commission appointed by the governor. The commission was empowered to select the highway director.
New freeways connected all of Michigan's larger cities, sharply reducing travel time while improving driving safety and traffic capacity. Downtown Detroit freeway system was finished in 1970.
Mackie resigned early in 1965, after he had been elected to Congress from the 7th Congressional District, centered on his hometown of Flint.
The new commission, appointed by Gov. George Romney and headed by Ardale Ferguson, a Benton Harbor industrialist, named Hill director of highways and agreed to completion of the second five-year highway building plan. Hill resigned in 1967, to be succeeded by Henrik E. Stafseth, former engineer-manager of the Ottawa County Road Commission and one of the authors of the new constitution. He stayed until 1972 when he left to become executive director of the American Association of State Highway Officials in Washington. The commission filled the vacancy with Stafseth’s deputy, John P. Woodford, a career engineer in the department with broad experience in various responsibilities.
Major changes were in the offing as Woodford assumed his new post. The section of the 1963 constitution setting forth the commission’s authority contained a clause which read "and such other public works of the state as provided by law." Those 12 words were to usher in the age of mass transit.
Advancing technology steadily improved efficiency of highway construction, exemplified by this "train" of pavement-laying machinery developed in the 1960's. It allows continuous production of steel-reinforced concrete roadways.
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