New Hampshire's Rankings in the
29th Annual Highway Report
New Hampshire’s highway system ranks 13th in the nation in overall cost-effectiveness and condition.
According to the Annual Highway Report by Reason Foundation, this is a six-spot improvement from last year’s ranking of 19th.
In safety and condition categories, New Hampshire’s highways rank 5th in Rural Interstate Pavement Condition, 1st in Urban Interstate Pavement Condition, 14th in Rural Arterial Pavement Condition, 8th in Urban Arterial Pavement Condition, 34th in Structurally Deficient Bridges, 9th in Rural Fatality Rate, and 4th in Urban Fatality Rate. New Hampshire ranks 32nd out of the 50 states in traffic congestion, and its drivers spend about 26 hours a year stuck in traffic congestion.
In spending and cost-effectiveness, New Hampshire ranks 18th in Capital and Bridge Disbursements, which are the costs of building new roads and bridges and widening existing ones. New Hampshire ranks 27th in Maintenance Disbursements, such as the costs of repaving roads and filling in potholes. New Hampshire’s Administrative Disbursements, including office spending that does not make its way to roads, rank 45th nationwide.
Compared to the previous report, the categories in which the state improved the most were Other Disbursements (44th to 20th) and Rural Fatality Rate (19th to 9th). New Hampshire worsened the most in Capital and Bridge Disbursements (9th to 18th).
When compared to its neighboring states, New Hampshire’s overall highway performance is better than Maine’s (16th), Massachusetts’ (17th), Vermont’s (38th), and New York’s (47th), but worse than Connecticut’s (7th).
Comparing its overall performance to similarly populated states, New Hampshire ranks better than Montana (22nd) and West Virginia (30th). “In terms of improving in the road condition and performance categories, New Hampshire should focus on reducing Administrative Disbursements and improving Structurally Deficient Bridges,” said Baruch Feigenbaum, lead author of the 29th Annual Highway Report and senior managing director of transportation policy at Reason Foundation. “While the state performs strongly in Urban Interstate Pavement Condition (1st), Urban Fatality Rate (4th), and Rural Interstate Pavement Condition (5th), its high administrative costs and large number of poor bridges remain areas for improvement.”
Reason Foundation’s 29th Annual Highway Report evaluates the cost-effectiveness and performance of state-controlled highways across 13 categories, including pavement and bridge conditions, traffic fatalities, congestion, and spending. In the performance categories, a rank of 1 indicates the best outcome—for example, the lowest fatality rate or the best pavement quality—while a rank of 50 represents the worst outcomes. In the cost-effectiveness categories, a rank of 1 means the state spends the least, while a rank of 50 indicates the highest relative spending. The report’s data are primarily based on information each state submitted to the Federal Highway Administration for 2023, supplemented by deficient bridge data from Better Roads and Bridges and congestion data from INRIX. For full methodology and data sources, see the complete 29th Annual Highway Report.