Hawaii’s highways rank near bottom in annual report

Hawaii still ranks at the bottom when it comes to road conditions given the amount of money the state pours into them.

Despite having the smallest state-run system in the nation, Hawaii ranks last when it comes to urban interstate pavement conditions and next to last for deficient bridges in the Reason Foundation’s annual state highway report, released this morning.

At near bottom overall, Hawaii is 47th in highway performance and cost-effectiveness — besting only Alaska (48), Rhode Island (49) and New Jersey (50). Hawaii’s overall ranking is one rung higher than it was in the previous report, when it was 48th in the nation in highway performance and cost-effectiveness.

The one bit of good news in the report is that Hawaii did pretty well in the fatality-rate category, coming in 12th among states.

But the Reason Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based libertarian think tank, ranked Hawaii’s urban interstate pavement conditions at the very bottom of all 50 states.

Each state’s overall rating was determined by rankings in 11 categories, including highway expenditures per mile, interstate and rural primary road pavement conditions, bridge conditions, urbanized area congestion, fatality rates and narrow rural arterial lanes. The data used was submitted by state highway agencies to the federal government in 2015.

“We’re behind,” said Ed Sniffen, state Department of Transportation deputy director for highways. “We’re behind on the maintenance of the system and we really need to catch up. So the focus of our highways program for a long time has been building out new roads and putting out more capacity, but we adjusted it to make sure we’re prioritizing the preservation of the system and making it safer.”

Focusing on preservation of existing roads and bridges rather than building new ones has been the state’s directive since early 2016 to make the best use of limited funding, he said.

Since the focus on preservation, the state Transportation Department has begun much-needed repaving projects on Kahekili Highway, westbound Moanalua Freeway and Pali Highway.

At the same time, Hawaii spends more than average, placing it among states reporting the highest per-mile capital and bridge expenditures in 2015, along with New Jersey, Florida and Massachusetts. Hawaii spent $316,637 per state-controlled mile in 2015 compared to the national average of $91,992.

Yet while a majority of states saw bridge conditions improve, seven states, including Hawaii, reported more than one-third of their bridges as deficient.

Sniffen said Hawaii’s bridges are structurally safe, but generally 50 to 60 years old.

Over the next four years, Sniffen said the Transportation Department is investing an estimated $224 million on bridge improvement projects, including two on Hawaii island, three in Maui County, seven on Kauai and 15 on Oahu.

In addition, he said Hawaii was awarded an additional $41 million in redistribution funds from the Federal Highway Administration, the most the state has ever received after working out processes to deliver projects faster. He noted that Hawaii’s improved No. 12 ranking in fatality rate per 100 million vehicle-miles was a sign the state is heading in the right direction.