New study claims New Jersey has some of the worst roads in U.S.

According to a recent report, New Jersey has the third worst roads in the entire country.

The report by Copilot.com says a whopping 42.4% of the Garden State’s roads are in poor condition, compared to 26% nationwide. Rhode Island (47.9%) and California (46.2%) rank worse than New Jersey. Georgia, Tennessee, and Florida have the roads in the best condition.

As is often the case, part of New Jersey is assigned to the Philadelphia metro area, and part of New Jersey is included in the New York metro. Taken as a standalone state, however, New Jersey is among the worst states for condition of the roads; Trenton is among the 15th worst small urban areas. Copilot.com used information from the Federal Highway Administration, using the FHA’s International Roughness Index (IRI) data, they ranked each urban area based on the percentage of road-miles categorized as poor. They found that urban roads are in considerably worse shape than rural roads. Rural traffic has been level since 2000 while urban traffic has been on the rise. Among large urban areas, the New York/New Jersey roads were deemed to be the fourth worst, while the Philadelphia/New Jersey/Delaware metro area was the 15th worst. San Francisco has the absolute worst rating.

In New Jersey, minor arteries in urban areas are in particularly bad shape: 58% of them are considered poor. According to a recent report, New Jersey ranks #1 in diverting gas tax money away from roads (a lot of it goes to mass transit).

The post above reflects the thoughts and observations of New Jersey 101.5 talk show host Bill Doyle. Any opinions expressed are Bill Doyle's own.