History quantified: Examining the damage in Washington, DC

The devastation, disconnection, and displacement of highways plowed through cities and neighborhoods is easy to see, but rarely do we quantify the costs in terms of lost wealth, land, residents, and businesses. The damage also could have been much worse, with many planned highways never built or completed. We examine current and historical data on the impact of one built and one unbuilt highway in Washington, DC (and in Atlanta here) to quantify both the damage and what could have been.¹

I-395/695 (built) and I-95/66/70 extensions (unbuilt)

Note: Click either tab below to toggle between I-395/695 and I-95/66/70 data, and animations

Washington, DC’s story

The highway plans in the 1950s and 60s for the national capital region—and the planners responsible for them—both predicted and facilitated suburban sprawl and white flight into existing and new suburbs in Maryland and Virginia, failing to serve the needs of the District of Columbia’s 750,000-plus residents. Documents produced at the time treated the city merely as a destination for far-flung commuters and interstate travelers to pass through via new interstates to provide “connection to principal arteries serving the Central Business District for convenient collection and delivery of traffic to and from exterior points.”⁸

Though there were scores of highway plans for the region, various iterations would have resulted in plowing new interstates through dozens of historic neighborhoods, including the iconic U Street corridor, Capitol Hill, Brookland, Georgetown, Shaw, Takoma Park, and others.

While the coalitions that emerged in DC were more successful than other cities in preventing the comprehensive destruction of the city for the full suite of planned highways, predominantly Black and blue-collar neighborhoods across the city were still devastated. In the Southwest quadrant more than 400 acres were cleared and 23,500 people removed from their homes for the construction of I-395/695 analyzed below and the accompanying broader “urban renewal” effort.

Though many historic Black and white neighborhoods were spared that are responsible for billions of dollars of annual tax revenue and economic growth for the city today, the displacement, destruction, and resulting barriers entrenched many disparities and inequalities seen in the city today.

It’s important to note that the District was not self-governed by its residents during the heyday of the interstate-building period and was still several years away from the limited “home rule” that came into effect in December 1973. Until 1967, the District’s Department of Highways and Traffic reported not to an elected mayor or a council, but to three DC commissioners who were appointed by the President and confirmed by Congress and the committees with oversight of DC. This cleared the way for powerful members of Congress and their appointed transportation representatives to realize their plans.

As an activist from the time said, “in the eyes of these congressmen, the city was expendable.” Congressional appropriators even threatened to withhold funding for the new Metrorail transit system in an attempt to force the opponents of highway expansion to relent.

One factor shaping highway opposition in DC was that wealthier and politically influential white neighborhoods were also targeted in addition to the lower-income or Black neighborhoods typically targeted, which led to a diverse coalition of those opposed to the highway. An interracial and interclass group of organizers, calling themselves the Emergency Committee on the Transportation Crisis (ECTC), led by Sammie Abbott, who was white, and Reginald H. Booker, who was Black, organized against the destruction through direct, nonviolent action at every turn. ECTC popularized the slogan “White Men’s Road through Black Men’s Homes.”

When the first Brookland homes were condemned for the construction of the (never built) North Central Freeway, Abbott and Booker cleaned up and repaired the homes and moved families into them (and were arrested as a result).

When Rep. William Natcher (D-KY), the chief appropriator in Congress, focused on advancing a new bridge (the Three Sisters Bridge) over the Potomac to carry today’s Interstate 66 from Virginia east directly through core DC neighborhoods, ECTC organized nearby (and primarily white) Georgetown University students to occupy construction equipment and the islets in the middle of the river. The bridge was ultimately never built and I-66 today ends at the Potomac River.