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Shortlist Already for Penn Station Redevelopment

When the Trump Administration took over delivery of the Penn Station redevelopment project last April, it promised to move forward with a procurement quickly for the long-delayed megaproject. It appears to be doing just that. Amtrak has already shortlisted three potential master developer teams and started the RFP process. Amtrak executive Andy Byford, who is […]

P3 Considered for American Legion Bridge, Again

A productive meeting between U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Maryland Governor Wes Moore in January yielded an interesting, though certainly not novel, idea: a P3 to deliver the reconstruction of the American Legion Bridge. The joint statement released after the meeting reads, in part: “Specifically for the American Legion bridge, we agreed about the […]

GDOT Completes NEPA for I‐285 Top End

In January, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) published a Notice of Final Agency Action in the federal register for the environmental study of the I-285 Top End Project. The notice marks the end of environmental permitting for the project under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). The Georgia Department of Transportation (GDOT) published a Record […]

An Integrated Framework to Improve Public Involvement in Public-Private Partnerships

Original study by Eric J. Boyer, Can Chen and John Clayton Thomas Public-private partnerships (PPPs) are widely used for major transportation infrastructure projects because they offer a mechanism for governments to build large projects with private financing and long-term private involvement. Yet many PPPs have faced intense public criticism, controversy, and even cancellation. Insufficient information […]

Transport Finance in 2026: High‐Speed Trouble, Express Lanes Rush

2026 will be the last year of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA). It was a historic law, and there will be a big debate over its inevitable post-mortem. That debate, and the negotiations over the surface transportation legislation to follow (see Poole, this edition), are two topics that Public Works Financing will be […]

Key Commercial Considerations for Agencies Planning Express Lane P3s

Priced managed lanes are having their moment. For decades after their mid-20th-century conception, only a handful of projects reached operation, and most were regarded as risky bets. They were difficult to forecast, dependent on government subsidies, and met with skepticism from both investors and the public. Over the past fifteen years, the narrative has shifted. […]

Shifting Gears on Federal Infrastructure Funding

The landmark Infrastructure Investment & Jobs Act (IIJA) has provided huge increases in federal funding for transportation infrastructure over the past four years. As we approach the last year of IIJA funding, coalitions have formed to enact something similar in the forthcoming surface transportation reauthorization (2026) and FAA reauthorization (2028-29). The first of these groups […]

Transportation Advisory Board Recommends New Federal P3 Office

The Department of Transportation Advisory Board introduced a set of draft recommendations at its second meeting with Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy in December. The very first idea raised was to create a new federal P3 task force or office to help state and local projects sponsors push projects forward and navigate federal development processes and […]

Pennsylvania Express Lanes in Unsolicited Proposal Cohort

Every six months, Pennsylvania’s P3 program opens a 30-day unsolicited proposal window for the private sector. In December, the state’s P3 Office reported to its board that it was considering four different unsolicited P3 proposals under the program, including a new express lanes project, a bundled bridge replacement project, an interchange project, and a defect […]

Bridging Politics and Projects: How Political Affinity and Government Support Affect Delays in Public-Private Partnership Initiation

Original study by Jorge Fleta-Asína, Alfredo Jiménez and Fernando Muñozc This paper aims to fill a significant gap in the literature by examining how institutional factors such as political affinity (diplomacy) and government support affect delays in project initiation in developing countries.  It focuses on PPPs that are financed by cross-border investment. The paper argues […]