Mr. du Pont, writing to Governor Thornton on January 20, 1955, stated: "At the time the Interstate Highway System was being selected, consideration was given to an east-west route in Colorado and Utah, but such a route was not included, largely because of the mountainous terrain west of Denver. We will, of course, give careful consideration to any requests that may be submitted by the State highway departments of the States of Colorado and Utah for additions to the presently approved interstate highway system in those States."

Mr. Du Pont added: "However, because of the necessity of using the undesignated balance to provide for important urban connections, it does not appear possible to add an extension west of Denver of approximately 500 miles within the overall limitation of 40,000 miles imposed by Congress."

Such remaining undesignated mileage is reported to be 2,400 miles, presumably being reserved for designation after further detailed study of essential circumferential and distributing routes in urban areas.

Information which has come to my office, however, indicates that there may be additional mileage which has been saved through the straightening or rerouting of existing segments of the system, and that such mileage might be utilized in Colorado and Utah without affecting the 2,400-mile reserve.

Regarding the old bugaboo about the mountains, the Colorado Department of Highways maintains 21 mountain passes throughout the year. Travel in winter, particularly by trucks and buses, is nearly as heavy as in summer.

Since 1947, millions of dollars have been spent in improving the mountain roads and in perfecting techniques of winter maintenance. A specially trained avalanche-control team has been operating for several years, shooting down potential snowslides when the highway was clear, thus preventing accidents. Mountain passes on the principal primary routes in Colorado are never closed for more than a few hours during an entire winter.

From all of these facts, it appears to me that the conclusion must be obvious Colorado, the bypassed State, should receive an east-west designation on the Interstate System, be put on the main line of national defense and peacetime traffic, and the 500-mile detour to the north or south, the longest in the entire Nation, be eliminated.

STATEMENT OF HON. WAYNE N. ASPINALL, MEMBER OF CONGRESS, OF COLORADO

Vital defense installations in Colorado and Utah are being bypassed by the failure to designate an east-west link through western Colorado to fill the 500mile gap on the Federal Insterstate Highway System, a system which has national defense and the direct connection of defense installations as one of its primary purposes.

I shall not attempt to tabulate all of these defense establishments, but in Colorado, alone, they range from a huge ordnance depot to the headquarters of the Air Defense Command, and from the Rocky Mountain arsenal to the Atomic Energy Commission installations.

In the early days of Colorado's history, the Continental Divide formed a barrier across the middle of the State, dividing it into areas generally referred to as the eastern and western slopes, and the mountainous terrain was mentioned as an objection to the designation of an east-west connection on the Interstate Highway System by the Bureau of Public Roads in 1946.

Conditions have changed radically since that opinion was expressed 9 years

ago.

The Colorado Department of Highways has spent many millions of dollars on these mountain roads. The highways have been widened and straightened, grades have been made easier; in many instances a third lane has been added for slow-moving traffic on ascending grades, and all major passes have been paved.

Rotary snowplows and other modern equipment and improved techniques have made the mountain highways virtually as serviceable in winter as in summer and, as a matter of fact, through travel is almost as heavy during the winter months as at any other season of the year.

Since 1950, the Colorado Department of Highways has engaged in extensive operations designed to make mountain highways even safer by controlling snowslides. Known slide areas have been pinpointed, and data collected which permit a determination of the time a slide may be expected to run.

At such time, a crew of trained men block off the highway and assemble the necessary snowplows and other equipment. The slide then is shot down, under control, by the use of .75 mm. guns or dynamite charges. If the snow reaches

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the road, it is cleared away immediately, and traffic proceeds in safety, all in the matter of a few minutes.

Records reveal that all of the principal roads on Colorado's primary State highway system are not closed for more than a few hours during an entire winter.

Everyone is aware, of course, that severe blizzards also cause the closing of highways even on the plains at lower altitudes in the Western States.

The Colorado General Assembly has authorized an expenditure of $16 million for a tunnel through the Continental Divide, and core drilling and exploration of tunnel sites already is underway.

The granite barrier of the Rockies has been tamed, as far as highway transportation is concerned, and offers a pleasant trip instead of the awesome adventure imagined by some a few years ago.

Assuredly, mountainous terrain no longer can be offered as a valid argument against the inclusion of an east-west connection on the Federal Interstate Highway System to relieve the 500-mile detour which is necessary at the present time. Of obvious importance in any consideration of such designation is the rapid development of the vast uranium deposits on the Colorado Plateau in Colorado and Utah.

From these widespread deposits is being mined and processed the bulk of the uranium being delivered to the Atomic Energy Commission. In addition to uranium mines, processing plants are located at many points in Colorado and Utah, and I understand even more are contemplated.

Also, not to be overlooked, is the planned expansion of the processing of oilshale deposits near Rifle, Colo. The United States Bureau of Mines has had an experimental plant at Rifle for several years. Major oil companies already are planning their own installations, and development of a 1,000-square-mile area containing 300 billion barrels of oil in the richest shale deposits has brought well-founded predictions of an increase of at least a million in population in the area.

My own participation in Colorado's efforts to obtain such designation dates back to 1948, when I began serving my first term in the House, and it has continued ever since.

But I was by no means the first Colorado representative to take up the cudgels in protest against this apparent discrimination.

The records reveal that the entire Colorado congressional delegation was both vigorous and insistent in seeking such designation as early as January 1944, as soon as information leaked out that the State was to be left off the main line of the national trunk highway system.

Every Colorado Senator and Representative serving at that time, and since. has taken every step possible in obtaining a reconsideration of the issue, and the State of Utah now has joined in the request for correction of a failure which manifestly, has created a "missing link" at a vital point in the Nation's most important highway transportation system.

STATEMENT OF HON. E. Y. BERRY, MEMBER OF CONGRESS FROM SOUTH DAKOTA

I am Representative E. Y. Berry, from South Dakota's Second District. I would like to take a few minutes of your time to testify in favor of a provision in the House highway bill that would relieve public utilities of the cost of rele cating their high lines on Federal interstate highway projects.

I would suggest that the House Committee on Public Works might wish to use the terminology on relocation payment contained in the Senate highway bill which passed the Senate yesterday. The House inclusion of this importan: matter might come either in the form of an amendment to H. R. 4260 or the addition of a special section if the committee decides to draft a new bill at the conclusion of your hearings.

Your committee has heard considerable testimony from numerous power companies, REA's, municipalities, telephone companies, and RTA's, stressing the need for this provision in the highway bill that receives final approval by the Congress this year. South Dakota groups would be similarly affected by the new proposed interstate highway development but are unable to appear here to per sonally present their positions.

Particularly South Dakota's smaller utilities, REA's and RTA's, would be seriously injured financially if provision is not made for relocation of poles and high lines at the expense of the Government authority making the highway

improvement. Financial burden to many smaller utilities without this provision could become so great as to cause severe disruption and even complete destruction of the utilities operation.

Under the expanding Federal-aid highway program there will, of course, be more and more highway improvements. This will require wider rights-of-way, and the cost of relocation of utility facilities will become progressively more expensive.

Everyone favors good roads and the resultant improvements in transportation. Everyone from the direct user to the indirect consumer benefits from an improved highway system. Everyone should help bear the cost of highway developments. The cost of these new highway expansions contemplated by the Congress should not be assessed against special groups such as utility customers. If the utility companies are forced to include the extensive costs for relocation in their operations, the additional cost can be passed on to one source only, and that is the consumer. Without proper legislative action, the utility users as a special group will end up paying higher rates for the services of the utilities because of improved highways that will benefit everyone.

I submit to this committee that it is only fair and equitable that the cost of relocating utility lines and poles should be charged against highway improvement itself. I hope that the highway bill that is reported out of this committee will contain a provision for reimbursing utilities from public funds for the cost of relocating facilities because of their expanded highway program.

Thank you.

STATEMENT OF HON. J. EDGAR CHENOWETH, MEMBER OF CONGRESS FROM THE THIRD DISTRICT OF COLORADO

Mr. Chairman, I appreciate the opportunity to appear before this committee in support of H. R. 4260 and the other highway bills you now have under consideration. I consider this legislation of great importance to our Nation.

I am particularly interested in the designation of a highway across the State of Colorado, each and west, as a part of the National System of Interstate High

ways.

One of the specific provisions regarding the National Interstate Highway System is that it be "so located as to connect by routes as direct as practicable" the principal metropolitan areas, cities, and industrial centers to serve the national defense and to connect at suitable border points with routes of continental importance in Canada and Mexico.

Colorado's two largest cities, Denver and Pueblo, were the only ones in this State which were named on the Interstate System. They were located on the north-south route, but neither was placed on any east-west route of that system going westward because no such route ever was designated.

There is no connection on that system between either of these cities "by routes as direct as practicable" with Salt Lake City, the largest principal metropolitan area between Colorado and California. Instead, because of the failure to designate an east-west connection through western Colorado, both cities, although recognized on the north-south route, are cut off completely from any link to the West.

Salt Lake City, by the same token, has no direct connection with these Colorado cities, although Utah, along with Colorado, has agreed to the need for such designation.

I was a Member of Congress in 1944 when the pattern for the Interstate System was adopted. At that time, along with the other members of the Colorado congressional delegation, I was active in seeking a designation for an interstate route through the State of Colorado. I have continued to work for the inclusion of such a connection in our national-defense network.

Early this year I received a letter from the chairman of the Interstate Cooperation Committee of the House of Representatives of the Colorado General Assembly, Hon. Wm. O. Lennox, who inquired concerning the possibility of obtaining an east-west highway through Colorado to be a part of the Interstate Highway System. I met with Mr. Lennox and his committee in Denver and discussed the situation in detail.

I have introduced a bill, H. R. 5558, which is now pending before this committee. My bill provides for the designation of a highway across the Continental Divide as a part of the National System of Interstate Highways. I wish to call attention to the following language contained in my bill:

"That the Secretary of Commerce is hereby authorized and directed to designate as a part of the National System of Interstate Highways established under section 7 of the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1944 (58 Stat. 838) a highway extending by a direct route from the United States Highway No. 85-87 in Colorado westward across the Continental Divide and connecting with United States Highway No. 91 in Utah.

"The route to be followed by such highway shall be selected by joint action of the State highway departments of the States through which it runs after giving due consideration to any recommendations of the Secretary of Defense. The mileage of the highway designated under this act shall be counted for the purpose of the mileage limitation on the National System of Interstate Highways."

Mr. Chairman, the State of Colorado is exceedingly anxious to have an eastwest highway through our State, as proposed in my bill. I hope that the committee will hold early hearings on my bill and that the same will be reported favorably.

I also urge the committee to increase the mileage of the National System of Interstate Highways by adding 2,500 miles to the total of 40,000 miles, which are now authorized. This would make a total of 42,500 miles in this system. After the addition of these 2,500 miles I hope that a portion of the same will be designated as the "East-West Highway" through the State of Colorado.

The State of Colorado, through its highway commission and department of highways, as well as through its entire congressional delegation, has exerted every possible effort to obtain a correction of the mistake which blocked the direct route westward from St. Louis and Kansas City and placed Colorado's principal metropolitan areas on a sidetrack.

Recent developments in Colorado make the designation of such a route of paramount importance, both from the standpoint of our national defense and the national economy.

Colorado has large deposits of uranium and oil shale. I am sure it is not necessary for me to go into detail on the importance of these minerals at this time.

We have in Colorado the greatest bituminous coal reserves of any State in the Union. It has just been announced that a large coal-processing plant will be located near Walsenburg in southern Colorado. This plant will use over 5,000 tons of coal per day and will revitalize the coal-mining industry of the entire State.

Although without benefit of an east-west interstate link west of the Rockies, Colorado already has developed highways which are carrying an immense burden of through-traffic. Transcontinental trucks and buses operate over the mountains the year-round, and the State's traffic burden consists of 1,700,000 motor vehicles-700,000 Colorado-registered and 1 million visitors: and 5,500,00 people-the State's population of 1,500,000 and 4 million from other States, many of whom are traveling from outside points through the State for business or pleasure.

It would appear unwise, on a highway system dedicated to national defense, to ignore the great number of vital defense installations in Colorado and Utah by failing to provide a connection between the principal metropolitan areas on "routes as direct as practicable." It is obvious that a 500-mile detour, as now exists, is neither direct nor practicable.

Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for the privilege of making this statement in support of the legislation now under consideration. I again urge the committee to increase the mileage of the National System of Interstate Highways by 2,500 miles, bringing the total to 42,500 miles.

CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES,

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, Washington, D. C., May 24, 1995.

Hon. GEORGE H. FALLON,

Chairman, Subcommittee on Roads,

Public Works Committee,

House of Representatives, Washington, D. C.

DEAR CHAIRMAN FALLON: Not long ago you were good enough to discuss with me, informally, the situation which confronts Alaska in regard to legislation under consideration for the expansion of the national highway system. You were

good enough to invite me to appear before your subcommittee to testify. After consideration, it occurs to me that my viewpoint may be more effectively presented by means of this formal statement which I trust can be made part of the record.

I very definitely feel that Alaska is entitled to consideration and should be included within the framework of any bill which may be reported by your subcommittee. Our present situation pertaining to what is apparently a national decision to speed up roadbuilding, is almost downright intolerable. Before the presentation of the President's message to the Congress on this subject I was in correspondence with his special Advisory Committee. The chairman of the committee reported to me, in effect, that he was aware of the fact that Alaska's roadbuilding program had proceeded at a very slow and uneven pace because my Territory is the only political jurisdiction not within the scope of the Federal-aid highway acts; yet for that very reason-the reason that the committee was making a study based upon those acts-Alaska could not be given consideration. So we suffer through no fault of our own. This, in justice, can be rectified by the Congress and I sincerely trust your subcommittee will incorporate in any bill you may report out a special section making financial help available to Alaska for the construction of roads.

Alaska is the only political subdivision of the United States not embraced within the general framework of the Federal-aid highway acts. It is true that some expenditures are made within the two Alaska national forests from funds derived from general appropriations, but the system in general use has not been extended to the vast public domain area of Alaska. This is in contrast to the situation in Hawaii and even in Puerto Rico, which share proportionately in funds appropriated for the national road network.

On several occasions the Alaska Territorial Legislature has memorialized Congress seeking inclusion within the Federal-aid highway system, but no affirmative action has been taken by the Congress.

Since 1905 all public domain roads in the Territory have been built by the Alaska Road Commission, first an agency of the War Department and for the last quarter of the century or so an instrumentality of the Interior Department. Contributions have been made to roadbuilding and maintenance by the Territorial Government, but not according to any matching formula.

Federal appropriations specifically for the use of the Alaska Road Commission have had their ups and downs. For example, I can recall construction funds from 1920 to 1940 sufficient in amount only to build about 250 miles of low-standard gravel-surfaced roads. By and large, the Federal appropriations were in amount sufficient only to provide for maintenance on a caretaker basis.

Federal attention to the Alaska road system tended to increase during World War II and late in the forties following the insistence of the Defense Department that an imperative necessity existed for bringing the road system up to date. Rather substantial sums, totaling in 1 year close to $30 million, were appropriated by the Congress. As a generality it can be said that this program was intended only to provide surfacing for existing roads rather than an extension of the road network. Covering an area of 586,000 square miles, that network extends now only for about 3,000 miles; obviously, altogether insufficient to promote settlement and development.

Now we find the Federal appropriation requests diminishing very radically in terms of dollars and this year the administration requested only $7,800,000 for the fiscal year starting July 1. Most of this money will be used to further the planned surfacing program. So when this work is completed, we greatly fear that the situation we shall confront very likely will be identical with that of the past where road activities will be carried on primarily on a maintenance basis.

It is true that the present Federal appropriation for the Alaska Road Commission includes maintenance funds without any requirement for a stated percentage of contributory money being advanced by the Territory. However, the Territorial legislature at its session concluded only in April increased the local gas tax from 2 to 5 cents a gallon for highway users. The additional money to be made available by the increased tax will be put to work at once on the road system.

We are cognizant of the fact that Alaska's vast land area would, under the formula of existing law, give the Territory an annual sum which might be considered disproportionate by the participating States and other Territories. In recognition of that, we agreed some years ago to a new formula to take account of Alaska's special needs and special circumstances. This formula had 63235-55-68