^^ That's actually the end-result of an urban-design studio taught in the early 70s. The goal was to create development around the expressway to turn the highway into an asset instead of a blight.
If they had built the expressway in conjunction with the development shown in the model, with the expressway partially underground, I think the result would have been great for the city.
Three rail tracks, the expressway, and a significant amount of parking would have been completely buried beneath new apartments, restaurants, and shops. No historic buildings would have been torn down, apart from the sugar mills and warehouses along the river - which were all lost anyway to demolition or arson. The parking lots that currently blight the area would be all hidden away below-grade. Most importantly, there would be no artificial barriers between the city and the river - no floodwalls, fences, or tracks, just a series of plazas and staircases/ramps linking Decatur to the riverwalk.
You can quibble with the Brutalist architecture that's hinted at in the model (it was the 70s, after all) but the basic idea is genius.
The architecture might even have turned out nicely. Paul Rudolph designed a similar complex of apartments as graduate housing for Yale:
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