The kingdom report is much more informative now, but roads are still a black box.  There is no indication in the UI as to what road construction costs or how long it will take.  Furthermore, the NET INCOME figure in the kingdom report does not include ongoing road construction.

Road construction itself is possible to cities that have not yet been discovered (although not all other cities in the game, apparently).  I haven't figured out why some foreign cities are making the list and others aren't since I haven't discovered them yet and don't know anything about them!