The 2026 National Freight Strategic Plan raises the bar for freight planning across the United States

Alisa Fine

July 22, 2026

The 2026 National Freight Strategic Plan (NFSP) evolves freight planning from a modally focused framework to a broader view of freight system performance and outcomes.

The NFSP, updated every five years, provides the long-term federal framework for freight policy, investment, and collaboration across the U.S. freight system.

The 2026 plan builds on the first NFSP, released in 2020. As compared to the 2020 NFSP, the 2026 NFSP:

Elevates resilience, innovation, and workforce capability alongside other freight priorities.
Increasingly emphasizes how freight investments should deliver system-wide benefits, not simply improve individual facilities or corridors.
Highlights the need for data-driven, risk-based planning that considers impacts from disruptions.
Emphasizes cross-sector coordination and partnerships to identify and validate freight system needs and opportunities.

Why does this matter to states?

State freight plans must be updated every four years and demonstrate alignment with federal freight policy goals. These plans are intended to document a comprehensive and coordinated approach to freight planning and investment. Aligning with the policy framework presented in the 2026 NFSP can help states meet statutory requirements while positioning projects more competitively for federal freight funding.

Better freight solutions. Better lives.

The 2026 NFSP reflects what CPCS has long believed:

Infrastructure succeeds when it makes communities safer and more resilient, helps businesses access markets, reduces costs for consumers, strengthens supply chains, and improves economic opportunity.

The ultimate measure of a freight system is not how much is moved, but how effectively it improves safety, economic opportunity, resilience, and quality of life.

Freight planning is becoming more integrated, data-driven, and outcome-focused

The 2026 NFSP doesn’t introduce new planning requirements, but it does signal an evolution in freight planning approaches. Rather than serving as static compliance documents, state freight plans are increasingly expected to take an integrated, systems-based perspective. The 2026 NFSP calls on states to examine, as part of their freight planning activities, how freight networks and supply chains perform under changing conditions, where vulnerabilities exist, and how investments can improve overall system outcomes. The 2026 NFSP also emphasizes the importance of cross-sector collaboration through forums like freight advisory committees, to align strategies, priorities, and investments.

Four ways CPCS believes freight planners should respond

1. Embed safety, emergency preparedness, resilience, and security into core analysis.

The 2026 NFSP emphasizes a risk-informed decision-making approach that anticipates disruptions, protects critical assets, and ensures continuity of operations across the freight network.

For states, this means considering strategies to incorporate risk-based prioritization, scenario testing, infrastructure redundance, and physical and cyber security into freight plans.

2. Prioritize hubs, gateways, bottlenecks, and choke points where reliability gains deliver system-wide economic benefits.

Freight flows are concentrated at or along key hubs, gateways, and corridors, where disruptions have heightened potential for cascading effects. The 2026 NFSP indicates that targeted improvements at these key areas can help reduce delays, improve supply chain efficiencies, and mitigate economic risks.

For states, this means incorporating reliability strategies into statewide freight plans and using data-driven tools to target investments to the highest impact areas.

3. Prepare for freight innovation, technology adoption, and workforce readiness.

The 2026 NFSP highlights the growing role of digitalization, automation, and other technologies in shaping the future of freight operations and infrastructure. It also emphasizes the critical importance of freight workforce capacity building and upskilling in effective freight system performance.

For states, this means addressing workforce development and training needs; coordinating with partners to align priorities, data, and strategies; and experimenting with innovative data analysis techniques.

4. Adopt a coordinated, system approach that highlights the critical role of supply chains.

The 2026 NFSP recognizes the essential role of supply chains and emphasizes end-to-end supply chain performance, as well as stronger coordination across modes, jurisdictions, and public- and private-sector partners to improve supply chain reliability and integration with the overall freight network.

For states, this means expanding collaboration, particularly with the private sector, to enhance information-sharing around system needs and opportunities, while prioritizing investments for strategically important freight corridors and gateways that support critical supply chains.

Freight plans don’t move freight. Decisions do.

The 2026 NFSP challenges transportation agencies to think beyond individual projects and consider how freight systems perform as interconnected networks that support economic prosperity and quality of life.

The plan places particular importance on advancing data and analytical tools to better understand freight system performance and support proactive decision-making. It points to opportunities to strengthen the use of real-time, multimodal data and expand coordination to enhance supply chain visibility and freight system responsiveness.

Is freight planning ready for an evolving and uncertain future? For transportation agencies answering this question, the task is to translate federal direction into practical investment decisions, clear priorities, and measurable outcomes.

That’s where CPCS helps clients move from policy to implementation.

About CPCS

CPCS helps transportation agencies and public-sector organizations navigate complex freight challenges. We translate policy into practice through actionable strategies, data-driven tools, and implementation-ready solutions that deliver measurable outcomes.

Across the U.S., our freight planning work spans policy analysis, investment prioritization, stakeholder engagement, and implementation support. For example, with deep expertise in data analytics and system-level analysis, CPCS can help agencies integrate diverse data sources, develop decision-support tools, and translate insights into high-impact policy strategies.

Alisa Fine is a principal consultant at CPCS. She helps plan for and develop safe, efficient, resilient, and inclusive multimodal freight systems. Before joining CPCS, she worked at the U.S. DOT Volpe Center as a Community Planner, where she supported federal agencies and other public sector clients to manage multimodal freight transportation programs and initiatives.

CPCS: Better infrastructure solutions. Better lives.