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Yahoo
20-02-2025
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Trucking bottlenecks cost U.S. billions — and a Nashville freeway is one of the worst
Americans are paying dearly for traffic congestion along U.S. highways — to the tune of a record-high $108.8 billion nationally — and one Nashville interchange landed in the top five on a list of the worst trucking bottlenecks in the country. That's according to the American Transportation Research Institute, a nonprofit focused on the trucking industry's role in a safe and efficient transportation system. Last week, the institute released its annual report of the nation's top 100 truck bottlenecks for 2025, compiled using a database of freight truck GPS data. 'Delays inflicted on truckers by congestion are the equivalent of 436,000 drivers sitting idle for an entire year,' the institute's president and chief operating officer, Rebecca Brewster, said in a news release announcing the report. 'These metrics are getting worse, but the good news is that states do not need to accept the status quo.' In the same release, the president and CEO of the American Trucking Associations, Chris Spear, said these bottlenecks 'choke our supply chains' and add almost $109 billion annually to the cost of transporting goods — on top of impacting the quality of life for other motorists who rely on the national highway system for their daily commute. In Tennessee, former President Joe Biden's Infrastructure and Jobs Act provided a few billion dollars of investment in highway infrastructure after its passage in 2021, but the state's unmet need for the five-year period between June 2023 and June 2028 has ballooned to nearly $38.5 billion according to the Tennessee Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations. The combined Interstate 24/40 heading east in Nashville where it meets I-440 lands at fifth on that list, up five spots from 2024. According to the institute, trucks travel along that roadway at an average speed of just 38.1 miles per hour and 27.2 miles per hour on average during peak traffic. That's not the only Nashville roadway to make the list. The next highest at 16th is where I-40 and I-65, heading east, converge on the west side of downtown. The split of I-65 and I-24 several miles north of downtown clocks in at 53rd. Those Nashville roadways are part of a list of seven truck bottlenecks throughout Tennessee that cracked the top 100. Four other highway interchanges, two each in Chattanooga and Knoxville, made the list between the 28th and 68th spots. This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Nashville has one of worst truck bottlenecks in the U.S. See where
Yahoo
12-02-2025
- Automotive
- Yahoo
Truck speeds continue to decline at nation's biggest highway bottlenecks
WASHINGTON — Average truck speeds below 45 mph are becoming more prevalent at the country's most notorious freight traffic jams, according to the American Transportation Research Institute. ATRI, the research of the American Trucking Associations, revealed in its latest annual freight bottleneck survey that 66 of the top 100 bottlenecks in the U.S. had average truck speeds of less than 45 mph. That compares with 62 of the top 100 bottlenecks in ATRI's 2024 survey and 49 in its 2023 survey. 'Delays inflicted on truckers by congestion are the equivalent of 436,000 drivers sitting idle for an entire year,' said ATRI President and COO Rebecca Brewster, in a statement Wednesday when the survey was released. 'These metrics are getting worse, but the good news is that states do not need to accept the status quo.' ATRI uses freight truck GPS data, customized software applications and analysis methods, and trucking operations data to produce a 'congestion impact' ranking for more than 325 locations on the national highway system. The intersection of I-95 and state Route 4 near the entrance to the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, New Jersey, ranked as the No. 1 freight bottleneck in the country for the seventh year in a row. Atlanta had three locations in the top 10, and Houston had two. After the Fort Lee site, the worst bottlenecks were: Chicago: I-294 at I-290/I-88. Houston: I-45 at I-69/U.S. 59. Atlanta: I-285 at I-85 (North). Nashville: I-24/I-40 at I-440 (East). Atlanta: I-75 at I-285 (North). Los Angeles: SR 60 at SR 57. Cincinnati: I-71 at I-75. Houston: I-10 at I-45. Atlanta: I-20 at I-285 (West). The intersection of I-95 and I-195 in Providence, Rhode Island, which ranked 25 overall, saw the largest deterioration in peak average speed among the top 100 locations, dropping 18% to 27.2 mph. The intersection of I-285 and state Route 400 in Atlanta, which ranked 29 overall, registered the biggest improvement in peak average speed, increasing 11.9% to 33.7 mph. The average peak-hour truck speed among all 100 locations in the 2025 survey was 34.2 mph, roughly the same average calculated in the 2024 survey. ATRI considers its annual bottleneck ranking, as measured by truck speeds, as providing critical insight for lawmakers and the private sector when making infrastructure investment decisions. To support that case, the research group pointed out that the intersection of I-290 and I-90/I-94 in Chicago, known as the Jane Byrne Interchange, had at one time been the top-ranked truck bottleneck in the country for three straight years. Sustained federal investment to relieve the bottleneck, however, resulted in the interchange falling to No. 15 in the latest ranking, with rush hour truck speeds improving by nearly 25% after construction was completed. 'ATRI's annual bottleneck list provides a clear roadmap for reducing supply chain impediments and guiding investment decisions as Congress begins to focus attention on our country's next transportation investment reauthorization bill,' the group asserts. ATRI: Road congestion cost trucking $108.8B in 2022 Texas again has highest number of traffic bottlenecks for truckers ATRI survey: Drivers and carriers see top issues in trucking differently Click for more FreightWaves articles by John Gallagher. The post Truck speeds continue to decline at nation's biggest highway bottlenecks appeared first on FreightWaves.
