New Mexico's Rankings in the
29th Annual Highway Report
New Mexico’s highway system ranks 39th in the nation in overall cost-effectiveness and condition.
According to the Annual Highway Report by Reason Foundation, this is a one-spot decline from last year’s ranking of 38th.
In safety and condition categories, New Mexico’s highways rank 42nd in Rural Interstate Pavement Condition, 31st in Urban Interstate Pavement Condition, 35th in Rural Arterial Pavement Condition, 38th in Urban Arterial Pavement Condition, 17th in Structurally Deficient Bridges, 38th in Rural Fatality Rate, and 50th in Urban Fatality Rate. New Mexico ranks 13th out of the 50 states in traffic congestion, and its drivers spend about 14 hours a year stuck in traffic congestion.
In spending and cost-effectiveness, New Mexico ranks 12th in Capital and Bridge Disbursements, which are the costs of building new roads and bridges and widening existing ones. New Mexico ranks 4th in Maintenance Disbursements, such as the costs of repaving roads and filling in potholes. New Mexico’s Administrative Disbursements, including office spending that does not make its way to roads, rank 47th nationwide.
Compared to the previous report, the categories in which the state improved the most were Other Fatality Rate (34th to 22nd) and Urbanized Area Congestion (25th to 13th). New Mexico worsened the most in Rural Interstate Pavement Condition (35th to 42nd).
When compared to its neighboring states, New Mexico’s overall highway performance is better than Arizona’s (41st), Colorado’s (42nd), and Oklahoma’s (45th) but worse than Utah’s (10th) and Texas’ (27th).
Comparing its overall performance to similarly populated states, New Mexico ranks worse than Mississippi (24th) and Nebraska (29th). “In terms of improving in the road condition and performance categories, New Mexico should focus on reducing its Urban Fatality Rate and reducing its Administrative Disbursements,” 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 Maintenance Disbursements (4th), Capital and Bridge Disbursements (12th), and Urbanized Area Congestion (13th), its poor performance in safety metrics and administrative spending remains an area of concern.”
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.