| Since the invention of the automobile, Americans have expanded the transportation network to accommodate the motorcar, propelled by layers of government programs and private initiatives. This reconstruction has had profound consequences on the landscape, on residential and commercial choices, and on occupational patterns.;This dissertation focuses on a major metropolis (Denver), a post-war boomtown (Smyrna, Tennessee), and a small village (Middlebury, Vermont). The three very different communities demonstrate that the issues at hand are not limited to any particular region or type of American settlement. Rather, all were transformed by unheralded and poorly understood incentives.;At the end of the nineteenth century, the Good Roads Movement defined highways as a "public benefit." The resulting system of highway finance subsidized automobility and decentralization. Subsequently, the federal income tax code created other incentives. Thus, separate policy decisions changed where and how Americans lived and worked.;The Denver case shows how these changes underwrote growth on the periphery and redirected resources towards suburban development. Separate decisions concerning transit, tollroads, airports, real estate, and highway planning combined to change a compact city into a sprawling metropolis.;Smyrna highlights the de facto industrial relocation policy of the United States, which has encouraged corporate investments in rural locations with numerous incentives, including a heavily subsidized transportation network. Between 1940 and 1990, Smyrna changed from a stagnant village into a burgeoning industrial magnet. Most significantly, the Nissan Motors company invested a billion dollars in the largest auto assembly plant in North America.;The third case, Middlebury, demonstrates that the transforming effects of these government programs have been both pervasive and ubiquitous. Even though Vermont is physically and culturally distant from big cities and newer growth areas, there are noteworthy parallels between Middlebury and these other areas.;Taken collectively, Denver, Smyrna, and Middlebury show how overlapping programs and interventions reshaped America. These changes cannot be explained as straightforward consequences of immutable cultural preferences or technological developments. Instead, culture and technology were channeled and focused by the cumulative power of overlapping policies, encouraging the dispersal of jobs and people. |
