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44 Build Your Own Electric VehicleFi g u r e 3-6 Growth in automobile registrations from 1950 to 1990.Highway Bill signed by President Eisenhower in 1956, authorizing a 42,500-milesuperhighway system. Public transportation and the railroads—the big losers in Japanand Europe due to World War II damage—also became the big losers in the United Statesas the U.S. government formally finished the job that major industrial corporations, actingin conspiratorial secrecy and convicted of violating the Sherman Antitrust Act, had startedin the 1930s and 1940s: ripping up the tracks, dismantling the infrastructure, and scrappingintercity and intracity light rail and trolley systems that could have saved consumers,cities, and the environment the expenditure of billions of dollars today. (Source: JonathanKwitny, “The Great Transportation Conspiracy,” Harper’s, February 1981.)The post–World War II rebuilding of European and Japanese infrastructures madethem more modern than the United States. Germany and Japan (and most of the rest ofthe industrialized world) rapidly converted from coal to oil economies after World WarII, and underwent an unprecedented period of economic and industrial expansion asthe surge in automobile registrations outside of the United States, shown in Figure 3-6,attests. All the industrialized economies of the world were now dependent on internalcombustion engine vehicles and oil.The 1960s: The Sleeper AwakensWhile electric vehicle automobile development languished since the 1920s (except forDetroit Electric’s efforts), commercial and industrial EV activities continued to flourish,perhaps best exemplified by Great Britain’s electric milk trucks (called “floats”) and itstotal electric vehicle population of more than 100,000.The heightened environmental concerns of the 1960s, specifically air pollution, werethe first wave upon which electric vehicles rose again. While numerous 1960s visionarieswere correctly touting EVs as a solution, the manufacturing technology was, unfortunately,not up to the vision.Figure 3-7 shows a chronological summary of what was being done by the primaryelectric vehicle developers in the United States, Europe, and Japan during the fourwaves.