By Kevin Tibbles, NBC News correspondent

Even though I am writing this from Chicago, I bet there are a lot of you out there who can feel the pain....

There is construction virtually EVERYWHERE. The 'City of Big Shoulders' is being renamed the 'City of Big Boulders' as work crews scramble to clean up fallen chunks of concrete and fill up Buick-eating potholes.

Americans drive an average of 3 trillion miles each year, on a road system that is beginning to show its age. It causes delays, boosts stress levels and makes getting behind the wheel anything but pleasant.

"You know", says Transportation Secretary Mary Peters, "A lot of the roads in our nation today are like some of us...they are about half a century old!".

That's a mid-life crisis we can all do without.

That combination of heavy traffic and heavy wear and tear is being blamed for everything from flat tires to more accidents to increased air pollution.

Of America's 600 thousand bridges, some 70 thousand of them are considered "deficient'. And, while a suspected design flaw is being looked into as the cause of that deadly bridge collapse in Minneapolis last August, the bridge had been inspected just a few months prior.

Some might go so far as to say our infrastructure is falling apart'. I'll have that report tonight on Nightly News with Brian Williams, that is if I'm not stuck in traffic.