Yahoo Autos How Tulsa Highlights the Divide on Federal Highway Removal
In recent years, infrastructure and racial equity have moved to the forefront of national discourse. The crumbling state of America’s highway infrastructure became far too dangerous to ignore. Also, the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer provoked an evaluation of the government’s impact on race relations in the United States.
The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, passed in 2021, established the Reconnecting Communities grant program. The United States Department of Transportation dedicated the $1 billion grant program to reconnecting communities that were previously cut off from economic opportunities by transportation infrastructure that benefitted other areas.
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Tulsa, Oklahoma seems like a perfect place to benefit from the USDOT grant program. The neighborhood of Greenwood, Tulsa used to be called “Black Wall Street” for its economic prosperity. However, the community was reduced to cinders in a horrific attack by white residents in 1921. While the centennial anniversary brought attention to what took place there, many Americans only became aware of the massacre through its use as a setting in HBO’s “Watchmen” TV series. Greenwood never recovered, partly because it seemed like an ideal location to build a highway through 50 years later.
Interstate-244 was built through Greenwood in 1975 as a bypass for I-44. The Crosstown Expressway, officially named the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Expressway, cuts straight through what remains of the historic Black neighborhood. Many local residents and politicians want to see the highway removed. However, the Oklahoma Department of Transportation wants to delay the prospect of removal by at least three decades. Both sides have applied for grants.
