Louisiana Roads Rank Bad But Not Worst In Recent Survey

For anyone who has bumped and banged along a Louisiana highway recently it's hard to believe that our state's roads are not the worst in the country. We aren't the worst but we're pretty bad according to a recent survey. The survey conducted by The Reason Foundation a Los Angeles based think tank put our roads at 40th in the nation.

This a considerable drop from the groups last survey in 2011. In that survey Louisiana highway's scored 16 positions higher in the nationwide survey. The author of the study, David Hartgen, suggested that the urban portions of our state's interstate system were a leading cause in the drop in stature.

"For urban interstates, 15-percent of the payment was rated poor that's almost doubled from the prior year,"

Hartgen's comments were reported by the Louisiana Radio Network.

Other factors that contributed the state's poor performance included that state's high fatality rate and the states deficiency in bridge conditions.

"28% of the bridges are rated as deficient. That's considerably higher than the national average, which is around 21%."

A spokesperson for the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development said the state is currently working to improve and upgrade the state's highway system. In fact the state has invested over six billion dollars in roadways since 2008.