Arkansas Ranks 28th in the Nation in Highway Performance and Cost-Effectiveness

Arkansas’ highway system ranks 28th in the nation in overall cost-effectiveness and condition.

According to the Annual Highway Report by Reason Foundation, this is a 15-spot worsening from Arkansas’ ranking of 13th overall in the last evaluation of the condition, safety, and costs of roads and bridges in all 50 states.

In safety and condition categories, Arkansas’ highways rank 40th in urban Interstate pavement condition, 39th in rural Interstate pavement condition, 30th in urban arterial pavement condition, 36th in rural arterial pavement condition, 23rd in structurally deficient bridges, 46th in urban fatality rate, and 43rd in rural fatality rate.

Arkansas ranks 4th out of the 50 states in traffic congestion, and its drivers spend about seven hours a year stuck in traffic congestion.

In spending and cost-effectiveness, Arkansas ranks 25th in capital and bridge disbursements, which are the costs of building new roads and bridges and widening existing ones.

Arkansas ranks 6th in maintenance spending, such as the costs of repaving roads and filling potholes. Arkansas’ administrative disbursements, including office spending that doesn’t make its way to roads, ranks 3rd nationwide.

The category in which the state improved the most from the previous report was urbanized area congestion (from 25th to 4th).

Arkansas worsened the most in urban fatality rate (from 7th to 46th).

Compared to neighboring and nearby states, Arkansas’ overall highway performance is better than Oklahoma’s (39th) and Louisiana’s (46th) but worse than Tennessee’s (5th).

Comparing its overall performance to similarly populated states, Arkansas ranks behind Kansas (22nd) but ahead of Iowa (31st).

Arkansas’ highway system ranks 28th out of 50 states overall this year, ranked 13th in last year’s report, and ranked 32nd in the nation five years ago in 2019.

“In terms of improving the road condition and performance categories, Arkansas should focus on improving urban Interstate pavement conditions, given it is Arkansas’ lowest performance-focused ranking,” said Baruch Feigenbaum, lead author of the 28th Annual Highway Report and senior managing director of transportation policy at Reason Foundation. “Arkansas should also make it a priority to reduce the number of deaths on its urban and rural roads, given its fatality rates are some of the worst in the nation.”

Reason Foundation’s 28th Annual Highway Report measures the condition and cost-effectiveness of state-controlled highways in 13 categories, including pavement and bridge conditions, traffic fatalities, and spending. In the performance categories, ranking first implies the state has the best or lowest fatality rate and its road pavement is in the best condition. A ranking of 50th in performance categories means the state has the worst fatality rates or pavement conditions. In simplified terms, in the cost-effectiveness categories, a rank of 50 means the state spends more money, and a first-place ranking means the state spends less money than other states in that category.

The report’s data are primarily information each state directly reported to the Federal Highway Administration for 2022. Better Roads and Bridges provides the deficient bridge data, and the Texas A&M Transportation Institute provides the traffic congestion data.
Please see the complete 28th Annual Highway Report for detailed methodology and a comprehensive list of data sources.