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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 […]

Will Asset Recycling Return to America?

In December the new U.S. DOT Advisory Board had its second meeting with DOT Secretary Sean Duffy. One of its recommendations was that the federal government should encourage state and local governments to “recycle” existing revenue-generating infrastructure, with investors entering into long-term brownfield P3 leases and the up-front concession fee being used by the state […]

Will Dulles Airport Makeover Be America’s First Major Airport P3?

Several months ago I received an email from an airport consultant in the U.K. He was preparing a global report on the prospects for whole-airport long-term P3s and wanted my outlook for the United States. I wrote back that no such projects were on the U.S. horizon, and I noted my recent policy paper explaining […]

Reducing Taxpayer Risk in Interstate Tolling

In June 2025, Indiana legislators made history. They agreed to finance the  long-needed reconstruction and modernization of their aging Interstate highways, using a reliable funding source: 21st-century electronic tolling. Rebuilding these vital corridors for personal travel and interstate commerce will be the largest set of public works improvements in Indiana’s history. Each Interstate reconstruction is […]

Starting the Transition to Per‐Mile Charging

Most transportation professionals are persuaded that paying for America’s highways via per-gallon fuel taxes is not sustainable much longer. While the transition to electric vehicles has slowed somewhat, hybrids increasingly contribute to lower fuel-tax revenues, and federal new-car mpg requirements are now the largest factor in projected decreases in gas-tax revenues. Over the past nine […]

Opening the U.S. Market for Airport P3 Leases

P3-focused global companies have long been frustrated that there seems to be no U.S. market for airport privatization. Worldwide, the last three decades have seen numerous large and medium-size airports either sold or P3-leased. Airports Council International (ACI) keeps a database which shows that in Europe 75% of passengers use privatized airports. In Latin America […]

Priorities for 2026 Surface Transportation Reauthorization

As Director of Transportation Policy for Reason Foundation, I’ve been writing this monthly column in Public Works Financing for more than 25 years. For readers who don’t know much about this think tank, you can get some perspective by perusing our website (https://reason.org). We are a nonprofit public policy organization, with a journalism division and […]

Indiana Takes the Lead on Interstate Tolling

Given the advanced age of most of America’s Interstate highways, it was inevitable that one state would eventually volunteer to be the first-mover on toll-financed Interstate reconstruction. Indiana has now stepped forward. Legislation authorizing the state DOT to use toll financing to rebuild all six of the state’s long-distance Interstates passed via a large, bipartisan […]

The Troubling Decline of Users-Pay/Users-Benefit

Some large-scale infrastructure has traditionally been paid for by taxpayers. But since World War II, commercial aviation infrastructure (airports and air traffic control) and highways have been largely paid for via user taxes. Customers (airlines, trucking companies, and motorists) understood that this infrastructure is costly, and they expected to pay for its use. The last […]

Expanding Congested Highways: Revisiting “Induced Demand”

I get tired of major media repeatedly publishing feature articles claiming that it’s futile to add capacity to urban expressways. Yet they keep appearing, not just in niche publications but in major media such as: – “Widening Highways Doesn’t Fix Traffic. So Why Do We Keep Doing It?” New York Times, January 6, 2023 – […]