- P3 surface transportation had a robust 2024
- New report examines the year in transportation finance
- Muddled thinking on fixing the Highway Trust Fund
- New insights on the truck parking shortage
- The role of transit in a changing America
- News Notes
- Quotable Quotes
P3 Surface Transportation Had a Robust 2024
By Baruch Feigenbaum
Reason Foundation recently released the Annual Surface Transportation Infrastructure Report, one of three related transportation publications. Formerly known as the Annual Privatization Report, the new name reflects how the report encompasses a variety of state and federal legislative changes and proposals, global public-private partnerships, and pure privatizations.
Privately-owned roadways in the United States are rare; there are only 22 of them. Most are bridges or highways that lead to bridges. Alabama has four, more than any other state. There are three private bridges connecting Texas and Mexico, built to increase freight movement with one of the country’s top trading partners. Two additional bridges connect the U.S. with Canada, another major trading partner. Other private roads serve small communities or beachside towns. Each of these bridges meets a need that the state could not otherwise afford to build.
In the U.S., public-private partnerships (P3s) are much more common. Reason Foundation defines a public-private partnership as having at least four of the five parts of a full concession: design, build, finance, operate, and maintain (DBFOM). Almost all infrastructure could be defined as some type of public-private partnership.
For example, the Virginia Department of Transportation awards some Interstate repaving design-build contracts to contractor Superior Paving Corp. However, these contracts are for short-term maintenance and do not involve operations or life-cycle maintenance. Design-build-finance or design-build-operate agreements can be considered mini P3s. They help to reduce costs, speed up project delivery, and improve project quality. Since they do not have at least four of the five P3 steps, they are not included in this report.
In 2024, the world’s largest transportation P3 contract was in the United States. The $2.3 billion Calcasieu River Bridge project will rebuild the I-10 bridge in Lake Charles, Louisiana. The revenue risk/toll DBFOM contract is 50 years in length, including the construction time.
The next nine largest projects were located outside the U.S. Highway projects in Turkey and Belgium, as well as a heavy-rail station and track refinancing project in Australia, each valued at more than $1 billion.
While the U.S. had the largest P3 deal for the second year in a row, activity remains most robust in Asia and Europe. In Asia, 23 public-private partnership projects worth $1.9 billion reached financial close. In Europe, 14 P3 projects worth $4.5 billion reached financial close. Latin America had three projects valued at $1.3 billion; Canada had one project worth $2.3 billion, and Oceania had two worth $1.5 billion.
After several U.S. P3 projects were bought out by state or local governments over the past two years, in 2024, the U.S. has 41 surface transportation P3 projects worth at least $0.1 million that have reached financial close. And there are several megaprojects in the pipeline including the SR 400 managed lanes in the northern Atlanta suburbs, the I-24 choice lanes southeast of Nashville, and the I-95/I-495 southside managed lanes south of Washington D.C. While the U.S. lags the per capita P3 investment of countries such as Australia and Colombia, the gap is closing.
One reason P3s remain robust is the doubling of the private activity bond (PAB) cap in the last federal surface transportation reauthorization, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA). Private activity bonds are tax-exempt bonds that help level the playing field with municipal bonds. Without PABs, private investors would have to pay a tax on P3 bond income, which they do not have to pay on municipal bonds.
Given that P3s serve a public purpose, it is important that their bonds are treated the same way as municipal bonds. Twenty-three active public-private partnerships have used private activity bonds. Unfortunately, in 2026, the $30 billion federal PABs cap is expected to be hit again. The next federal surface transportation bill needs to raise the cap to at least $45 billion, or better yet, eliminate it.
The Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA) is another key tool for P3s. Twenty-five of the P3 projects used TIFIA loans. Unfortunately, by expanding TIFIA beyond its core highway and transit mission to transit-oriented development and allowing projects with only one investment-grade rating to receive a TIFIA loan, the Department of Transportation (DOT) risks the economic viability of the program’s loan portfolio. Fortunately, many members of Congress have expressed interest in returning TIFIA to its core focus.
Similarly to 2023, 2024 was not a banner year for state-level P3 legislation. This is not necessarily a bad thing. It reflects the fact that 24 states already have broad P3-enabling laws. Broad enabling legislation allows state DOTs to enter into public-private partnerships with minimal meddling from elected officials. Another 18 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico have restrictive P3 laws. In such jurisdictions, the legislative and executive branches must approve each P3 project. While this is better than the small number of states with no P3 authority, it introduces politics and horse trading into the process, minimizing the technical guidance of the DOT engineering, financial, and legal advisors.
State legislation was in play in 2024 in some states’ second session of the two-year calendar. Four bills to make P3s viable in Illinois failed. One in Rhode Island to authorize P3s failed. On the other side, one bill that clarified how revenue from the Louisiana Belle Chase Bridge can be spent passed, and one bill passed in Georgia that streamlined the public meeting requirements for P3s. Meanwhile, the state of Texas completed its buyout of the SH 288 P3 concession, so the state could add parallel general-purpose lane capacity without needing to reimburse the concessionaire.
New Report Documents 2024 Innovative Transportation Finance
For more than 20 years, I have been researching and writing a report on the previous year’s developments in innovative transportation financing. It’s now known as the Annual Transportation Finance Report, and it was released in late May.
The report’s three main sections cover global infrastructure investment funds, companies, and projects making use of innovative finance, including public-private partnerships (P3s), and public pension fund investments in revenue-generating infrastructure.
It turns out that 2024 was not a record year for infrastructure investment funds. The total they raised in 2024 was $103 billion, well short of a record. However, the Infrastructure Investor 100 largest funds finished with their five-year total exceeding $1 trillion for the second year in a row.
Figures in the report estimate that these funds’ assets under management (AUM) totaled $2.26 trillion and their “dry powder” (funds raised but not yet invested) totaled $376 billion. Readers of this newsletter may be pleased to learn that for the second year in a row, the most popular category of infrastructure for these funds to invest in was transportation, at 64% of all such investment, per IonGroup, publisher of Infralogic.
The section on companies and projects reports that of the world’s 15 largest investor-financed transportation infrastructure projects last year, two were in the United States: the $2.3 billion I-10 Calcasieu River Bridge in Louisiana and the $1.25 billion I-285W and I-20W design-build-finance project in Atlanta. Two of the world’s top-five transportation project developers were French companies (Vinci and Meridiam), with the next two based in Spain (Sacyr and ACS Group). In fifth place was Macquarie, based in Australia. Within the United States, the five leading transportation developers were Meridiam, Ferrovial/Cintra, ACS, Fluor, and John Laing.
Another table in the report tracks U.S. P3 greenfield transportation projects, dating back to 1993 (the 91 Express Lanes in Orange County, CA). The top half of that table has financing details for 22 revenue-risk projects, and there are 17 availability-payment (AP) projects in the table’s lower half. On average, the revenue-risk projects received only 9% of their funding from the relevant (state) government, and got 28% of their construction budget from equity investors. The AP projects, by contrast, got 35% of their budgets from the relevant state/local government and had only 6% equity investment.
One of the most notable findings in this 2024 report is the substantial pipeline of P3 transportation projects, most or all following the design-build-finance-operate-maintain (DBFOM) revenue-risk model. Already in procurement is Georgia DOT’s $4.6 billion SR 400 express toll lanes project in Atlanta, which has selected its preferred bidder (Meridiam/ACS/Acciona). Also underway, with an initial request for proposals expected this summer, is the I-24 Choice Lanes project in Nashville, TN. It is the first of four such projects to be procured over the coming decade. Besides those projects, the U.S. P3 transportation pipeline includes:
- Georgia DOT’s I-285 upper-half express toll lanes—estimated at $10-15 billion
- North Carolina DOT’s I-77 South express toll lanes, estimated at $3.2 billion
- Two potential projects on Virginia DOT’s northern Virginia express lanes network—extending I-495’s ETLs to or across the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, and possibly converting the I-95/395 express lanes to bi-directional from reversible.
- Illinois DOT has legislative OK to add toll-financed express lanes to I-55 in the Chicago suburbs, but this is not yet in their current work plan.
- Louisiana plans a new toll bridge across the Mississippi River at Baton Rouge, which will probably be a DMFOM P3.
- And two still-speculative Florida projects are extensions of the I-4 express toll lanes near Orlando and a possible railroad bridge under the New River in Fort Lauderdale, similar to the Port of Miami Tunnel P3.
This unprecedented project pipeline has led transportation organizations, including AASHTO and ARTBA, to call for a large increase in the current $30 billion federal cap on surface transportation tax-exempt private activity bonds (PABs). U.S. DOT’s Build America Bureau has announced that only $2.4 billion of that $30 billion cap remains available, and transportation groups are calling on Congress to either raise the cap again or to abolish it.
Muddled Thinking on Shoring Up the Highway Trust Fund
I will give members of the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee some credit for finally starting to think about the looming bankruptcy of the federal Highway Trust Fund. The problem began with the 2005 reauthorization bill called SAFETEA-LU, which for the first time projected highway and transit funding well in excess of the user tax revenue it was likely to bring in during the same time period. The shortfall ever since has been covered by general-fund bailouts, now totaling $272 billion according to analysis by Jeff Davis of the Eno Center for Transportation. All of that bailout money is borrowed, contributing to annual federal budget deficits that increase the national debt.
So, in one sense, it’s good news that Transportation & Infrastructure Committee Chair Sam Graves (R-MO) proposed a first-ever federal electric vehicle user fee of $250 per year and a corresponding fee of $100 a year for hybrids. In doing this, Rep. Graves also acknowledged that federal gasoline and diesel taxes are unlikely to remain viable long-term and expressed support for eventually shifting from per-gallon taxes to per-mile fees. Graves’ initial proposal also called for an annual $20 user fee on internal combustion vehicles, but that was quickly dropped.
In defending these proposed annual fees, Graves said, “I’d like to completely eliminate fuel and diesel tax and go to a system that I think is fair—and that’s just a system with registration of our vehicles.”
But a flat annual fee would be grossly unfair to both road-warriors who rack up 30,000 miles a year and retired people who drive 2,500 miles per year. The original concept of fuel taxes is that they charge based on how much roadways people use each year, just like electric bills, water bills, and other utility bills. Since highway user fees/taxes pay for the capital and operating costs of our roadways, they must be proportional to both the amount of driving and the weight of the vehicles. Fortunately, I believe Graves simply misspoke on this, and I think he genuinely favors per-mile road user charges, as he has said on a number of occasions.
But now let’s look at the electric vehicle/hybrid fees included in the House plan. How much would they address the looming Trust Fund shortfall, and would they be fair to electric vehicle (EV) and hybrid drivers?
Consumer Reports estimated that an average new internal combustion vehicle getting 28 mpg and driving 11,000 miles per year would pay $73 per year in federal fuel taxes. The $250 a year EV fee is 3.4 times that amount. To be sure, the average EV is heavier than a conventional vehicle of the same dimensions, but if it’s 20% heavier, a more realistic EV fee would be about $88, not $250. The hybrid fee at $100/year is also too high.
Even at their far-too-high levels, these new fees would not do very much to address the Highway Trust Fund shortfall. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that those new fees would yield $85.7 billion over 10 years, but their net effect, CBO says, would be $64.3 billion. Eno’s Jeff Davis estimates that the Trust Fund would still be short $199 billion by the end of 10 years. So basically, even at their far-too-high levels, those EV/hybrid fees would do little to restore the Trust Fund to solvency.
The only honest way to do this—to stop increasing each year’s budget deficit and with it the national debt—would be to either (a) massively increase the current (mostly fuel) highway user taxes or (b) slash the amount of federal highway and transit spending to match the user-tax revenue. At the very least, this would mean forgetting about reauthorizing surface transportation at the historically very high funding level from the bipartisan infrastructure law (IIJA). While state DOTs and highway builders are counting on IIJA-level funding being the baseline in 2026, not doing that could be a down payment toward restoring solvency to the Highway Trust Fund.
The late Herb Stein, once chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, is famous for introducing Stein’s Law: “If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.” Free (borrowed) federal money cannot go on forever, so it will stop. The time to start preparing for this is now.
Some New Insights On the Truck Parking Shortage
Most of those interested in or involved with interstate trucking are aware that, in addition to driver retention, another ongoing problem is insufficient safe truck parking. This shortage primarily affects long-haul trucking—big rigs with sleeper cabs. My long-standing impression has been that trucking industry ally NATSO (National Association of Truck Stop Operators) tends to think of itself as the legitimate provider of overnight services for long-haul truckers. It has fiercely defended the long-standing ban on commercial services being offered at rest areas on Interstate highways, which makes them dreary alternatives to its members’ full-service truck stops.
A new report from trucking industry research organization ATRI takes a refreshingly broader view of the truck parking shortage. Its new report is “Expanding Truck Parking at Public Rest Areas,” by Andrew Fain and Dan Murray, April 2025. Conducted in partnership with state DOT organization AASHTO, it acknowledges the role played by state-owned rest areas and looks cautiously into the potential of expanding their role.
To begin with, we learn that public rest areas provide only 13% of truck parking spaces—only 40,000 out of 313,000, the large majority of them at commercial truck stops. The report looks into state DOT progress in implementing truck parking information systems, state plans to provide truck parking during emergencies (e.g., at weigh stations and other locations), and at the potential for “repurposing state-owned facilities for truck parking.”
The data collected in the study shows wide variations among states and regions in the number of public truck parking spaces and in the amount of truck parking spaces per 100 miles on the National Highway System. (The West and Southwest score worst on that measure.) Another measure provided for all states is the ratio of public to private (truck stop) parking spaces, which the report benchmarks against a 1 to 4 ratio. Using that metric, it targets states that fall well short of that in public spaces as “expansion opportunity states”: among these are Colorado, Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana. The study also finds that over the past 10 years, 26% of states have sought to acquire land for additional truck parking. A more optimistic finding is that 64% of states have looked into expanding truck parking at existing facilities. Funding for truck parking real estate has been difficult for state DOTs, but the report identifies 13 federal grants awarded for such purposes, under several discretionary grant programs.
As you may know, the only thing anyone can buy at an Interstate highway rest area is what’s available in vending machines. Refueling or recharging is forbidden as a commercial service under a federal law that is routinely defended by NATSO. Truck drivers would obviously appreciate showers (not just toilets) and actual food and drink (and somewhere to sit down and consume it). The report tiptoes into this formerly off-limits territory with a three-page Appendix A, “You Can’t Buy That Here.” It explains the origin of the federal ban (to protect service stations and fast-food operators at Interstate off-ramps) from—think of it—competition. It summarizes a 2024 attempt in Congress to permit electric vehicle charging at rest areas, which was defeated by NATSO and its ally, the National Association of Convenience Stores. I take this Appendix as a welcome departure from the trucking industry’s historic alliance with NATSO on this subject.
When I compare Interstate rest areas with the service plazas on American toll roads, the differences are stunning. Truckers and motorists alike have both gas stations and EV charging, clean, modern restrooms, multiple fast-food choices, and safe, lighted overnight parking. These services are all provided by commercial firms, typically under long-term public-private partnerships, which finance the construction, and (in conjunction with the state DOT or toll agency), contract with brand-name commercial service providers. This model could be adapted to develop commercial truck stops on Interstates, with the P3 developer financing the land acquisition and construction, and negotiating an operating agreement with a reputable truck stop company.
ATRI has not suggested anything like this, but perhaps they have opened a door for thinking about such things. If anyone is interested in trying this out on the Florida Turnpike, on my latest trip, I noticed two large parcels between Orlando and West Palm Beach that have similar dimensions to the Turnpike’s existing service plazas. I have no idea what the Turnpike plans to do with them, but one might serve as a test case for a truck-stop-on-turnpike pilot project.
The Role of Transit in a Changing America
Reason Foundation last month released the third in a series of three research papers by Prof. Steven Polzin of Arizona State University. All three focused on transportation and climate change. This third report deals with urban mobility in a climate-sensitive post-COVID world.
Last month’s article covered Polzin’s assessment of the greenhouse gas (GHG) impact of all transportation modes, which included some surprising results for urban bus systems (not GHG-friendly) and commuter rail systems (generally GHG-friendly). Those findings were based on historical, pre-COVID data. The new report looks at urban transit’s potential future in a changed post-COVID environment. It’s hard to summarize 56 pages backed up by many tables and figures, but here are a few highlights.
For example, a whole array of new technologies is already changing the ways people do and don’t travel. Working from home has permanently changed commuting. New modes such as e-bikes and e-scooters have provided alternatives to driving and transit for some trips. Vehicle automation, not yet perfected but making serious progress, could lead to smaller transit vehicles offering something closer to door-to-door service, thanks to not having to pay for a driver. Ordering things online continues to reduce trips to the mall. And service businesses for residents (lawn service, pool service, bug services in Florida), etc., also substitute for some categories of shopping trips. One result of these and other changes shows up in data from the American Time Use Survey. It found that daily person trips declined from 4.44 in 2003 to 3.04 in 2022—a very significant change.
The pandemic, along with very high housing costs in central cities, has led to relocations to suburbs and exurbs, which also spells trouble for traditional transit service, which has focused on bringing commuters from suburbs to central business districts. Polzin discusses the changing value of downtown density, historically responsible for urban agglomeration benefits (increased productivity due to better matching of job skills with employer needs).
Polzin draws on these and other changes to assess the role of U.S. public transportation moving forward. While he’s confident that transit will continue to provide vital transportation for those unable to afford a car or other means of personal mobility, he suggests that “Traditional public transit is at a unique point in its history with perhaps the greatest gap between empirical reality and the aspirations and expectations of industry stakeholders.” He notes increased auto-availability thanks to ride-hailing companies (which, contrary to transit-industry hopes, did less in bringing riders to transit stations and more to shift riders away from transit). He notes changes in age distribution, with a large increase in people over 65 (low transit use) and a slight decline in people aged 15 to 29, who are more often transit riders. His Table 3 shows declines in transit ridership in all nine of the country’s largest metro areas between 2019 and 2022, ranging from 17% (Miami) to 54% (Dallas/Ft. Worth)—and even a 25% decline in New York, the country’s largest transit market. Among his conclusions is, “Aspirations that more funding for public transportation or that more-aggressive transportation and land-use coordination will meaningfully impact future transit utilization lacks empirical evidence that such initiatives can produce in a time frame or at a scale that is meaningful in the aggregate.”
Polzin’s assessment will, I hope, spur others to grapple with these questions about the future role of transportation in U.S. urban areas. My Reason Foundation colleague, Baruch Feigenbaum, has written such a book, tentatively titled “Reinventing Transit for the 21st Century.” It examines how urban transit (rail and bus) systems can be reimagined to provide better service at lower costs. After detailing the challenges facing transit systems, such as crime/perception of crime, increasing costs, and declining ridership, it reviews examples of recent changes, such as redesigning their networks, offering more consistent service, and shifting from transit-choice to transit-dependent riders. Looking further ahead, it suggests a future in which fixed-route and on-demand transit would be integrated, and private providers would provide seamless mobility in urban regions. The book is expected to be published in 2026.
And a final word for those who may think Polzin is “anti-transit.” His distinguished career began at transit agencies in Chicago, Cleveland, and Dallas. He went from that experience to academia, first at the University of South Florida, where he was Director of Mobility Policy Research at its Center for Urban Transportation Research. While there, he served on the boards of the Hillsborough County Transit Authority and the county’s metropolitan planning organization (MPO). He later served as Senior Advisor for Research & Technology in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Research & Technology at U.S DOT. He holds bachelor’s, master’s, and PhD degrees in civil engineering from the University of Wisconsin (BSCE) and Northwestern University (MSCE and PhD).
Alabama’s Mobile River Bridge Gets Federal Funding
The long-stalled project to build a new bridge and causeway across the Mobile River has won a $550 million grant toward its now-estimated cost of $3.7 billion. Originally planned as a toll-financed public-private partnership project at an estimated cost of $2.1 billion, ALDOT’s original tolled P3 plan was cancelled by ALDOT in 2019, after it was voted down by the MPOs on both sides of the river, due to the proposed toll rates being too high. But soaring construction cost inflation in recent years has greatly increased the construction cost. ALDOT has applied for a federal TIFIA loan, but even if it were for half the project cost ($1.85 billion), the project would still need toll financing and some amount of state highway investment to cover the missing $1.3 billion.
Tolls the Only Option for NC Cape Fear Bridge Replacement?
The aging Cape Fear Memorial Bridge in Wilmington, NC, needs replacement, at an estimated cost of $1.1 billion. While NCDOT is seeking federal grant funding, its own analysis found the project does not rank high enough to be included in the State Transportation Improvement Program. NCDOT’s Trevor Carroll told local officials last month that, “Right now, NCDOT cannot produce this project without a toll or an alternate funding source.” While officials on the Wilmington side of the bridge seem open to a toll, those on the Leland side seem strongly opposed. Meanwhile, the Army Corps of Engineers has announced that the lowest-cost option will not be permitted, because it would not meet the agency’s requirement for 135 ft. of vertical clearance for ships passing under the bridge.
Inglewood Light Rail Project Replaced with a Busway
As noted here last month, political support has disappeared for a $2.2 billion, 1.6-mile light rail line to serve a new sports and entertainment center in Inglewood, CA (near Los Angeles International Airport). But the planned P3 project will now proceed to develop an “event-activated” exclusive bus lane. The P3 will still be developed by Elevate Inglewood Partners, led by Plenary Americas. One goal is to have the project up and running in time for the 2028 Olympics to be held in Los Angeles.
Congestion-Priced Toll Road Will Serve Seattle Airport
Washington State DOT in October will open a new SR 509 expressway, giving Sea-Tac users coming from the Puget Sound region south of the airport a short-cut from congested I-5, their current route. But in what may be a U.S. first, the toll rates will vary by time of day and direction. The peak rate of $2.40 will apply only to peak-time/peak-direction trips on the new tollway.
Flix Train Ordering 65 High-Speed Trains for European Routes
Passenger rail has been deregulated within the European Union, ending the long-standing monopoly of state-owned systems such as Deutsche Bahn and SNCF. German passenger rail company Flix Train (a subsidiary of global travel company Flix SE) on May 27 announced orders for 65 high-speed trains from manufacturers Talgo and Siemens, in a deal valued at €2.4 billion. Flix Train is based in Germany, but it serves some 50 European cities thus far. FlixBus, a sister company, has 300 stops in Germany alone.
Amtrak Board Considers Profit by 2028
Politico reported (May 21) that Amtrak’s board was planning to adopt a plan that would project a profit by 2028. They did not, of course, mean a real profit, which covers capital costs and depreciation as well as operating costs. The article referred to “operating profits” on the Northeast Corridor, compared with operating losses on most or all of its other routes, none of which are apparently being considered for termination. Instead, the board will double down on the NE Corridor, increasing its Acela trains from 20 to 28, and passenger capacity by even more, since the newest Acela cars have 25% more passenger capacity. Amtrak still has an enormous backlog of “deferred maintenance” which does not appear to be a factor in this plan.
Oregon-Washington I-5 Bridge Will Be Later and Cost Even More
The two states plan to seek $1.9 billion in state and federal funds to support the ever-expanding cost of replacing the aging and obsolete I-5 bridges across the Columbia River linking Portland with Vancouver, WA. Back in 2023, the cost estimate was $5 to $7.5 billion, with the larger number due to Oregon’s insistence on including a light rail line rather than a set of express-toll/bus lanes. The previous plan called for starting tolling on the existing bridges in 2026, rather than waiting until the new bridges are in place. Due to projected delays in design and construction, the early toll collection will now be postponed to 2027, further straining the project’s financing plan. Washington State will be responsible for issuing $2.5 billion in general obligation bonds backed by the taxpayers of both states. Revenue to service the bonds will come from tolls, fuel taxes, and vehicle fees, but backed up by the “full faith and credit of the state,” i.e. general taxpayers.
Supreme Court Unanimously Cuts Back Environmental Reviews
The U.S. Supreme Court, ruling in favor of a Utah short-line railroad project, narrowed the scope of environmental impacts that could be considered in Environmental Impact Statements. It rejected the need to include distant upstream or downstream impacts, rather than the direct impacts of the project itself. In the case of this railroad, that meant potential increases in oil use in other states far from Utah were judged not within the scope of what the National Environmental Policy Act requires. The ruling reverses a policy introduced by the Biden administration. The decision was by a vote of 8-0, since Justice Gorsuch recused himself from the case.
Maryland May Face Lawsuits Over Bridge Collision
The Washington Post reported last month that the state of Maryland could face lawsuits for negligence and wrongful death related to the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge last year. This prospect relates to the NTSB’s finding that Maryland failed to conduct the risk analysis required for such bridges. National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy said that state officials “could have known and should have known” that the bridge was at risk of collapse in the event of a ship collision. State officials also ignored repeated warnings from the Baltimore Harbor Safety and Coordination Committee about the lack of meaningful protection of the bridge piers.
Louisiana Senators Back Port Toll Road
With a new $2 billion port terminal planned in St. Bernard Parish (south of New Orleans and open to very large container ships), a state senate committee late last month approved plans for a $600 million toll road to connect the new port to the Interstate highway system. The objective is to keep heavy trucks off local roads and to provide an additional evacuation route during hurricanes. The new toll road is planned as a P3, but whether it would be toll-financed remains to be seen. The project would also have to be approved by the state legislature’s transportation committees.
Virginia DOT Releases I-495 Missing Link Plan
On June 2, VDOT unveiled its proposed approach for the last segment of its express toll lanes on the I-495 beltway: two express toll lanes each way along the 11-mile corridor, including across the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, using existing capacity set aside for future use. The plan also envisions a new express bus service on the new express lanes. Four public hearings are scheduled to take place this month, as part of the Environmental Assessment of the project.
Louisiana Mississippi River Bridge Update
On June 3, the Louisiana Department of Transportation & Development announced that by fourth-quarter 2025 its preferred design for the planned crossing of the Mississippi River just south of Baton Rouge will be released. The purpose of the bridge is to relieve traffic congestion in the Baton Rouge metro area, including on the existing I-10 bridge. As of now, the projected cost is between $1.5 and $2.5 billion. It has long been planned as a toll bridge and has been referred to as a likely candidate for P3 procurement, as has been used for two prior Louisiana bridge projects.
Making Vehicle Controls More User-Friendly
A recent Wall Street Journal article was headlined, “The Latest Car Technology Is Starting to Drive People Nuts.” High-tech door handles and over-use of touch screens were among the features many drivers resent. Surveys of new car buyers by Strategic Vision found a decrease in drivers’ positive response to vehicle technology, slipping from 79% in 2015 to 56% in 2024. (Personally, I would not buy a car in which touch screens replaced dials and buttons, due to the visual distraction involved.) Volkswagen has gotten the message. In March 2025, it announced that all future VW models will feature physical controls for the most important functions. The Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) should take note.
Maryland Considering a Freight Rail P3
The state government acquired a failing 92-mile short-line freight railroad in 1978. Because it has at least 15 customers, the Maryland DOT would like to keep it in operation but turn over its operations and maintenance to a private contractor. Unfortunately, more than half the trackage is only Class 1, which limits speed to 10 mph. Upgrading the track could permit higher speeds. According to Public Works Financing’s April article, the state was hoping to issue an RFP in June to four short-listed companies and select a winner before year-end (when the current operations contract expires).
“NEPA has transformed from a modest procedural requirement into a blunt and haphazard tool employed by project opponents (who may not always be entirely motivated by concern for the environment) to try to stop or at least slow down new infrastructure projects,” wrote [Justice] Kavanaugh. “All of that has led to more agency analysis of separate projects, more consideration of attenuated effects, more exploration of alternatives to proposed agency action, more speculation and consultation and estimation and litigation.” Projects that receive the necessary permits to start “often end up costing much more than is anticipated or necessary, both for the agency preparing the EIS and for the builder of the project,” he added, “And that in turn means fewer and more expensive railroads, airports, wind turbines, transmission lines, dams, housing developments, highways, bridges, subways, stadiums arenas, data centers, and the like.”
—Jeff Luse, “Supreme Court Unanimously Agrees to Curb Environmental Red Tape That Slows Down Construction Projects,” Reason.com, May 29, 2025
“It dawned on very few at the time, but the economic situation in late 2021, when the IIJA passed into law, was the exact opposite of those ideal conditions for a big Keynesian infrastructure push. . . . In February, Foreign Affairs published an article from Harvard economist Jason Furman . . . one of whose specific points was particularly biting: real infrastructure investment in the highway sector was down since the IIJA passed into law. . . . DOT’s National Highway Construction Cost Index does not yield promising results for the first few years of IIJA. Highway inflation appears to move nearly in lock step with nominal spending, while real investment has declined. . . . The IIJA was clearly investing at the top of the market, and construction cost inflation either greatly diminished or completely overwhelmed the federal investment so far.”
—Michael Bennon, “Lessons from the IIJA: Inflation and Federal Infrastructure Legislation,” Public Works Financing, Feb. 2025
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