Indiana has a long way to go to bring its roads and bridges up to shape, the Indiana Department of Transportation says. Anyone who has driven on area roads — or who has wanted to drive on the Cline Avenue Bridge — knows this is true.
Of the 5,435 bridges maintained by the state, 373 are rated poor, and 1,007 are rated fair.
At the current rate of spending — $273 million a year for bridge repair and replacement — Indiana will have 682 poor bridges, or 12.5 percent, and 1,705 rated fair in 2024.
Look also at pavement maintenance numbers. Indiana spends $394 million a year yet has 1,127 miles of highways in poor condition. It will worsen to 1,305 miles in 2024 if nothing is done.
It gets worse. INDOT says most of the interstate highway bridges and overpasses built in the 1960s will be near the end of their 75-year projected lifespan in 2024.
Had the Indiana Toll Road privatization not happened, funding Major Moves, we would have been in worse shape. But there are no magic tricks left to fund transportation.
The hard question is how much Hoosiers are willing to pay for good roads and bridges?
Getting to INDOT's goal of fewer than 3 percent of bridges and fewer than 4.5 percent of state highways rated poor would require an additional $258 million a year, INDOT Commissioner Karl Browning recently told a legislative transportation study committee.
State Rep. Ed Soliday, R-Valparaiso, chairs that committee. He's warning that tough decisions are ahead.
"I think we need to think very honestly and say to the public: Here's our choices, here's what it costs, and then somebody is going to have to exercise some political courage," he said.
Soliday pushed through House Enrolled Act 1104 this year, requiring INDOT to study alternative transportation funding mechanisms.
Increasing a tax is not palatable, but neither is letting the state's roads and bridges deteriorate faster. Transportation infrastructure is the lifeblood of commerce, a fact that should be readily apparent when anyone looks at a map of Northwest Indiana or even just looks out the window at work.
It's up to the Indiana General Assembly to come up with the appropriate funding to rebuild the Crossroads of America.