Removal of aging highways is a strategy some cities are using to try and boost their downtown districts http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2011/0302/Downtown-need-a-makeover-More-cities-are-razing-urban-highways – Christian Science Monitor

By Jeremy Kutner, Correspondent / March 2, 2011
New Haven, Conn. In New Haven, Conn., a mistake of the past – one that displaced hundreds, razed a neighborhood, and physically divided a city – is finally set to be rectified: A highway is going to be demolished.

Some people in New Haven have been waiting to see this for 40 years, ever since it became clear that a modern roadway slicing through the heart of downtown would not bring the hoped-for suburban shoppers and revitalization. That waiting list is long, it turns out, as cities across the United States look to erase some of the damage from urban highway construction of the 1950s and ’60s – tearing up or replacing the roadways and attempting to restitch bulldozed neighborhoods. ….

In Providence, Rhode Island transportation officials opted to reroute a dilapidated section of highway, moving the road Some people in New Haven have been waiting to see this for 40 years, ever since it became clear that a modern roadway slicing through the heart of downtown would not bring the hoped-for suburban shoppers and revitalization. That waiting list is long, it turns out, as cities across the United States look to erase some of the damage from urban highway construction of the 1950s and ’60s – tearing up or replacing the roadways and attempting to restitch bulldozed neighborhoods.outside the downtown core at no small expense. Demolition began late last year.

Now, “there’s an opportunity not only to create a new neighborhood but to sort of reinvent our downtown,” says Robert Azar, a planner with the Providence Department of Planning and Development….”