Why Mayors Should Run the Department of Transportation

The federal Department of Transportation has its roots in the post-World War II era of the American highway. It was formed, in 1966, just a decade after federal legislation created the Interstate Highway System that would change how Americans travel and where they live.

"And highway building has been the primary focus ever since," says David Goldberg, communications director for the advocacy group Transportation for America. Transportation policy, as with housing policy of that era, was designed to enable Americans to spread out from crumbling and crowded cities into new communities in the suburbs. "That’s still essentially how the game has been rigged," Goldberg says, "with some minor modifications."