New Jersey Has the Worst Road Conditions in the US, Report Finds

The condition and cost of New Jersey's roads are the absolute worst in the nation, according to a new study, which ranked each state's highway system.

The report, which was released on Thursday, by the Reason Foundation found that New Jersey spends a ton of money on our roadways as well. In fact, we have hotel highest per-mile costs.

The condition of our highways is also not great. In fact, the state ranks dead last in the nation for urbanized area traffic congestion.

The study's lead author, Baruch Feigenbaum, said in a release that the condition of the nation's highway system continues to worsen.

“In looking at the nation’s highway system as a whole, there was a decades-long trend of incremental improvement in most key categories, but the overall condition of the highway system has worsened in recent years,” Baruch, who is the assistant director of transportation at Reason Foundation, said in the release. 

North Dakota ranked first on the findings for their overall performance and cost-effectiveness (for the second year in a row).

"Despite spending more money per mile than any other state, New Jersey has the worst urban traffic congestion and among the worst urban Interstate pavement conditions in the country," the authors wrote. 

In fact, we actually rank in the bottom of five states in eight of the 13 metrics, which were studied.

New Jersey did, however, rank fourth-best in the nation for our overall road fatality rate. That's a positive at least.

Click here to view state-by-state performances by category.

The nonpartisan Reason Foundation produces respected public policy research on a variety of issues and publishes the critically-acclaimed Reason magazine.