Connecticut’s roads need investment and are “at risk” of failing, according to a recent report card from local and national engineering organizations that graded the state“s road infrastructure a “D+.”
The Connecticut Society of Civil Engineers, along with the organization“s national umbrella entity, issued a 61-page report evaluating roads, bridges, rail transportation, drinking water systems and wastewater systems in the state. Overall, the organization gave the state a “C” when it comes to its infrastructure with the rail system getting a high mark of “B,” bridges and drinking water a “C”, wastewater a “C-”, and roads bottoming out the report card with a “D+.”
Three out of five categories — bridges, drinking water and wastewater — showed some improvement over the last four years since 2018, when the first report card was issued, and no categories declined in grades.
But still, the report states that “Connecticut has some of the oldest infrastructure in the country, much of it over 50 years old and beyond its intended life,” so there needs to be significant infrastructure investment to get the state where it should be.
Regarding roads, the report said that Connecticut has 21,430 miles of roadways, 19% of which are owned and maintained by the Connecticut Department of Transportation. The remaining 81% are owned and maintained by municipalities, and 77% of local miles are in poor riding condition, and Connecticut has some of the most congested commuter corridors in the country.
The report says that Connecticut has a “significant” long-term funding gap for its prospective capital improvement projects, so how the state uses more than $5 billion in infrastructure funding from the federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is key, the report said.
