Archives

Modal Angst on the D.C. Beltway

The U.S. Department of Transportation pushed a number of new P3 initiatives forward in April. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, in a quarterly meeting with the USDOT Advisory Board, threw his support behind the idea of a “P3 task force,” or a new P3 office within the Department to help shepherd projects through planning and procurement. […]

Groundbreaking for SR‐400 in Atlanta

The largest public-private partnership (P3) in U.S. history finally broke ground in April. On April 22, the Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) held a groundbreaking for the SR-400 Express Lanes project, which will develop barrier-separated express lanes along SR-400 north of Atlanta. The project promises to transform regional mobility in one of the most congested […]

A Managed Lanes Data Gold Mine

For anyone interested in details about managed lanes financed by revenue bonds, the annual review of this topic by Fitch Ratings is a uniquely valuable resource. I’ve been relying on it for years, and I’m especially impressed by its 2026 edition, released on March 30th and titled, “U.S. Managed Lanes Poised for Growth.” In addition […]

Calcasieu River Bridge Replacement Starts Major Construction

The long-awaited Calcasieu Bridge Replacement Project held a ceremonial groundbreaking in April. Now Louisiana’s Department of Transportation & Development (DOTD) and its concessionaire for the public-private partnership (P3) will finally commence major construction on a bridge replacement that has been a generation in the making. The project has years of construction ahead, but just getting […]

Brightline West Gets Investment Deadline Extension, East Raises Liquidity Warning

Brightline West, the private company building and aiming to complete financing for a high-speed rail line between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, secured a key extension from bondholders to give it more time to raise an additional equity investment in the project. Yet the firm’s sister company, Brightline Florida, which operates a high-speed rail network […]

Comparing Public-Private Partnership with Traditional Delivery of Transportation Projects: A Duration Analysis

Original study by Kunqi Zhang, R. Richard Geddes and Qingbin Cui This paper examines the proposition that public-private partnerships, or P3s, are a tool for accelerating project delivery.  The authors assert that “no researchers have compared durations of procurement and implementation processes for comparable-sized transportation projects between P3 and traditional delivery methods, perhaps because of […]

What Canada’s New Strong Fund Could Mean for its P3 Industry

The Canadian government has announced that it is creating a massive new sovereign development fund, called the Canada Strong Fund, to invest in national infrastructure projects. If it is implemented in full, it could significantly alter the infrastructure investment industry in the country. However, details remain, for the time being, forthcoming. The announcement from the […]

Why Value‐for‐Money is Still a One‐Sided Burden

It has been a long time coming, but American public sponsors finally have official guidance on completing Value-for-Money (VfM) analysis. VfM as a concept long predates the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) in federal law, but the IIJA made significant changes, culminating in last month’s final VfM guidance from the Build America Bureau (BAB). […]

Express Lane Series #2: Key Planning Considerations for Agencies Developing Express Lane P3s

Priced managed lanes (PMLs) are increasingly delivered through public-private partnerships, and the commercial, planning, and long-term decisions needed to deliver them well are the subject of this three-part series. Our first paper examined the commercial decisions at the heart of every PML P3: toll policy, discount structures, and toll services agreements. We argued that good […]

The Future of the Highway Trust Fund

One of the most important transportation policy reports I’ve ever read is the recently-released “Last Exit: Options for Fixing the Highway Trust Fund While Solvency is Still Solvable.” It was researched and written by Jeff Davis and Rebecca Higgins, highly respected transportation analysts at the Eno Center for Transportation. (https://enotrans.org/the-last-exit) As the authors document, the […]