Evening star., 1947-01-26
w " ASHINGTON, with more
automobiles on its streets
wv per capita than any city
in thu rnrld farecar1tS O

in the world, presents a
gluay traffic problem every day,
when 100000 Government workers
converge on the downtown section
in the morning and swarm home
ward at $50 each evening.
The best that city officials have
been able to do Is designate certain
street as "one way" at rush hours
and put extra policemen on duty
when the traffic is thickest. Stag
gered working hours for Govern
ment employees might help, but city
officials have no control over that.
Rush hour is still fearsome thing
In overpopulated Washington.
There has been much talk and
little do about the parking prob
lem. Shoppers find plenty of room
In private lots, but workers who are
due at their Offices at least by $50
am. must leave their cars at home
and pack the buses and streetcars
because parking lots do not want
all-day customers. Partial decen-
tralization of shopping facilities has
not made F street any less con-
gested.
Taxicabs have been local prob
lem, with the cabbies themselves
anxious for a limitation on the
number of hackers licenses issued.
Bans against cruising on some
downtown streets have been of some
help.
To keep reckless drivers off the
streets Traffic Director George E.
Keneipp last August reacted to a
wave of tragic accidents by Waging
a vigorous campaign against traffic
violators through the Police De-
partment and the courts. Fines and
penalties were made doubly severe.
Washington has its work cut out
plainly. The following Associated
Press story tells what problems
other United States cities face be-
cause a man named Henry Ford
sat down to produce the au-
tomobile.
So you're caught in the cacophony
of a city traffic jam, your nerves
tangled and raw from the smile
an-hour pace with mary an open
space in sight, and you mutter
irritably:
"If it's this bad now, how will it
be when new cars and trucks get
into full production again?"
The answer to one of America S
toughest municipal problems lies in
the current race between the men
who make the cars and the men
who make room for the cars on the
Nations downtown streets.
New York City merchants, &C
eording to estimates, lose more than
$1,000 900 a day because Of the ag-
onizing bottleneck on the streets.
Boston places it's annual loss at s4o,-
100000. Practically every city or
town of size in the country is strug-
Cling with the headache.
To fight hardening Of the traf1lc
arteries more and more cities de-
mand that new buildings provide
off-the-street parking and truck
unloading facilities.
Demonstrating an advance stage
of this trend is drive-in BANK IN
Los Angeles. The bank has two
lane road running through its street
level. The motorist pulls up and a
counter. stocked with pen, blotter
and deposit slips, slides out to WIN
dow level and back again with the
deposit. In Akron, Ohio, a depart
ment store plans to turn two OF lts
floors into parking areas and IN the
future customers practically will
drive UP to the counters.
More Elevated Streets
Are on the Program
In downtown America you can
expect to see more elevated or oe-
pressed expressways and limited-ac-
cess highways. Also, the dream ROADS
-three-level highways, one 1or
pedestrians, one for cars ana one
for public transit vehicles-are no
longer so remote.
But until such things come TO
pass authorities are agreed that the
first problem is to clear the con-
gested areas of parked cars, the
worst clot in urban circulatory sys-
TENS.
The situation, as sized up Dy
Walter Blucher, executive director
Of the American Society OF Plan
nlng Officials, is this:
Il can't name an important clty
in America which has adequate
parking space in the downtown ols-
trlct to take care of the traffic gen.
Grated on our existing highways.
Although every important city
Is ready to admit that parking is
one of the No. l unsolved problems
we are now proposing in most OF
our cities to build a number OF
1reeWays and superhighways which
VIII generate additional traffic. How