Most of the discussion has assumed that there is a clear distinction between "infrastructure preservation" on the one hand and "capacity expansion" on the other. As any highway engineer will tell you that is not necessarily so. Many "preservation" projects ---be they classified as "repair," "reconstruction," "rehabilitation," or "modernization" --- involve or result in expanded capacity. In fact, one senior state DOT official told me that both the widening of the Wilson Bridge and the rebuilding of the Springfield Interchange were essentially maintenance projects--yet they both resulted in vastly expanded capacity. U.S. PIRG will be disappointed with the practical outcome of its "fix-it-first" campaign.

The Bipartisan Policy Center’s National Transportation Policy Project (NTPP), in its June 2009 report, called for broad and comprehensive reform of the nation’s surface transportation programs, based on clearly articulated goals, outcomes, performance, and accountability. Among NTPP’s recommendations was to focus formula programs on the preservation and restoration of existing systems and facilities. It should be noted that NTPP’s principle of “preservation” incorporates the management, restoration, and improved performance of existing assets. New capacity, NTPP recommended, should occur through competitive programs that foster innovation, performance, and outcomes, consistent with national goals and purposes.

While we need to invest far more in the nation’s transportation infrastructure in the future than we have in the recent past, we must recognize that resources are likely to be severely constrained, in the context of the declining capacity of the Highway Trust Fund (HTF), the unwillingness of Congress to consider and enact expanded and/or new revenue sources for transportation, enormous annual budget deficits, and a ballooning national debt. Fiscal and political reality, then, will require that priority be given to those programs and projects that will bring the greatest operational and economic benefits in relation to the investments made.

Often, but not always, these will involve rebuilding and improving existing facilities. The key is not to prescribe the character of projects or the modes that deserve the investment of limited resources. Rather, as NTPP has urged, the federal government should prescribe the outcomes and results to be achieved, while states and localities should demonstrate the mix of investments and activities that can best achieve national goals.

NTPP calls for a strategic programmatic approach to investing in the nation’s transportation infrastructure, rather than investing in a list of often uncoordinated and unrelated individual projects. Such an approach offers the promise of an appropriate balance of spending on preservation, improvement, and new capacity. States, localities, and regions could receive and use federal funding for programs that improve the overall performance of the transportation network and achieves clearly articulated national goals.

The flexibility of such a strategic programmatic approach affords states, metropolitan regions, and localities with the incentive to develop innovative solutions and to bring together a bundle of tools and projects to meet their particular needs, in the context of national goals.

For the immediate future there will not be sufficient investment resources to do everything in all places. Thus, priority must be given to assuring that all funds will be targeted on those programs and projects that will produce the greatest benefits and that will maximize returns, in terms of national goals and purposes. Data, metrics, and analysis should form the foundation on which we can transition to a system in which performance, innovation, and strategic planning and programming will be rewarded, and in which spending will be prioritized, based on results and outcomes.

Much has been discussed on this topic already and there is much agreement. We agree that our transportation infrastructure is in bad shape and needs repair and reinvestment. I don’t think anyone is arguing that all infrastructure must be brought up to standard before any new capacity is added. It’s clear to me that we need some new roads and highways. This discussion really comes down to determining the right balance of repair and expansion.

I come down on the side of increasing the amount of repair and maintenance we’re doing. Many of the reasons to increase investment in our existing roads and bridges have been articulated elsewhere in this blog, but there hasn’t been enough discussion of the short term and long term costs of neglecting repair. What does it cost us to neglect needed repairs?

In the University of Utah/Smart Growth America paper, “The Best Stimulus for the Money,” the Sacramento Area Council of Governments had this to say about deferred maintenance: “Deferred maintenance drives up long term cost; it shortens the cycle for rehabilitation, which is four times as costly. Deferred rehabilitation compounds the problem, often leading to pavement failure and the need to reconstruct the whole roadbed, at ten times the cost.”

The other way to look at this is that by choosing not to repair, we are passing up an opportunity to get a return of 4x to 10x on our money. AASHTO, in their report “Rough Roads Ahead,” estimates even higher returns on repair, saying “every $1 spent in keeping a good road good precludes spending $6-$14 to rebuild one that has deteriorated.” Anyone would love to get this kind of return on investment in their retirement portfolio. It looks even better when compared to recent and declining returns on new road capacity. According to the Eno Foundation, annual return on highway investment peaked in the 1950s and 60s at anywhere from 35-48% but has dropped steadily since, to 10-16% in the 1980s. Letting repair costs go up by a factor of 4 to 10 times so we can get a 16% return on investment sounds like a strategy to run out of money faster—which may help explain why we’re out of money now.

Clearly, not all deferred maintenance is leading to these kinds of costs, but it’s undeniable that shifting resources away from maintenance forces taxpayers to pay more for repairs than they should. And when it comes to our transportation system we’re moving in the wrong direction on this cost curve — with infrastructure getting worse, not better. The recent American Society of Civil Engineers assessment indicates that we’re piling up maintenance needs faster than we’re addressing them, giving highways a D-minus — down from a D in 2005.

The drop to a D-minus provides a pretty clear indicator that the current balance of repair and expansion is the wrong one, costing us significant amounts of money.

Taxpayers aren’t just paying with their taxes; they pay directly. Rough roads add an average of $335 to the annual cost of owning a car due to damaged tires, suspensions and reduced fuel efficiency. This makes repair and maintenance a doubly good investment.

In the long run, business as usual leads to higher repair costs for our existing road system. If we don’t address these now, it’s hard to see how it will be easier in the future. Indeed, the only difference will be that we will have new infrastructure that will also have to be maintained. In plain English, we’ll have dug ourselves a bigger hole.

The people who ultimately pay these costs, the taxpayers, clearly recognize that the choice is essentially pay now, or pay a lot more later. In a 2009 poll conducted for the National Association of Realtors, fully 80% of respondents indicated that it was more important that the federal transportation stimulus include efforts to repair existing highways and build public transit rather than build new highways. Forty-five percent of those polled said construction of new highways should “definitely” or “probably” not be included in the stimulus. From the looks of it, taxpayers would rather be fiscally conservative, have government live more within its means, and pay less now.

This survey was conducted before the federal transportation stimulus spending began. From data reported to the US House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, we know now that for STP funds—the biggest and most flexible pot of money provided to the DOTs in the stimulus—59% were used for preservation, and 33% for new capacity with the remainder going to other uses. This was better than the 50% for preservation and 38.8% for new roads and new lanes that US DOT reports was the average for the normal spending cycle. But we already know that the latter has been inadequate to keep the highway system in shape.

No matter how Congress decides to fund the next transportation bill, we know for certain that we will have limited transportation dollars, and we have to make some hard decisions with scarce resources.

The federal government must be accountable to federal taxpayers for protecting their past investments. Sending money out the door on a wing and prayer that the system will be repaired is reckless and irresponsible. Homeowners, small businesses, local governments, schools, and others have all made investments that depend on existing streets, roads and bridges. Our first job is to honor the federal commitment to keep these facilities in good repair—protecting private investments, taxpayers investments, and saving money at the same time.

The question of how highway dollars should be spent—on new capacity or on maintaining and improving existing infrastructure—is not new. This debate has been repeated with every transportation bill since the first ISTEA. The context of the debate, however, has changed in two important ways since then to make the question no longer just about whether we need more roads, but about America's national security and fiscal solvency.

First, the cost of U.S. dependence on oil has become intolerably high—in terms of lives lost and dollars sent abroad, let alone other economic, public health, and environmental costs. Second, the limits of America’s financial and economic resources have become painfully clear. Long-term structural deficits in the federal budget, made worse and more apparent by the recent economic recession, are presenting the nation with hard choices about how we fund all public priorities, not just transportation infrastructure.

If we are serious about reducing our dependence on oil and making the best use of limited resources, we need to invest in a transportation system that moves people and freight in the most cost and energy efficient way possible. Better fuel economy, biofuels, electric vehicles, and other technology are important pieces of the solution, but they do not relieve us from the cost and national security imperatives for a smarter transportation system. Reversing an upward trend in oil use will be difficult enough without adding to the size of the challenge.

The old “fix-it-first” issue was analogous to asking whether you should build an addition to your house before you fixed the leaks in the roof. Given the nation's uncertain financial future, however, the question now is more akin to asking whether it makes sense to build that addition if you might never have enough money to fix the roof. Over the past half-century, we built an immense highway system that connects states and regions into one nation. But that system is expensive to maintain, and thus far, we have been unwilling or unable to properly maintain it. Worse, deferred maintenance is more costly than timely maintenance; wait long enough and costs can more than double—with too many examples from state DOTs. Squeezed between rising costs and declining revenues, many states are now reviewing the possibility of devolving roads to local government or defunding roads in other ways.

Not only has the current system for funding transportation through fuel taxes proven inadequate, it also provides the wrong signal to transportation agencies. What incentive is there to reduce fuel consumption and conserve financial resources when funding rises with fuel and vehicle use? A more sensible incentive would reward efficiency and minimize heavy traffic in order to reduce wear and tear on roads and associated maintenance costs.

Stakeholders on different sides of this debate agree that increased investment in transportation infrastructure is critical to rebuilding America's economic health. But, favoring more investment is no longer sufficient. We cannot afford to spend billions—cumulatively trillions—of dollars without determining the most efficient way to spend those dollars to meet national needs, and without properly maintaining the most essential parts of the existing system. Given our fiscal and national security realities, the only rational strategy I can see is to prioritize maintenance of important road corridors and improvements that increase efficiency of traffic flow of the existing network (redesigned intersections, congestion mitigation etc.). New lane miles and other highway improvements that induce demand, increase fuel consumption, and defer investment in more cost and energy efficient forms of transportation are, at this point in time, inconsistent with a national strategy to reduce our dependence on oil and protect America's fiscal health.

One of the many reasons we need a “fix it first” approach to highway spending is the one TEN highlighted in its Road to Good Jobs report last year: highway repairs create more jobs than new highway construction. This difference matters more than ever today.

Bill Graves wrote in this forum that “while setting highway spending priorities, it’s important that Congress ensure that taxpayers get the greatest value for their investment.” We agree. That’s exactly why “fix it first” is crucial while we’re struggling through the worst economy since the Great Depression. A Good Jobs First study in 2003 showed that highway repair and maintenance create 12% more jobs than new construction. If maximizing taxpayer value is the goal, “fix it first” sounds like a good way to do it. And if the voice of the actual taxpayers matters in the debate, we should listed to the 84 percent of them who said in Transportation for America's March 2010 poll that “we cannot afford to build new roads while existing roads are in disrepair.”

Graves and other new-construction advocates keep mentioning traffic as a reason for new construction. They should remember the traffic engineers’ favorite joke: “Trying to cure traffic by adding more capacity is like trying to cure obesity by loosening your belt.”

This is a good topic of debate. I think Bob Poole has a point that the two diametrically opposed positions miss middle, more reasonable territory. However, AASHTO distorts the debate by making PIRG's position seem cartoonishly extreme. In their report, they state: "One of the policy positions being considered by the Congress is that no federal investment could be used to add highway capacity until the entire national highway system is brought up to a good state of repair. One advocacy group, has recommended that, 'Congress should firewall these funds so they cannot be flexed into other spending areas without certification that existing infrastructure is in a state of good repair.'"

I read that and thought, "Wow, that is extreme!" But I then checked out the PIRG report, and lo and behold didn't come across that sentence in the policy recommendations. Instead, Phineas and co. call for similar reporting standards to New Starts, performance benchmarking, and some other concepts that seem pretty reasonable. So where did the AASHTO quote come from? Turns out it's on p. 25 of the Transportation for America "Route to Reform" publication, and there's context that AASHTO shoved aside. Here's the assertion in its entirety: "Current repair and rehabilitation programs do not require substantial overhaul. Nevertheless, Congress should ensure that adequate funding levels are available, and should firewall these funds so they cannot be flexed into other spending areas without certification that existing infrastructure is in a state of good repair."[emphasis added] This is a much more moderate proposal.

With the facts in hand, I too come down between PIRG and AASHTO, but closer to the PIRG pole.

I also think that AASHTO and its members should consider carefully whether or not pushing for a near-doubling of the federal highway system in fiscally-constrained and energy-security-challenged times is a wise policy position. It kind of reminds me of a great speech by Sen. Moynihan at an event honoring the tenth anniversary of ISTEA. As I recall, he said when writing the bill he canvassed traditional transportation lobbies about the road ahead now that the Interstate System was complete. He hoped for innovative ideas, but the response was simply "Build another one!"

This is plainly not what is needed, since CBO and AASHTO numbers show that while total highway capital investments (fed, state, and local) have been on a steady upward curve since 1956, the VMT growth rate has been trending just as steadily downward in the same time frame (from nearly five percent per annum to just above one percent per annum). Overall, I think it's fair to say that the next fifty years look pretty different from the last fifty years, especially in terms of fiscal capacity, energy needs, and demographics, and state and local officials should plan accordingly.

It seems that the difficult issues are being skirted on this blog. After all, nobody has suggested zero new capacity until every road and bridge is in top condition. We can stop knocking down that scarecrow. Moreover, nobody on this blog seems to contest that the current state of disrepair is unacceptable. Likewise, nobody suggests that available funding on the current horizon will be adequate to both restore good repair and simultaneously build out states’ wish lists for new capacity.

If we can’t have our cake and eat it too, then there really are only three options: (1) We can reform the current system to place more emphasis on repair and maintenance while ensuring only the highest-value new capacity gets built; (2) We can embrace the status quo, perhaps with better measurement; or (3) We can bypass prioritization by not reauthoring highway funding and letting the private investors sort it out.

U.S.PIRG’s paper advocates the first option. Mr. Roth suggests the third. Are others embracing the status quo?

Lisa -

I agree with Bob Poole that the question cannot be answered without establishment of an investment criterion, but I doubt whether the benefit/cost ratio is the right one, as the invention of “benefits” can enable politicians (aided by complicit economists) to justify any project.

We need a criterion that reflects consumer choice and willingness to pay. In market economies that criterion is profitability. We already use it in aviation, shipping and railroads. We now need to apply it to roads, and thus get an assessment tool that can cover all major transportation investments.

You might feel that my answer is not relevant to the US today, to which I would respond that your question is more relevant to Cuba. The recent incursion into “High Speed Rail”, with no analysis to justify it, shows that the US federal government is not organized to assess investment priorities in transportation.

The most useful federal policy would be to not reauthorize highway funding, and to encourage the states to apply to transportation the pricing and investment criteria on which we rely for the provision of food, water, telecommunications and other necessities.

Framing the issue as fix-it first vs. new highway capacity makes for a spirited debate, but leaves out some closely related elements of the equation, particularly (1) more effectively managing demand on existing highway capacity and (2) meeting increased demand for mobility through investments in expanding capacity in other transportation modes.

These additional perspectives are reflected in this well-reasoned excerpt from the US DOT’s draft Strategic Plan 2010-2015 (pages 29-30):

“Recent history indicates that expansions and improvements in system capacity are eventually consumed by increased demand for road travel. Managing that demand and stewardship of existing critical assets are complementary strategies—both are needed to avoid over expansion. Through these strategies expensive expansion programs can sometimes be avoided altogether. Managing the demand for road travel and the associated problem of traffic congestion consists of strategies such as congestion pricing or telecommuting to reduce the growth of and periodic shifts in demand during peak hours; providing reliable and timely information for users to make more rational trip planning decisions; and providing a full array of modal choices as affordable and practical alternatives to road travel. If traffic demand is not managed, the performance of the transportation system will be adversely affected and the cost to sustain even current performance levels will be much higher than current spending in real terms. By managing demand on the transportation system, the cost to maintain and keep the system in a good state of repair and performance is minimized in terms of monies and time. Further, the increased use of non-road transportation options has added social benefits including reduced environmental impact from single-occupancy driving and congestion-related idling, increased exercise regularity for users that opt adopt walking and biking into their travel regimen, and increased economies of scale in mass transit that can make reliable service more affordable. The principles embodied by livable communities such as improved land use planning go hand-in-hand with demand management as they make alternatives to driving more practical. A comprehensive strategy that promotes livability and reduces the demand for auto travel will significantly lower the long-run cost of transportation (and other infrastructure) both for household budgets and taxpayers.”

This week’s question is an important one because a reasoned debate on this issue is long overdue. First and foremost, our nation’s infrastructure is in lousy condition. In his prior post, John Horsely wonders out loud if roads and bridge conditions are as bad as PIRG asserts in their new report. I would have him look no further than AASHTO’s own report, “Rough Roads Ahead: Fix Them Now or Pay for Them Later,” released in May of 2009. In their own words, one-third of the nation’s highways are in poor or mediocre condition, a quarter of all urban roads are in poor condition and the result is an auto repair bill for motorists that approaches $67 billion a year.

We all know it’s going to take significantly increased investment to bring all modes of surface transportation into a state of good repair – bridges, roads, rails and transit systems. Transportation for America has supported a 20 cent increase in the federal gas tax because we believe we have shortchanged our existing system for far too long. This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t build any more new highway capacity until we’re done fixing everything, but it does mean we need to be a lot smarter about when and how we invest in new capacity.

New roads and lanes tend to be offered as the only solution for congestion relief when there ought to be a full suite of other tools in the transportation toolbox. While there’s good lip service paid to congestion pricing, ITS and operational improvements for highways, these aren’t core go-to strategies for most transportation agencies. And let’s not undervalue express bus and parallel rail facilities as a way of better managing congested corridors.

Although PIRG and AASHTO come at transportation issues from a different perspective, both argue that the status quo is unsustainable, and we at Transportation for America couldn’t agree more.

The reality we face today is this: Not only is our system currently in poor condition, but it also lacks the capacity to meet our future needs. It’s no wonder that, while many transportation experts have tried to develop a prioritization system for transportation, most have been unsuccessful. Finding the right balance to solve this problem is a big challenge.

USPIRG’s report is based on the assumption that there will be no new money for transportation (or at least it does not seem to advocate for it). Faced with an aging system and no new money, they suggest that we should focus on preserving what we have to cut down on accidents and damage to vehicles. An admirable goal. Pragmatic too, in the face of the Highway Trust Fund dollar’s reduced purchasing power. However, the report fails to consider the effect increased population and commercial activity have on congestion.

AASHTO’s report reasons that capacity projects can improve congestion and condition, and ASCE agrees. Our future prosperity requires a transportation system that takes advantage of many different modes. However, in a time when frustration with government is high and willingness to pay more in taxes is low, the industry could win some good faith points with the public if we patched some potholes before we started drawing up grand new plans.

That’s why ASCE looked at condition and capacity, as well as funding and future needs, in our last Report Card for America’s Infrastructure. And, that’s why we have to look at all of those things when we talk about solutions.

Addressing transportation issues has been so low on the national priority agenda for so long that any attention it gets is going to be an improvement. But, if we can’t even afford to take care of what we have now, what is the likelihood that a simple change in priorities will make much difference?

The American Trucking Associations (ATA) agrees with AASHTO’s report that calls for increasing highway capacity at our nation’s worst traffic bottlenecks to help mitigate traffic congestion. AASHTO’s report states over the next 10 years the U.S. population will grow by 27 million, exacerbating congestion on our nation’s highways. ATA forecasts that freight volumes over the next 10 years will grow by more than 26 percent, with the share moved by truck increasing to 71 percent. Investing in projects that alleviate critical bottlenecks on our national highway system will have lasting, positive effects on the economy and environment.

While setting highway spending priorities, it’s important that Congress ensure that taxpayers get the greatest value for their investment. As I’ve mentioned before on this blog, the federal government should start by addressing the Federal Highway Administration’s list of worst traffic bottlenecks. Repairing and expanding capacity at these congestion points would have the greatest impact for highway users, improving commute times and the flow of freight. ATA estimates that in addition to economic and safety benefits, if congestion in all 437 bottlenecks were eliminated, the reduction in truck CO2 emissions alone would be 45.2 million tons over 10 years.

Moreover, the federal government should tie infrastructure investment to system performance by requiring recipients of federal funds to meet performance standards related to safety, infrastructure condition, congestion reduction and emissions. Placing these criteria on highway construction helps focus limited resources and maximize cost benefits to taxpayers. Limiting federal transportation dollars to merely repairs on existing roads ignores the long-term transportation needs of citizens and businesses. Repair and expansion must both be components of a national transportation strategy that reduces congestion.

Both the PIRG and the AASHTO reports are flawed, in that neither calls for highway investment policies that require a decent return on the investment.

PIRG correctly notes that elected officials have a bias toward cutting ribbons rather than ensuring proper highway maintenance. And AASHTO correctly points to ample research demonstrating the large need for adding capacity in both urban areas (for congestion relief) and on long-distance Interstates (for goods movement). But both exaggerate their cases.

PIRG’s proposal to do no capacity expansion until every last mile of road in the country is brought up to first-class standards would waste huge sums on roads with very little traffic. But AASHTO’s uncritical endorsement of more than doubling total annual highway investment to $175 billion makes the same mistake. That number does come from the excellent 2008 Conditions & Performance Report from the US DOT—but that’s only one of several dozen scenarios in the report. It’s what we might call the DOT’s “unconstrained” scenario. We can get a more credible investment approach by reviewing the report’s other scenarios.

The C&P report provides two approaches to prioritizing highway investment. One is to use a benefit/cost screen, allocating investment dollars only to projects that exceed some B/C threshold value. Its “unconstrained” scenario uses B/C = 1.0, a standard far below a reasonable return on an infrastructure investment—especially when resources are limited. Reviewing the same data with a B/C screen of 1.2 yields a highway investment target of $157 billion, while B/C of 1.5 puts the annual target at $137 billion. That’s still a large increase from the current $79 billion, but is a far more defensible investment goal.

The other prioritization approach in the C&P report is congestion pricing—assumed to be applied immediately to all congested highway segments nationwide. While that is totally unrealistic, if it were do-able, it would further reduce the required annual investments. Pricing and a 1.0 B/C screen yields $122 billion per year; B/C of 1.2 with pricing cuts that to $117 billion, while the 1.5 screen reduces it further to $102 billion. While we aren’t going to price all lanes on all congested highways anytime soon, those numbers should give us the bottom range of sensible highway investment.

For purposes of the current reauthorization, I’d opt for the no-pricing approach with B/C of 1.5, which gives us the $137 billion/year highway investment target. The DOT’s modeling suggests that 52% of this should be system rehabilitation, 38% of it on system expansion, and the balance for safety and other enhancements.

My point here is that serious modeling of this sort gives us a way to go beyond PIRG’s ideological anti-highway posturing—and AASHTO’s state DOT wish lists. A nation that by all realistic forecasts will still be using highways for 90 to 95% of all personal travel 25 years from now and will still be using trucks for 80 to 90% (by value) of all domestic goods movement has no realistic option but to invest in both highway rehabilitation and highway expansion. But AASHTO would be more credible if it started applying realistic benefit/cost screens to prioritize both kinds of investment.

The Woodrow Wilson Bridge near Washington, D.C., is an excellent example of why expanding highway capacity must have equal priority with preservation in the next highway and transit authorization bill. Fifty years ago the bridge was designed to carry 75,000 vehicles per day. By 2000 it was carrying 200,000 vehicles a day, or more than double the level of capacity it was designed for. The Virginia and Maryland DOTs joined forces to expand the bridge from six to 12 lanes. Its completion in 2008 has saved drivers and truckers 40 minutes a day, and significantly reduced the Capital region’s congestion. Two of the new lanes will eventually be used for transit, stemming the need for additional expansion as the number of vehicles grows to an anticipated 300,000 vehicles per day over the next 20 years.

The “fix-it-first” approach espoused by US PIRG in a recent report would slam the door on needed capacity expansion in the next highway and transit authorization bill. PIRG would have Congress focus nearly all highway funding on preservation and make it difficult, if not impossible, to invest in needed system expansion.

In 1991, Congress shifted the responsibility to state DOTs and Metropolitan Planning Organizations for deciding how best to meet statewide and community transportation needs. The result has been a balanced approach that considers both maintenance and expansion to meet system needs. These decisions have been made by officials who are held accountable to the public for delivering a sound transportation system.

Groups like PIRG have largely failed to influence transportation policy at the state and local levels, and are now turning to Congress to impose their maintenance-only approach on states and localities. This debate raises two important questions that must be addressed : 1) What are the priorities for highway investment? ; and 2 ) Who should set those priorities?

AASHTO’s report , Transportation Reboot: Unlocking Gridlock, outlines the fact that the U.S. population grew by 140 million over the last 50 years, and is expected to grow by 100 million more people in the next 40. To meet future needs, the report recommends taking a balanced approach: preserve today’s system; improve its performance; and add the highway, transit, and rail capacity needed. If most or all of our capital investments were made in system rehabilitation and little to none in adding needed capacity, as PIRG recommends, the condition of the nation’s roads and bridges would improve, but traffic would grind to a halt.

PIRG’s recommendations run contrary to the 2008 Conditions and Performance Report U.S. DOT released this year. U.S. DOT documented the need to increase highway capital investment to $175 billion per year, but also stressed the need for a balanced approach: $85 billion for system rehabilitation, $71 billion for system expansion, and $18 billion for safety and environmental improvements. The report documented a $620 billion backlog of highway and bridge improvements, 46% of which was created by current capacity deficiencies.

AASHTO also takes exception to some of the accusations by PIRG that state transportation funding policies are “short-sighted,” and have “neglected road and bridge maintenance.” What do the facts show?

Since 1996, states have reduced the percentage of structurally deficient bridges in the country from 18% to 12%. Are America’s roads as PIRG asserts “in such terrible shape”? U.S. DOT’s 2008 Report documented that travel on National Highway System pavements “with acceptable ride quality” increased from 89% in 1997 to 93% by 2006. Are states spending more on expansion than maintenance? According to U.S. DOT, states spent 50.3% on system rehabilitation, 20.6% on new capacity, and 17.6% to add new lanes. Of the $26.6 billion provided for highways under the Economic Recovery Act, states and local governments spent 5% on new road and bridge capacity and 95% on preservation.

States recognize that there is always room for improvement, and we welcome the opportunity to engage in this policy debate with groups like PIRG. But when it comes to setting priorities for highway spending, community by community and state by state, we believe better decisions will be made by those accountable to the public for results at the state and local level, rather than by advocacy groups who want their views imposed on the rest of the country by Congress.

Both reports agree that America’s roads and bridges suffer an unacceptable state of disrepair. And budgets force difficult choices. Flagging transportation funds don’t permit states to build their wish lists for new and wider roads while also maintaining and repairing the roads we already have. Given the fiscal realities, deciding to build new highway capacity diverts resources away from fixing the backlog of deferred maintenance and repair. Except in very special circumstances, that’s a bad idea.

The American people agree. An overwhelming 84 percent are convinced that, “We cannot afford to build new roads while existing roads are in disrepair,” according to a March 2010 national poll (slide 23).

But politics and perverse policy incentives have long favored new highway construction at the expense of preserving existing assets. Politicians favor ribbon cuttings and taking credit for new road expansions, while repair tends to remain invisible or causes inconvenient disruptions in the short term. Special interests lobby more for new roads. Meanwhile rules can discourage strong stewardship. States that allow more bridges to become structurally deficient will qualify for additional money in federal formulas. Many states direct bridge money to instead build new highway projects, despite hundreds of bridges that are structurally deficient in their state. Meanwhile states must get approval for systematic preventative maintenance programs before they can even use bridge money for preventative maintenance, and even then a daunting amount of extra paperwork and approvals are required. States that allow bridges and roads to crumble may have an easier time getting federal capital funds to replace a bridge or road – even though costs are much higher.

Enthusiasts for new highway construction tend to offer three arguments to elevate its importance. Each falls short when confronted by the facts.

(1) The future needs of the 21st century are sometimes characterized as requiring more new highway construction. But vehicle miles per capita fell over the past decade, tailing off even before rising gas prices or economic downturn. Long-term trends show growing use of other modes of transportation, more freight carried by rail or boat, and emerging technologies, such as telecommuting and high speed rail, which will reduce the need for highway traffic. When gas prices again rise, these trends will gain further strength. Meanwhile, the new and wider highways that we build today will impose further costs for future repair and increase our dependence on oil in the future. The era of massive highway construction is truly behind us.

(2) Reduced traffic congestion gets touted as a rationale to build new and wider highways. But past experience and research show that additional capacity often makes congestion problems worse. New capacity tends to induce additional traffic and fosters development patterns that require more driving for longer distances. Higher volumes of traffic end up piling up behind bottlenecks. And the areas where traffic congestion is worst – urban areas – also tend to be the places where it is most expensive to widen highways or build new ones. Even when well-targeted new highway capacity projects would reduce congestion, investments in repair would often deliver bigger reductions. Much of traffic congestion is caused by auto breakdowns and lane closures, which are more likely when roads are in disrepair.

(3) Safety is sometimes put forward as a reason to build new capacity. There are certainly cases where unsafe intersections, ramps, or shoulders should be rebuilt to conform to more modern codes. But too often, updating old structures becomes a pretext for unnecessary widening and constructing new routes. Worse still, updating roads to increase the speed of traffic flow can also make driving more lethal. A recent study reviewing the empirical evidence finds that roadway designs that encourage higher speeds appear to reduce a roadway's safety performance.

States and the federal government should create new rules to prioritize preservation and repair. The U.S. PIRG report lays out some innovative ideas for doing so. States should be held accountable for showing progress on clear goals for state of good repair. Large new highway capacity projects should operate more like the New Starts program does for proposed new public transit capacity, including demonstration of where future funds will come from to maintain the roadway. States should set clear performance criteria that they report on annually and make sure the allocation of dollars reflects these goals. States should pass their own reforms, like Maryland’s law established last month that benchmarks transportation dollars to match stated priorities for good state of repair. New reforms need not reduce local discretion; once states restore a good state of repair, they can be flexible in spending additional dollars.

Whatever the exact reforms, America needs greater accountability to ensure that bridges and roads are taken care of, even though that will mean fewer new highways.