About ARTBA

Established in 1902 at the Cadillac Hotel in New York City, the American Road and Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA) is the oldest and most respected national transportation construction-related association. ARTBA founder Horatio Earle, a Michigan public official, was the first to articulate the need for a federally-built network of Interstate highways. Earle called it the “Capital Connecting Government Highway System,” which he said, would “connect every state capital with each other and the Nation’s Capital-Washington, D.C.”

Earle’s vision was achieved in 1956 when President Eisenhower signed the law authorizing the construction of the Interstate Highway System and creation of the Highway Trust Fund to pay for it. ARTBA members designed, built and continue to maintain the Interstate system, along with the rest of the nation’s transportation network.

In the late 1980s, ARTBA members were the first to recognize the important role public private partnerships (P3s) could play in the design and construction of transportation improvement projects.  These volunteer leaders sought to establish a membership division within ARTBA to become the collective transportation construction industry voice on innovative financing policy, and launch an annual event to bring together the public and private sectors under one roof to explore ways to grow this segment of the transportation market.  They succeeded on both counts.