America’s roads and bridges ‘not crumbling’ – report

A new report from the Reason Foundation concludes, after  examining 20 years of state highway data, that the condition of America’s state-controlled roads has improved in seven key areas including deficient bridges and pavement condition.

“There are still plenty of problems to fix, but our roads and bridges aren’t crumbling,” said David Hartgen, lead author of the Reason Foundation report and emeritus professor of transportation at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. “The overall condition of the state-controlled road system is getting better and you can actually make the case that it has never been in better shape. The key going forward is to target spending where it will do the most good.”  The reports found that all 50 states lowered their highway fatality rates from 1989 to 2008 and 40 states reduced their percentages of deficient bridges during that time. Nationwide, the number of deficient bridges in the country fell from 37.8 percent of all bridges in 1989 to 23.7 percent in 2008.

The study tracks spending per mile on state-owned roads and measures road performance in seven categories: miles of urban Interstate highways in poor pavement condition, miles of rural Interstates in poor condition, congestion on urban Interstates, deficient bridges, highway fatalities, rural primary roads in poor condition and the number of rural primary roads flagged as too narrow. In the 20 years examined, 11 states (North Dakota, Virginia, Missouri, Nebraska, Maine, Montana, Tennessee, Kansas, Wisconsin, Colorado, and Florida) made progress in all seven categories and 37 states improved in at least five of the seven metrics.

California was the only state that failed to improve in at least three areas, making strides only in deficient bridges and fatalities. Five states—New York, Hawaii, Utah, Vermont and Mississippi—progressed in just three categories.

The L.A-based Reason Foundation says it is a public policy think tank promoting choice, competition, and a dynamic market economy as the foundation for human dignity and progress.