U.S. Leads the World in Highway Congestion. Toll Roads, a Proven Solution.

The transportation analytics experts at Inrix have added one more data point to the overwhelming case for a national infrastructure program in the United States, with an annual scorecard that ranks the U.S. as the most congested developed country in the world.

The findings are a sharp contrast to the day-to-day experience on the 42 managed lanes across 11 U.S. states, where drivers can opt for faster, more reliable mobility across 602 center lane miles of tolled infrastructure. (Stats from IBTTA’s TollMinerTM data visualization tool.)

The Impacts of Congestion

In its annual Global Congestion Scorecard, Kirkland, a Washington-based company surveyed 1,360 cities across 38 countries, Traffic Technology Today reports. It concluded that the average U.S. driver wastes 41 hours per year in peak-hour traffic, at a cost of $1,445 per driver, or a mind-boggling $305 billion across the economy.

The country has 10 of the world’s 25 most congested cities, including three of the top five—Los Angeles in first place, New York tied for second with Moscow, and San Francisco in fifth.

“Congestion costs the USA hundreds of billions of dollars, threatens future economic growth, and lowers our quality of life,” said Inrix Chief Economist Graham Cookson. “If we’re to avoid traffic congestion becoming a further drain on our economy, we must invest in intelligent transportation systems to tackle our mobility challenges.”

The Sound of a Solution

Contrast that with the success story from IBTTA President Tim Stewart, Executive Director of the E-470 Public Highway Authority, in last week’s op ed in The Hill, one of the leading daily newspapers in the Washington Beltway.

“Without E-470, Denver-area drivers would spend an astonishing 14.8 million additional hours stuck in traffic each year,” said Tim Stewart, Executive Director, E-470 Public Highway Authority. Instead, the Denver-Aurora metropolitan area is in a sustained economic boom, thanks in part to development along the E-470 corridor.

“In the two years since I joined E-470 as Executive Director, the corridor has welcomed new distribution centers for Amazon and UPS and several new housing developments. Walmart has bought land for a major logistics facility. Gaylord is about to complete a big, new hotel and event center. It adds up to a massive buildout of secondary development, made possible in part by toll-funded mobility.”

There will be many twists and turns ahead as legislators decide the final shape and size of a national infrastructure initiative. But add congestion to the list of urgently compelling problems that Congress and the White House can go a long way toward solving once they find the right formula.

With the problem so clearly defined by Inrix, and a key solution so eloquently articulated by Stewart, it’s obvious that tolling will be an essential part of the mix.

Learn more about tolls and tolling technology as a leading solution to highway congestion! Sign up today for IBTTA’s Managed, Lanes, AET & Technology Summit, April 22-24, 2018 in Charlotte, NC.