Seventy-six modern rest areas were built along Michigan's 1,800-mile freeway system by 1980, many containing information plazas like this one on I-94 to make highway travel easier and more pleasant.
Hannes Meyers Jr. of Zeeland, first chairman of State Transportation Commission.
The gasoline tax was raised from nine to 11 cents a gallon, the diesel fuel levy from seven to nine cents. The weight tax went up by 30 percent, truck fees by 35 percent. The distribution formula of the newly named Michigan Transportation Fund was rewritten to give the Michigan Department of Transportation, also a new title, 46 percent of gas and weight tax revenues. The counties' share was pegged at 34.3 percent and the cities and villages at 19 percent. The state's portion was split 82.3 percent for highway construction and maintenance and 17.7 percent for public transit, rail and port programs. In addition, the non-highway programs can receive up to 25 percent of unearmarked sales taxes collected on auto-related products. The package produced more than $160 million in new money for transportation.
A constitutional amendment approved by voters froze 90 percent of gas-weight revenues for construction and maintenance on highways, roads and streets. It empowered the Governor, for the first time, to appoint the department director as well as a chief administrator of its Bureau of Urban and Public Transportation. The same amendment replaced the four-member Highway Commission with a six-member Transportation Commission. Zeeland attorney Hannes Meyers Jr., chairman of the Highway Commission, became the first chairman of the new panel by appointment of Governor Milliken.
One of the commission's first major
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