Interstate highway construction was executed with great speed. Since implementing the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 to 1965, four different interstate freeways, with their junctions and exit ramps, dissected and strangled the city of Cleveland. Neighborhood after neighborhood along highway paths was razed to continue construction on the ever lengthening river of concrete out to the suburbs.

The demographic trend of whites moving out to the suburbs and blacks remaining in the city continued throughout the 1970s. In 1970, Cleveland’s black population grew by thirteen percent but the city lost twenty-six of its white population. Inversely the suburb of Parma saw a seventeen percent growth in the white population and a sixty-two percent decrease in the black population which now comprised of a mere 0.0005 percent of the suburbs’ total population.[1]

While suburbanites reaped the rewards from the interstate highway design of the post war period, the poor, the elderly, and minorities paid the highest cost. Unfortunately interstate highways have long been interpreted as economic engines with little attention paid to social cost. People of different classes paid that cost differently. Poorer people tended to fare worse than wealthier ones. Younger and more affluent households relocated to “better” or “comparative” neighborhoods with few hassles. The city’s poor and elderly found relocation more difficult, often moving into “less desirable” housing in decaying neighborhoods.[2] Geographer James O. Wheeler notes that “the threat of being displaced from one’s home and neighborhood, enduring a period of construction inconvenience, and the dread of the anticipated increased traffic congestion with accompanying noise and air pollution lie at the heart of the issue for residents in the path of a freeway. Those supporting freeway construction tend to live some distance from the route and expect to enjoy the transportation advantages without bearing many of the detrimental freeway features.”[3] Owning an automobile was status symbol during the latter half of the previous century. Because the poor could not afford automobiles the interstate highways served as a hindrance instead of a help.