PUBLICATIONS Inside Illinois Vol. 25, No. 19, April 20, 2006

‘Road trip' celebrates interstate highway system

By Melissa Mitchell, News Bureau Staff Writer
217-333-5491; melissa@illinois.edu

Click photo to enlarge Photo by L. Brian Stauffer Conversation piece An Airstream travel trailer outfitted with a recording studio, an array of flat-panel screens and a 3-D virtual environment will join a convoy of other vehicles traveling through Illinois on June 24 as part of the 50th anniversary celebration of the federal law that established the Eisenhower Interstate Highway System. Individuals may contribute to the history about traveling U.S. highways through the project’s Web site.

An Airstream travel trailer featuring an interactive installation created by a design team from the UI will hit the road in June as part of a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Eisenhower Interstate System.

The 28-foot trailer is similar to the original Airstreams that were popular on interstate highways among vacationers beginning around the time the system was launched. The UI trailer – which originally was featured on Donald Trump’s television show, “The Apprentice” – is parked on the south side of the Krannert Art Museum, where it is expected to remain until the interior installation is completed.

The trailer will join a convoy of other vehicles passing through Illinois on  I-80 – enroute from San Francisco to Washington, D.C. – on June 24. The convoy, organized by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, will stop in Chicago for an anniversary celebration on June 26 before proceeding to the nation’s capital.

The symbolic route across the United States is similar to the one Dwight D. Eisenhower took in 1919 as a young soldier traveling in a cross-country military convoy. Eisenhower’s memory ofthat long, arduous trek was the stimulus for his  later advocacy of a national interstate highway system that could transport military vehicles and people across the country with ease and expedience. During his presidency, he signed the legislation that funded the system on June 29, 1956.

The exhibit to be housed in the UI  trailer was designed by art and design instructor Steve Kostell; Rose Marshack, visiting art and technology specialist at Krannert  Art Museum; and Rick Valentin, a graduate student in the School of Art and Design.

The trio submitted the winning designs in a campuswide competition sponsored by the Illinois Department of Transportation, and the UI’s department of civil and environmental engineering, Krannert Art Museum and School of Art and Design.

“There was one team of two (Marshack and Valentin), and Kostell worked by himself, and we chose both entries as our winner because we felt they strongly complemented each other,” said David Weightman, director of the art and design school and a member of the judging panel.

The traveling exhibit will include a recording studio and an array of large, flat-panel screens to project images and interviews by ordinary people recounting their travel experiences on the interstate highways. Also part of the installation will be a 3-D virtual environment that allows visitors to use a game pad to navigate a simulation of the interstate highways under construction, and to “fly over” the highways to hear random, pre-recorded travelers’ stories.

Audio or text stories may be submitted as part of the project.

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