Highway Gridlock Costs Truckers $50 Billion per Year

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DALLAS -- Congestion on U.S. highways adds almost $50 billion of operational costs to the trucking industry per year as drivers sit gridlocked in traffic bottlenecks, the American Transportation Research Institute (ATRI) said in its latest analysis of nationwide traffic data.

The 728 million hours that trucks and truckers lose each year to congestion is the equivalent of 264,500 commercial truck drivers sitting idle for a year, said chief analyst W. Ford Torrey IV.

"A key impediment to nimble supply chains is the level of traffic congestion experienced on U.S. roadways, and the subsequent costs that are incurred due to this congestion," Torrey said.

The bottlenecks are located mostly in urban areas, with little or no congestion on 64% of total highway miles in the survey, he said.

Almost 90% of the total congestion costs are concentrated on 18% of the 160,000-mile National Highway System (NHS), which includes interstate highways and other major roads that link to 198 ports, 190 rail terminals, and 207 airports, the report said. The NHS system consists of 4% of the nation's road network while accommodating more than 75% of all heavy truck traffic.

"From a national perspective, 95% of the total congestion cost occurred in metropolitan areas, with just over $2.5 billion occurring outside of metropolitan areas," Torrey said.

Four of the top five counties with the highest level of congestion are in the New York City metropolitan area, he said. The congestion price tag within the area accounts for 53% of the combined congestion costs for New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania.

Commercial trucks transported nearly 10 billion tons of freight in 2014, almost 70% of the total domestic tonnage shipped, and traveled more than 279 billion miles on the nation's roadway network in 2014, Torrey said.

ATRI has been tracking highway congestion since 2008. The data in the current report is from 2014, the latest year for which information is available.

More than a dozen states experienced at least $1 billion of congestion costs in 2014, ATRI said, with Florida's $4.6 billion topping the list. Texas took the second spot with $4.1 billion, followed by California with $3.3 billion and New Jersey with $3 billion.

Truckers are all too aware of the perils of highway bottlenecks, said David Congdon, chief executive officer of Old Dominion Freight Line.

"Unfortunately we've come to expect traffic congestion as a part of our daily lives," he said.

Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said last week that new requirements are on the way to improve how states report information on traffic system performance to the Federal Highway Administration, including peak-hour congestion and freight movements.

"The department is taking a major step to improve accountability and address the costly congestion problem that is plaguing our nation every day," Foxx said. "Commuters and truck drivers from every state and region will be able to learn how transportation investments are performing in delivering reliable highway travel with minimal delays and less air pollution."

The Transportation Department is expected to soon announce the award of $800 million of discretionary grants for critical highway and freight projects aimed at congestion relief.

The $305 billion Fixing America's Surface Transportation (FAST) Act enacted late last year created the $4.5 billion National Significant Freight and Highway Projects Program.

The Fostering Advancements in Shipping and Transportation for the Long-term Achievement of National Efficiencies (FASTLANE) grants will total $800 million in fiscal 2016 and increase to $1 billion in fiscal 2020, the fifth and final year of the FAST Act.

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