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AAA Northern New England
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Action Alerts
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Other Resources
- www.mbtaonline.org
Maine Better Transportation Association
- www.state.me.us/mdot
Maine Department of Transportation
- www.nh.gov/dot
New Hampshire Department of Transportation
- www.aot.state.vt.us
Vermont Agency of Transportation
What happens when our roads and bridges are out of date and out of mind?
By John Melrose and Paul Lariviere
Recognition is growing that the nation’s transportation system is broken and needs fixing.That is the finding conveyed in the nationally released report “Driving Questions: AAA’s Look at the Future of Transportation Funding.” Unfortunately, by most measures, the situation in Northern New England is even more serious than in the nation as a whole. Many roads in all three Northern New England states do not meet basic engineering standards adopted in the 1950s. Too
many bridges in this region are kept in service well beyond designed life expectancies. And, the financial contribution made in these three states to sustain our transportation infrastructure compares very unfavorably to the level of effort made by the preceding generation.
One guidepost for measuring whether a road has been constructed to a modern design standard is the width of the travel lanes: Substandard roads tend to have narrower lanes than roads designed to modern standards. Modern roads are designed with a lane width of at least 11 feet, and preferably 12 feet. Using a lane width of 10 feet or less as the measure of a substandard road, 45 percent of the non-interstate state roads in Maine, and 28 percent in Vermont, have narrow lanes, while the national average is less than 24 percent. New Hampshire beats the national average with 12 percent. Statistics provided by the MaineDOT in 2007 reveal a distinct relationship between higher crash rates and roads not built to modern-day standards.
The bridges of Northern New England are also in significant need of modernization: A disproportionate number are older than the national average. Much of today’s bridge inventory was designed to provide service for 50 years. Based on the latest bridge data maintained by the Federal Highway Administration, 49 percent of the bridges in Maine, 48 percent of bridges in Vermont, and 41 percent of bridges in New Hampshire are at least 50 years old. In comparison, only
29 percent of the nation’s bridge inventory is that old. Generally, even with a good preventative maintenance effort, bridges lose service reliability after 70 to 80 years. Of the 7,443 bridges in Northern New England, nearly half are more than 50 years old, and nearly 10 percent are more than 80 years old.
Northern New England’s bridges are not being replaced at the rate needed. The loss of life associated with the interstate bridge collapse in Minneapolis,
on August 1, 2007, reminds us all of the consequences a bridge failure can have. As a point of reference, the Federal Highway Administration deems 12.2 percent of Minnesota bridges deficient enough to be eligible for federal bridge aid. In Northern New England, 33.6 percent are deemed eligible.
The bottom line is that our region has been coasting along, consuming the investments made in transportation by a prior generation. Following World War II, state governments sustained a level of capital investment in bridges and roads that was roughly double the level of financial effort witnessed in the three states for the past 20 years. Our parents pedaled their bicycles to the top of the hill, giving us the luxury of coasting to the bottom. Now someone needs to start pedaling again.To learn more about this subject and how to contact your local legislators to raise the level of transportation infrastructure priority,
please log on to AAA.com/roadahead.
John Melrose and Paul Lariviere, former heads of MaineDOT, and the Maine Division of the Federal Highway Administration, respectively, are advisors to the Maine Better Transportation Association.
Northern New England Journey
