In the Name of Progress": Urban Renewal and Baltimore’s "Highway to Nowhere

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Urban Erasures and Contested Memorial Assemblages" session, at the 2019 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The nation-wide wave of urban highway construction of the postwar era dramatically changed the appearance and structure of American cities. Throughout the 1950s-1970s, highway construction cut through inner-cities across the country, devastating entire neighborhoods, and dislocating hundreds of thousands of residents—overwhelmingly those from poor and working-class black communities. In Baltimore, construction on an east-west stretch of highway through the city began in the 1960s, starting with a two-mile section in some of the city’s poorest neighborhoods. The project was eventually abandoned due to resistance by community-led preservation and environmental justice organizations, but not before the destruction of hundreds of African-American homes and businesses in West Baltimore. Known locally as the "Highway to Nowhere," this abandoned stretch of urban highway stands as a monument to the ability of community-based activism to shape the urban landscape, as well as a material reminder of the devastating effects of urban renewal and racial inequality.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology 2019   •
• Urban Erasures and Contested Memorial Assemblages

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 378