The quality of the roads in Virginia’s major metropolitan areas does not stack up very well to that of other cities, according to data compiled by The Road Information Project and published today in USA Today. According to a chart in USA Today, the “Virginia Beach” metro area and Washington. D.C. metro areas are in the middle of the pack–roughly in line with national averages, which are nothing to write home about. Richmond’s roads are measurably worse.
The numbers break out like this:
Virginia Beach: 28 percent good; 23 percent fair; 27 percent mediocre; 22 percent bad.
Washington, D.C.: 30 percent good; 17 percent fair; 28 percent mediocre; 24 percent bad.
Richmond: 18 percent good; 26 percent fair; 32 percent mediocre; 23 percent bad.
Now, go read Steve Haner’s column in Bacon’s Rebellion, “The Transportation SOLs,” which argues that spending on road maintenance is crowding out dollars for new construction. According to Steve’s numbers, maintenance will consume all state road dollars by 2018. (See chart.) I don’t know where he gets his numbers, and I don’t know how good they are because I haven’t had a chance to examine the assumptions embedded in them. But given that those are the only numbers we’ve got, and given the already mediocre condition of Virginia’s roads, it’s understandable why Virginia lawmakers believe we have a time bomb on our hands.