Michigan’s highways in worse shape than those of most states

Michigan's rural interstate highways are safer than those in all but two states, but its rural and urban interstates are in worse condition than those of most states. That is according to the Reason Foundation's 28th Annual Highway Report, published in March, which ranks the 50 states on a variety of measures, using 2022 data.

Michigan’s overall highway performance was 23rd out of 50 states. The state is up 11 places from the 2019 edition of the report and four spots better than it was in the 2023 report. Having snowy winters did not prevent some states from scoring even better than Michigan. These included North Dakota (3rd), Minnesota (7th) Connecticut (13th) and Idaho (15th). Two of Michigan’s immediate neighbors also did better: Ohio (10th) and Indiana (20th). Two other nearby states did worse: Wisconsin (26th) and Illinois (36th).

Michigan’s record on traffic fatalities was mixed. Its rural highways were safe. Only Maryland and Minnesota had a lower fatality rate, which compared the number of fatalities to 100 million vehicle miles driven. But the state's safety record for urban highways was barely better than average (24th).

Michigan’s roads and bridges were in worse shape than those of most states. Its rural and urban interstates were ranked 38th and 41st, respectively, for pavement conditions. Ohio ranked 12 spots higher than Michigan on urban interstates. In the category of highways that are not interstates, Michigan did significantly better than the national average (16th) for the share of rural arterials that were in poor condition. But it was lower than average (33rd) for its urban arterial pavement.

Michigan ranked near the bottom (43rd) for the percentage of bridges (11.22%) that were structurally deficient. It performed worse than Illinois, which had a lower overall score; 9.02% of its bridges were deemed structurally deficient.

“Michigan should focus on improving both rural and urban interstate pavement conditions,” said Baruch Feigenbaum, the Reason Foundation’s senior managing director of transportation policy, wrote in the report.

Commuters in the Great Lakes State who suffer from traffic congestion could have it much worse, though that may not be much consolation. Michigan ranked 26th, with the average motorist spending 16.80 hours per year in peak congestion traffic. Motorists in New Jersey endured 103.92 hours, the most for any state, while urban commuters in North Dakota faced only 4.23 hours per year. Ohio motorists fared much better than those in Michigan, putting up with 11.53 hours of congestion each year.

Michigan is slightly above average (22nd) when states are ranked by how much they spend on maintenance (repaving lanes and filling potholes) compared to what the Reason researchers would expect they would spend. It scored highly (12th) for its frugality in administrative expenses. But the authors noted that a state’s performance on these two measurements can vary widely from year to year.