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Rethinking Transportation Equity

No one who’s been paying attention to transportation policy over the past decade could miss the increasing focus on “equity.” The U.S. DOT is building on President Biden’s Executive Order 13985, “Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal Government” with an effort to include equity considerations in all its programs. Sessions […]

The Benefits and Costs of Interstate Highwway Reconstruction

Highway construction is getting short shrift from the Biden Administration. While the Infrastructure Investment & Jobs Act (IIJA) increased formula highway funding, the Federal Highway Administration has tried to discourage state DOTs from using their increased funding to add capacity, even where this would mean replacing a four-lane bottleneck bridge on a six-lane highway with […]

The Return of Revenue-Risk Transportation P3s

Ten years ago many people in the U.S. P3 infrastructure world believed that the relatively new availability-payment model was the wave of the future. It proved successful on two Florida P3 megaprojects—the Port of Miami Tunnel and the reconstruction and widening of I-595 in Fort Lauderdale. It was seen as more attractive to bidders since […]

Infrastructure Needs Major Environmental Reform

I was guardedly optimistic when Sen. Joe Manchin (D, WV) introduced what was portrayed as a measure to streamline environmental review of major infrastructure projects. Manchin had previously voted with all 50 Senate Republicans to overturn a Biden administration action that scrapped modest 2020 Trump administration enviroSnmental streamlining, but that measure died in the House. […]

Threats to Express Toll Lanes

One of the greatest transportation policy success stories is express toll lanes. Since the world’s first variably priced express lane project opened on SR 91 in Orange County, California in December 1995, similar projects have spread to nearly all the largest U.S. urban areas apart from the Northeast. FHWA data shows more than 60 ETL […]

Dealing with Opposition to New Tolls

Modernization of America’s major highways and bridges is facing a serious problem. In a nutshell, highway users don’t want to pay what it costs to rebuild or replace these aging pieces of critical infrastructure. And this poses a significant threat to the ability to use long-term DBFOM P3s for these megaprojects. Two recent examples are […]

The Potential of Pension Funds to Expand US P3s

Reason Foundation’s 2022 report on P3 investment in transportation infrastructure had both good news and bad news for the U.S. P3 industry. The good news is two-fold. In 2021 global infrastructure investment funds raised a record total of $136 billion. And worldwide, the largest category of their infrastructure investment (at 58%) was transportation.

Road User Charges and Long-Term Highway P3s

What if there were a way to jump-start states to embrace long-term DBFOM revenue-risk P3s for rebuilding and modernizing major highways? I suggested such an opportunity earlier this month at the International Bridge, Tunnel & Turnpike Association’s Road User Charge and Transportation Finance conference.

In Defense of Value for Money Analysis

As previously reported in Public Works Financing and elsewhere, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (aka IIJA) requires Value for Money (VfM) analysis (“or other comparable analysis”) in two circumstances: for federally-aided projects costing $500 million or more proposed as P3s, and for all projects costing $750 or more that plan to seek TIFIA or RRIF credit […]

Is It Time for Major Reform of NEPA?

With all the recent focus on infrastructure, the past year has seen numerous articles in major media, along the lines of last year’s Vox article, “Why Does It Cost So Much to Build Things in America?” The better-researched articles, including that one, focused attention on environmental litigation.