Total bridges
384
Public highway bridges in Payne County
County profile · official public datasets
Payne County, OK
384 public highway bridges tracked in the FHWA National Bridge Inventory: 24% rated Good, 65.6% Fair, 10.4% Poor.
- 384
- Public bridges
- 24%
- Good condition
- 10.4%
- Poor condition
The verdict
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory.
Payne County pairs a higher-than-median Poor-condition share among rated counties in the state with a newer average build year than the state inventory.
- 56th
- of 77 on Poor share
- 10.4%
- Poor-condition share
- 384
- public highway bridges
- 1982
- avg year built
Poor is an FHWA condition category from the lowest applicable component rating (4 or below), not a live crossing-safety or closure decision. Rankings cover counties with at least five public highway bridges.
Payne County Bridge Snapshot
According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory, Payne County ranks #56 of 77 Oklahoma counties with at least 5 public highway bridges on Poor-condition share (lower share ranks better; currently 10.4%). Payne County, Oklahoma contains 384 public highway bridges. Roughly 24% are rated “Good,” 65.6% “Fair,” and 10.4% “Poor.” Poor means the lowest applicable deck, superstructure, substructure, or culvert rating is 4 or below on the 0–9 NBI scale. It is a condition category, not a live safety or closure decision.
Responsible agencies inspect covered bridges on risk-based intervals under current NBIS rules and submit inventory data to FHWA annually. The list below shows every NBI-tracked bridge in the county. Use the “Sort by” controls to change the ordering, and click any row for its reported inspection date, traffic count, and condition fields.
Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory. See methodology for full definitions.
Good condition
24%
92 of 384 rated 7-9
Fair condition
65.6%
252 of 384 rated 5-6
Poor condition
10.4%
40 of 384 rated 4 or below
In-state Poor-share rank
#56 of 77
Among Oklahoma counties with 5+ bridges, lower share ranks better
Condition distribution
Share of 384 NBI-tracked bridges by lowest applicable component rating.
Good 24% (92)
Fair 65.6% (252)
Poor 10.4% (40)
Payne County's Poor-condition bridges carry 17,363 vehicle crossings a day
That is 2.4% of the county's reported daily bridge traffic on 10.4% of its bridges: Poor-condition structures carry less traffic than their share of the inventory. Each Poor bridge averages 434 crossings a day against 3,047 for a Good-condition one. A Poor rating is a condition category, not a closure or a live safety judgement; it means the lowest applicable component rating is 4 or below.
Computed over the 384 of 384 bridges in this county that report an average daily traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
34.4% of Payne County's bridges have passed the 50-year mark
132 of the 384 bridges with a recorded construction year were built in 1974 or earlier. Age alone is not a defect: a well-maintained older bridge can rate Good, and 24% of this county's inventory does. Even so, this older cohort is the population from which future Poor ratings are drawn, which is why the age profile below matters alongside the condition split above.
Cutoff derives from the 2024 release year minus a 50-year design life. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
One structure carries 28.5% of the county's Poor-condition bridge traffic
S.H. 51 WB over CREEK, built 1975, carries 4,950 vehicles a day, the most of any Poor-rated structure here. The county's Poor-condition exposure is concentrated rather than evenly spread, so the 40-bridge count understates how much of the daily burden sits on a single crossing.
Share is of the 17,363 daily crossings on Poor-rated bridges that report a traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
When Payne County's bridges were built
384 bridges with a recorded construction year, grouped by decade
- 1910s 3
1910–1919
3 bridges
- 1920s 18
1920–1929
18 bridges
- 1930s 30
1930–1939
30 bridges
- 1940s 13
1940–1949
13 bridges
- 1950s 26
1950–1959
26 bridges
- 1960s 16
1960–1969
16 bridges
- 1970s
1970–1979
37 bridges
- 1980s 34
1980–1989
34 bridges
- 1990s
1990–1999
86 bridges
- 2000s
2000–2009
56 bridges
- 2010s
2010–2019
49 bridges
- 2020s 16
2020–2029
16 bridges
What this shows Construction peaked in the 1990s, when 86 of the county's bridges still in the inventory were built, which is 22.4% of those with a recorded year. That cohort is now 25 to 34 years old in the 2024 inventory. Its average build year is 1982, 5 years newer than the Oklahoma average of 1977.
How Payne County compares with Oklahoma's closest counties by inventory size
The 5 Oklahoma counties nearest Payne County in number of bridges, with their condition splits. Its 10.4% Poor share is the 5th-lowest of these 6. Its average build year of 1982 against a peer-group mean of 1980 is in line with the group.
Showing the 5 closest of 76 Oklahoma counties eligible for comparison.
| County | Bridges | Good | Fair | Poor | Avg. built |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Muskogee County | 398 | 37.7% | 52.3% | 10.1% | 1971 |
| Creek County | 395 | 40.5% | 38.7% | 20.8% | 1972 |
| Alfalfa County | 387 | 27.4% | 66.1% | 6.5% | 1988 |
| Custer County | 384 | 73.2% | 25.5% | 1.3% | 1982 |
| Payne County (this page) | 384 | 24% | 65.6% | 10.4% | 1982 |
| Stephens County | 382 | 29.1% | 68.1% | 2.9% | 1985 |
Each share is of that county's own total tracked bridges; peers are the counties with 5 or more bridges whose inventory size is closest to Payne County's. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.
Nationwide counties with similar inventory size or average build year
Two NBI-derived peer sets for Payne County, both outside Oklahoma so the neighborhoods are not the same-state size table above.
Similar inventory size
Nearest county inventories outside OK (384 bridges here).
- Bristol County, MA · 384 bridges
- Lee County, MS · 385 bridges
- Hillsborough County, NH · 385 bridges
- Trumbull County, OH · 383 bridges
Similar average build year
Nearest mean year-built outside OK (1982 here).
- Jackson County, MO · avg 1982 · 930 bridges
- Milwaukee County, WI · avg 1982 · 893 bridges
- Champaign County, IL · avg 1982 · 727 bridges
- Broward County, FL · avg 1982 · 686 bridges
Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release. Peers floor at 10 bridges so stub inventories cannot own the match.
Fair-condition bridges (252)
Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.
Related
Data sourced from official public datasets. See our methodology for details. Retrieved and formatted by PlainBridges
Every figure on PlainBridges is rendered directly from federal source data, no number is typed in by an editor. This page draws directly on federal source data, no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. NBI condition categories reflect the latest reported inventory record, not a live safety, closure, or travel decision.