Aging roads and bridges, increased traffic and persistently constrained revenues put local road systems in peril, but the public is largely unaware of the pressures facing their communities, a Minnesota Local Road Research Board study has found.
The LRRB undertook the study to identify critical gaps in public knowledge about local road system challenges and to develop communication methods and tools to address these shortfalls.
Researchers found that even elected officials are unaware of the gap in funding needed to keep the road system going — in part because county engineers have been creative in a period of dwindling resources, and the cost of deferred maintenance has not been immediately visible.
In fact, only one Minnesota news outlet specifically covered the issue of local road system sustainability in a five-year period analyzed by researchers, with media coverage focused mainly on big events, like the collapse of the 35W bridge and the federal transportation funding bill.
There are multiple challenges to road system sustainability, including rising construction costs, declining tax revenues, heavier agricultural and industrial equipment and rising public expectations.
Education needed
To help county engineers better educate the public, researchers looked at outreach strategies (such as open houses and focus groups) currently used in three Minnesota counties: Beltrami, Dakota and Jackson. The research team talked with county road managers to identify key issues and concerns and surveyed 91 residents who had participated in public engagement efforts.
The project revealed widespread confusion about local road system issues. For example, many participants erroneously believed that the gas tax covers (or was enacted to cover) the cost of maintaining local roads.
Researchers have produced a set of recommendations and tools for county engineers to use in designing effective public engagement processes that overcome confusion and a lack of information. A newly approved follow-up project will test the tools in three or four other Minnesota counties and cities.
Note: This article was adapted from the July-August 2014 issue of our Accelerator newsletter. Sign up for your free print or email subscription by clicking here.
Resources
- Technical Summary (PDF, 1 MB, 2 pages)
- Final Report (PDF, 8 MB, 91 pages)
Crossroads 
Is this the first in a series of articles? It seems rather abbreviated. I was hoping to read more about the basis for gap in funding. That is, do the authors of this study take the ASCE’s assessment for infrastructure needs as gospel? If so, and if future infrastructure was to be funded exclusively by the gas tax, it would need to be raised from 18¢ to 78¢ a gallon. This would negatively impact the demand to drive, thus negatively impacting gas tax revenue over the long run. So if my assumption of the basis for the gap is in fact correct, then I think it’s apparent that the manner in which road infrastructure is funded is problematic. What’s more, so too is it problematic the manner in which the future supply of infrastructure assessed. If anything, civil engineers have proven their inability to solve traffic congestion by building more roads, and thus they should not be the source for determining future infrastructure needs. When you’re a hammer, everything looks like a nail.