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How Interstate Safety Rest Areas Began
And Who’s Job It Is To Maintain Them
As we travel from state to state on Interstate Highways, I often wonder about the rest areas we stop at. Each state has such different facilities and rules. I thought I would do a little research to see what I could find out.
An Interstate is a freeway or highway that crosses over state lines — as opposed to an Intrastate that does not. In 1956, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed into law the Interstate Federal Aid Highway Act which provided 90 percent of the funds to build a national system of highways across America. This would be good for transporting goods and services across the country, but the real reason for pushing the Interstate Federal Aid Bill through at that time was to create a way to transport troops and weapons or evacuate cities in case of a nuclear attack.
Research tells me that it took 13 years to complete the original planned network of roads, but from what I can see, they are still being built. It is a work in progress. You can’t drive down an Interstate, or a state highway, without seeing the all-too-familiar orange cones of death.
