Public-Private Partnerships for Transportation: Infrastructure Development in the United States

A vast network of Interstate highways, state roads, local streets, bridges, overpasses, and tunnels forms the backbone of the US surface transportation system. The system includes 46,000 miles of Interstate highways, which, along with roughly 117,000 miles of major roads, forms the National Highway System. In 2013, the US road system supported almost 3 trillion truck and car miles traveled, making it one of the nation’s most valuable public assets (US Department of Transportation 2013). That valuable network is, however, dogged by an array of persistent problems. The problems include both the demand- and supply-side dimensions of the system. They are sufficiently severe to warrant a new approach to the funding, financing, operation, and maintenance of America’s extensive road transportation system. A key demand-side system problem is high and rising traffic congestion. US traffic congestion wasted almost 3 billion gallons of fuel in 2011 while generating roughly 56 billion pounds of additional carbon dioxide emissions, or about 380 pounds per auto commuter (Schrank, Eisele, and Lomax 2012). The overall financial cost of traffic congestion was $121 billion, or about $818 per US commuter in that year (Schrank, Eisele, and Lomax 2012). The costs of congestion are growing rapidly. For example, annual hours of delay per peak-time traveler increased 136 percent between 1982 and 2009 in the country’s 14 largest urban areas.