March 18, 2025
How have pavement conditions in Greater Philadelphia changed from 2020 to 2023? Find out in today's #TrackingTuesday.
Connections 2050, the long-range plan for Greater Philadelphia, sets a goal to modernize and improve the condition of the region’s transportation infrastructure to achieve and maintain a state-of-good repair. This can be challenging given Greater Philadelphia’s aging infrastructure, meaning roadway repairs must compete with other investment priorities for maintenance funding. Having a roadway network with pavement in good condition enables a smoother flow of traffic and reduces crashes. Improving traffic flow can enable goods and people to move more efficiently through the region, which can bolster the region’s economy.
Pavement conditions data from the region’s state departments of transportation shows that there were one percent fewer road National Highway System (NHS) lane miles in poor condition in the region in 2023 compared to 2020, based on the Federal Highway Administration’s Transportation Performance Management (TPM) Performance Measure 2 (PM2) asset condition metric. The NHS, which was designated in 1995 and expanded in 2012, contains nearly 221,000 miles of roadway across the U.S. It includes all interstates and principal arterials, the Strategic Highway Network for defense purposes, and intermodal connectors, which are roads connecting the NHS to ports, airports, rail terminals, and pipeline terminals. The NHS covers just 5.3% of the nation’s roads, but it carries about 55% of all traffic.
The International Roughness Index (IRI) measures the entire road network for overall ride quality. This metric shows that 25.8% of the region's pavement is in poor condition. This is down by six percent from its 2015 peak, but is still 1.1% higher than in 2010. According to IRI, non-National Highway System (non-NHS) roadways are in much worse shape than ones that are part of the national network. In 2023, 32% of non-NHS pavement segment miles were in poor condition, versus 23.4% of non-interstate NHS pavement segment miles, and just 7.6% of NHS interstate pavement segment miles.
The region has been making progress toward improving pavement condition. However, there is still a way to go before it sufficiently lowers the amount of both its NHS and non-NHS pavement in poor condition. For more details on pavement conditions trends in the region, go to the “How are we doing?” tab in the Pavement Conditions Indicator.
Want to download the data for your own use? Under each chart, find a link to the data in DVRPC’s Data Catalog. You can also explore other indicators in Tracking Progress, DVRPC’s interactive dashboard for exploring Greater Philadelphia’s progress toward the Connections 2050 regional vision.