Acknowledgments Grateful acknowledgment is made to the National Highway Users authorizations, and Trust Fund status; to the Automotive Safety The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much. That is a very fine statement which you have presented on behalf of your organization. I understand that you have been in this business for a number of years, yourself. I also know the gentleman with you, Mr. A. E. Johnson, who is in your organization, has been in this business for a great number of years. He started out at a very young age, as you can tell from looking at him, for him to have been in this business as long as I know he has been. I want you, as president of the American Association of Highway Officials, and the others who are present in the room, to know of the deep appreciation that this committee has for the help that Mr. Johnson has rendered to the committee in the past in coping with problems of trying to finance this Interstate System. Members of the committee will recall that he sat in executive sessions with us. That is a little unusual, for someone not connected directly with the Congress or the Government. But we asked him to do that when we had this matter up before. He has talked to me a great number of times about the problems that you State highway officials would face if action were not taken by the Congress. Mr. Bartelsmeyer, there are some questions, I think, that have been raised in the committee that you can help us resolve. I will submit them to you, and very briefly do so. I think your answers can be equally brief. First, could the States continue this Interstate System if the 90-10 matching ratio were changed to 80-20 or 75-25 or 70-30, or some other figure? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. Mr. Chairman, they could not. The CHAIRMAN. It is the opinion of the State highway officials that it would be too much to ask of the States to undertake the completion of this added program, this interstate program, in addition to the other programs that you are participating in on a 50-50 basis, the ABC program? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. That is right. The CHAIRMAN. How many of the States, in your opinion, could continue to carry on the program, if any, if the figures were reduced to 80-20 or 75-25? Do they have the resources available? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. There probably would be individual States that would continue, but it would then lose the identity as the interstate highway program. The CHAIRMAN. That is the point. Mr. BARTELSMEYER. There would not be any continuity in completion. The CHAIRMAN. That is the point. It is not an interstate system unless all the States can participate, is that right? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. That is right. The CHAIRMAN. And if only 10 States can participate at 75–25, it would certainly not be an interstate system? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. That is right. The CHAIRMAN. Or if there were just 10 States that could not participate, it would still not be an interstate system in the opinion of the highway officials? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. That is correct. The CHAIRMAN. Would a greater participation by the States result in more economical design of projects? Some suggestion has been made that if the Federal Government is paying 90 percent of the cost and the States are paying only 10 percent, there is not much economy to be realized by the States in more economical design or projects. What do you have to say about that? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. Well, I would say that it doesn't make any difference. Every State builds Federal aid highways and builds State highways with their own moneys, and there certainly isn't any difference in degree of caution and care exercised in the expenditure of those funds. So I would say there is no difference at all. The CHAIRMAN. The point that I thought might be true is that 10 percent of the cost of this program to the States added to the other costs that the States incur in connection with ABC is not a small figure to begin with, from the point of view of most of the States. Is that not true? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. It is a relatively large figure, because we are talking of large funds. The CHAIRMAN. I say from the viewpoint of the States, even 10 percent of this type of program would be a rather sizable figure. Mr. BARTELSMEYER. That is right. The CHAIRMAN. Even though it is relatively small in the overall cost, too? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. That is right. The CHAIRMAN. So even this 10 percent is of sufficient magnitude in most States, in your opinion, for the States themselves to have the desire to operate on the most economical basis possible? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. I think there is another thing that should be mentioned here. The States are fully and completely responsible for the maintenance and operation of the system after it is completed. They are certainly not going to build anything that isn't in line with good highway operation, building, and maintenance. The CHAIRMAN. My respect for the soundness of operation in the Bureau of Public Roads goes back to the days, even, of our friend of many years, Mr. McDonald, and I know that in my conversations with Mr. McDonald certain standards were in existence at that time for the development of roads and systems that we then had that were prepared by the States and agreed to by the Bureau of Public Roads, and adhered to by the Bureau of Public Roads in approving the projects. I assume that that is pretty nearly the same situation with respect to all the operations of today, including the Interstate System, is it not? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. That is right. The CHAIRMAN. So the designs that have been developed for construction of the Interstate System are designs that the best informed people in this field that we have available have determined are needed in order to take care of the situation that we will have in existence upon completion date in 1975? Mr. BARTELSMEYER. That is correct. The CHAIRMAN. Any reduction in your opinion, in standards for the program, that is, designs and so on, that we might now envision |