Highway system The state of Georgia has of
Interstate highways within its state lines. Georgia's major Interstate Highways are
I-95,
I-75,
I-16,
I-85, and
I-20. Other important interstate highways are
I-24 and
I-59.
I-285 is
Atlanta's perimeter route and
I-575 connects with counties in
north Georgia on I-75 and
I-675 connects to I-285 on the south side of Atlanta.
I-475 is a western bypass of
Macon, shortening the trip for through I-75 traffic. The Georgia Department of Transportation maintains only 16 percent of the roads in the state. The other 84 percent are the responsibility of the counties and cities; 75 percent of those roads are
county roads. GDOT maintains approximately 18,000 miles of state routes and has maintained this mileage cap since the early 1970s. This has led to a significant shift of road responsibility from state to local governments. This is because the state highway system has not been allowed to grow in proportion to the massive overall road system growth due to rapid population increases statewide over the past 40 years. This has left many urbanized counties forced to maintain many miles of arterial routes and a few freeways due to the inability to get these roads onto the state highway system.
Freeing the Freeways The
Freeing the Freeways program was the largest urban expressway reconstruction project of the late 20th century. The program involved widening all the interstate highways within the beltway of
Atlanta. The Federal Highway Act of 1976 allowed states for the first time to use federal highway dollars to widen and build new interchanges on existing highways. This change to federal policy and subsequent similar changes in the 1978 Surface Transportation Assistance Act and 1981 Federal-Aid Highway Act allowed Georgia to rebuild metro Atlanta interstates with 90/10 federal support. Widening of I-285 took place first, in order to allow drivers to bypass the construction when it took place within the beltway. Construction began on the northern arc of I-285 from Paces Ferry Road just west of I-75 to Chamblee Tucker Road just east of I-85 in 1976, and it was completed by 1978. The radiating expressways were then upgraded. By July 1985, I-75 and I-85 had both been widened from the Brookwood Split to north to their interchanges with I-285. The only section of major interstates that was not rebuilt in the project was I-85 between the Brookwood Split to present-day
Georgia 400. The Georgia Department of Transportation opted to build a new viaduct carrying the new 10-lane I-85 just north of the original I-85 alignment and downgraded the original alignment to
Georgia State Route 13. The construction of the
Tom Moreland Interchange, replacing the
cloverleaf interchange at the junction of Interstate 85 and Interstate 285 on the northeast side of Atlanta, began in 1983. The first flyover ramp opened in 1985 and the interchange was completed in 1987. The other intersection of I-285 and I-85 on the southwest corner of Atlanta was originally constructed as a concurrency in the 1960s. When completed in 1989, the newly widened I-285 and I-85 had separate parallel roadways. The final phases of construction were on the Downtown Connector. Work on the Connector began in 1984. The project widened the Connector to 10 lanes, which included the design and construction of 55 bridges over the connector. GDOT policy mandated that there were never fewer lanes open during construction as existed before construction which added to the cost and time devoted to the Downtown section. The final segment of the Downtown Connector opened in November 1988. While not officially part of Freeing the Freeways, over the next few years into the early 1990s, several of the suburban interstates would be widened including I-75 in Cobb County from Windy Hill Road to I-575 and I-85 in Gwinnett County from I-285 to
SR 316. I-285's northern arc would get another lane in each direction. All these projects contributed to Atlanta having world class infrastructure and being selected to host the
1996 Summer Olympics. I-75 and I-85 (as well as their
Downtown Connector concurrency) were built with provisions for
high-occupancy vehicle lanes (HOV lanes) including dedicated exits and on-ramps at Northside Drive, Lindbergh Drive, Williams Street,
Piedmont Avenue, Memorial Drive, and Aviation Boulevard. In 1989, the Georgia Department of Transportation estimated it would cost just under $430,000 to convert a lane in each direction for 21.3 miles of I-85 to HOV lanes. In June 1996, in anticipation of the
1996 Summer Olympics, HOV lanes opened on I-75 and I-85 from Aviation Boulevard on I-75 north to the
Chattahoochee River and I-85 from the Connector north to I-285. This marked the true end of Freeing the Freeways as all the urban and suburban widening projects were complete and the HOV lanes initially built in the late 1980s were finally opened and operating.
Railroads Georgia boasts one of the most extensive freight rail systems in the U.S., with some 5,000 miles of track that run through almost all of the state's 159 counties. The system primarily consists of two Class 1 railroads—
Norfolk Southern and
CSX—and 25 shortlines. 29 percent (1,433 miles) of the state's railroad system is operated by 25 independent or short-line operators.
Light density lines The DOT owns nearly 540 miles of light density rail line. Approximately 90 percent of the 540 miles is leased to a shortline operator. The remaining 10 percent is leased to the
Georgia Department of Natural Resources for use as a bicycle and pedestrian trail, is inactive, or is not leased. Norfolk Southern has approximately 851 miles of light density lines and CSX has another 242 miles. Georgia's light density lines carry less than 5 million gross tons of freight per year and function as local shortline service operators, primarily in rural agricultural areas.
Mainlines 2,463 miles of the
rail system are classified as "mainline track". Some Georgia mainlines transport more than 80 million gross tons per year, ranking them among the most heavily used in the country. == Air transportation ==