Georgia Roads' Efficiency Declines

According to a study released Thursday by the Reason Foundation, Georgia’s highway system has started to decline.

Georgia roads ranked No. 10 in the nation in the Reason Foundation’s 17th Annual Report on the Performance of State Highway Systems.

Georgia ranked sixth in the nation in last year’s study.

The foundation's report measures the performance of all state-owned roads and highways from 1984 to 2006.

The study calculates the effectiveness and performance of each state in 12 different categories, including traffic fatalities, congestion, pavement condition, bridge condition, highway maintenance costs, and administrative costs.

California ranked dead last for road congestion, while Georgia ranked 36, or 14th worst. Sparsely populated states, such as Montana, North Dakota and Wyoming, tied for the least congested roads.

When measuring safety, Georgia held the middle of No. 28 out of 50 states.

Georgia’s bridges ranked 16th in the nation in deficiency, with 19.64 percent of all state-owned bridges declared deficient.

North Dakota's state-owned highway system is the nation's most cost-effective, an honor the state has held since 2001. North Dakota finished first, or tied for first, in five of the report's 12 categories, including rural interstate condition.

New Jersey, which has ranked last every year since 2000, continues to be the nation's least cost-effective and worst-performing road system. Despite having the nation's 4th smallest state-owned highway system, New Jersey finished dead last in five of the study's 12 categories.

Several of the least populous states performed very poorly, and make up the rest of the bottom five: Alaska (49th), Rhode Island (48th), Hawaii (47th), and New Hampshire (46th).

For the full report go to www.reason.org.

--Liz Flowers