America’s transportation system is being pushed beyond the limits of what it was built to handle. Freight volumes continue climbing, supply chains are more time-sensitive, and our roads — long the backbone of domestic commerce — are increasingly defined by congestion and delay.
Anyone who driving the New Jersey Turnpike, the D.C. Beltway, I-40 across Tennessee, or California’s I-405 has experienced it: occupying every lane are heavy 18-wheelers and delivery trucks, slow-motion rolling blockades as two tractor-trailers crawl side-by-side for miles. It’s a daily reminder that the highway network is saturated and clever policies such as limiting truck traffic during peak hours, while helpful on the margins, cannot resolve a structural capacity problem.
The economic consequences are real. According to the 2025 Urban Mobility Report from the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, Americans lost an average of 63 hours to traffic delays in 2024, with a national cost exceeding $269 billion. Those delays flow directly into freight transportation costs, which ultimately show up in household budgets. Whether it appears in the prices of groceries, medicine, building materials, or manufactured goods, congestion is a hidden tax on consumers.
The core funding mechanism for our highways has also eroded. The Congressional Research Service reports that federal gasoline and diesel taxes have lost roughly 73% of their purchasing power since 1993. That loss has compounded deferred maintenance and contributed to growing pressure on the Highway Trust Fund. Public dollars are stretched thin at the same moment that system demands are rising.
I have seen these pressures from multiple vantage points: as a federal regulator, as someone who has run a motor carrier, and as an adviser on infrastructure strategy. Fragmented freight networks, unpredictable travel times, and siloed infrastructure investment all translate into higher costs and reduced national competitiveness. Meeting today’s challenges requires more than simply widening roads. It demands smarter traffic management, targeted new capacity, expanded P3 delivery models, improved freight logistics, and more efficient ways to move long-haul freight.
One option now before regulators could help address part of this equation: the proposed combination of Union Pacific and Norfolk Southern. If approved, the deal would create the nation’s first single-system, truly coast-to-coast freight railroad, spanning more than 50,000 route miles across 43 states and reaching roughly 100 ports, according to independent reporting from Reuters.
Today, long-distance rail shipments must often pass across multiple carriers, adding interchange delays, extra handling, and fragmented visibility. A unified network could eliminate many of those friction points, cutting days off cross-country runs, improving reliability, and offering shippers a seamless experience more comparable to trucking — without drawing on taxpayer funds. Shifting even a portion of the heaviest freight back to rail would also reduce highway wear, ease the driver-shortage burden, and lower emissions and crash exposure per ton-mile.
Nevertheless, this is not an argument for rail at the expense of trucking. Trucks remain indispensable for first- and last-mile delivery and for much of America’s freight. A healthier, more balanced system benefits both modes. And I understand the concerns of those who lived through past mergers that produced service slowdowns, job losses, or consolidation of local rail facilities. Those concerns are not hypothetical.
Critics also raise real competitive issues: the risk of reduced choice for captive shippers, potential rate pressure, and the possibility that a single mega-network could amplify service disruptions. Short-line railroads worry about fair access. Communities worry about job impacts. Labor wants assurance that service improvements are not achieved through workforce cuts that compromise safety.
These issues deserve a direct response. The Surface Transportation Board should condition any approval on enforceable service-quality metrics, strong gateway protections, guaranteed short-line interchange access, transparent pricing, and clear penalties for service failures. These guardrails are essential, not optional, to ensure competition is preserved and shippers benefit from the efficiencies promised.
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If those protections are in place, the merger represents a rare opportunity: a substantial infusion of private capital into the backbone of America’s freight system at a moment when public resources cannot fully keep pace. Railroads are privately owned infrastructure, and strategic private investment relieves pressure on taxpayer-funded roads while strengthening national supply-chain resilience.
Ultimately, the goal is not to pick winners. It is to let the market move freight on the mode best suited to the job, freeing highways for the trips that truly require them, improving safety, and ensuring American goods can move at the speed demanded by a competitive global economy. A unified rail network, if properly regulated and responsibly executed, can help get us there.
Brigham A. McCown is an infrastructure and transportation thought leader and former federal government executive. He is currently an outside director and the chair of the Alliance for Innovation and Infrastructure.