North Carolina ranks 15th in the nation in highway performance and cost-effectiveness in the Annual Highway Report by Reason Foundation.

North Carolina ranks 33rd in fatality rate, 42nd in deficient bridges, 19th in rural Interstate pavement condition, 21st in urban Interstate pavement condition, and 15th in urbanized area congestion.

On spending, North Carolina ranks 3rd in total disbursements per mile and 9th in administrative disbursements per mile.

North Carolina’s best rankings are total disbursements per mile (3rd), capital-bridge disbursements per mile (5th), and maintenance disbursements per mile (8th).

North Carolina’s worst rankings are rural arterial lane-width (42nd) and deficient bridges (42nd).

North Carolina’s state-controlled highway mileage makes it the 2nd largest system.

North Carolina’s Complete Results Ranking
Overall Rank in 2013: 15
Overall Rank in 2012: 20
Overall Rank in 2011: 17
Performance by Category in 2013 Ranking
Total Disbursement per Mile 3
Capital-Bridge disbursements per mile 5
Maintenance disbursements per mile 8
Administrative disbursements per mile 9
Rural Interstate Percent Poor Condition 19
Rural Other Principal Arterial Percent Poor Condition 23
Rural Other Principal Arterial Percent Narrow Lanes 42
Urban Interstate Percent Poor Condition 21
Urbanized Area Congestion, Annual Delay Per Auto Commuter 15
Bridges Percent Deficient 42
Fatality Rate per 100 Million Vehicle-Miles of Travel 33

The Annual Highway Report is based on spending and performance data submitted by state highway agencies to the federal government for 2013. For more details on the calculation of each of the 11 performance measures used in the report, as well as the overall performance measure, please refer to the appendix in the main report. The report’s dataset includes Interstate, federal and state roads but not county or local roads. All rankings are based on performance measures that are ratios rather than absolute values: the financial measures are disbursements per mile, the fatality rate is fatalities per 100 million vehicle-miles of travel, the urban congestion measure is the annual delay per auto commuter, and the others are percentages. For example, the state ranking 1st in deficient bridges has the smallest percentage of deficient bridges, not the smallest number of deficient bridges.

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