
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