North Carolina’s next smart move on infrastructure policy

North Carolina has become one of the great American growth stories. Families are moving here in record numbers. Businesses are expanding. Manufacturers, technology firms and logistics operators are investing billions. It makes sense that CNBC has ranked North Carolina America’s top state for business three of the last five years.

This is no accident. State policymakers have quietly built one of the country’s most effective policy environments for infrastructure investment and economic growth.

While Washington debates how to modernize America, North Carolina has spent years actually doing it.

One example is broadband deployment. While many states have stifled it with layers of bureaucracy, North Carolina streamlined municipal permits to a 30-day shot clock, capped local permitting fees and eliminated the need for duplicative agreements. Meanwhile, NCDOT took steps to ease the “encroachment” process for companies to install infrastructure along public rights of way.

Another example is utility pole attachments. Once a major infrastructure bottleneck, North Carolina’s statutes now feature improved incentives, a clarified dispute-resolution process for municipal and co-op-owned poles, and expedited make-ready estimates from pole owners. It also launched innovative programs like the Broadband Pole Replacement Program to accelerate rural broadband expansion.

These incentive improvements have levered the state’s broadband grants, channeling taxpayer resources to truly unserved areas where broadband is needed most. Waste on duplicative overbuilding has been avoided, and private providers have contributed matching investments to compete on speed and affordability. The state successfully leveraged roughly $900 million in federal ARPA funding while also establishing additional recovery-focused broadband efforts after Hurricane Helene.

These same lessons apply to the broader policy environment. North Carolina has reduced barriers to investment through corporate tax reform, simplified video programming taxation and lowered small-scale wireless broadband permitting fees. The state has strengthened protections for critical infrastructure and increased penalties for assaults against communications workers. All this recognizes broadband networks as essential infrastructure supporting modern commerce, education and public safety.

Technical reforms like this have tangible impacts. They have helped North Carolina attract extraordinary levels of private-sector investment while many other states struggle under permitting delays, infrastructure bottlenecks and slow deployment timelines.

But success creates new challenges.

Take road projects, for example. As North Carolina grows, transportation expansion and infrastructure modernization are more important than ever. More roads are being widened. More transportation corridors are being rebuilt. And this means more utility infrastructure — broadband, electric, water and gas systems — must coexist inside increasingly crowded rights of way.

In a new study (“A Compensation Requirement to Avoid Delays in Transportation Projects with Infrastructure Relocations”), I show how road projects involve a coordination challenge that policymakers should not ignore.

The truth is utility relocation is one of the biggest contributors to road project delays. Before roads can be widened or rebuilt, existing infrastructure often must be moved. And when these relocations are delayed, it means transportation projects are also stalled, raising costs and forcing delays on commuters and shippers.

It’s not that infrastructure relocation delays are due to bad actors or opportunism. Manpower, budgeting and operational constraints are real, especially when sudden relocation orders arrive. As my study shows, current policies frequently misalign incentives, leaving the public to absorb delay costs while utilities absorb relocation costs. North Carolina can make another good policy move by introducing cost-sharing for infrastructure relocations.

A compensation policy, where cost-sharing is contingent on timely relocation by communications providers, can induce better outcomes and deliver transportation projects on schedule. Such a policy can be in the interests of both parties, as well as taxpayers. It is a natural next step after North Carolina’s track record on broadband and infrastructure.

The state has already embraced an important truth about infrastructure policy: Speed, coordination and investment don’t happen on their own but thrive when government creates policy environments that reward them.

As North Carolina’s growth engine hums along, policymakers can further modernize infrastructure coordination, reduce unnecessary delays and ensure projects are completed efficiently. The same innovative mindset that helped make North Carolina a national broadband leader can help the state stay ahead of the infrastructure pressures that come with rapid growth.

America needs more examples of states that solve problems instead of merely debating them. North Carolina is increasingly showing what that looks like.

Edward Lopez is professor of economics at Western Carolina University.