Highway public-private partnerships have the potential to provide numerous benefits to the public sector. There are also potential costs and trade-offs. Highway public-private partnerships created to date have resulted in advantages from the perspective of state and local governments, such as the construction of new infrastructure without using public funding and obtaining funds by extracting value from existing facilities for reinvestment in transportation and other public programs. For example, the state of Indiana received $3.8 billion from leasing the Indiana Toll Road and used those proceeds to fund a 10-year statewide transportation plan. As we reported in 2004, by relying on private-sector sponsorship and investment to build roads rather than financing the construction themselves, states (1) conserve funding from their highway capital improvement programs for other projects, (2) avoid the up-front costs of borrowing needed to bridge the gap until toll collections became sufficient to pay for the cost of building the roads and paying the interest on the borrowed funds, and (3) avoid the legislative or administrative limits that govern the amount of outstanding debt these states are allowed to have. All of these results are advantages for the states. Highway public-private partnerships potentially provide other benefits, including the transfer or sharing of project risks to the private sector. Such risks include those associated with construction costs and schedules and having sufficient levels of traffic and revenues to be financially viable. Various government officials told us that because the private sector more reliably analyzes its costs, revenues, and risks throughout the life cycle of a project and adheres to scheduled toll increases, it is able to accept large amounts of risk at the outset of a project, although the private sector prices all project risks and bases its final bid proposal, in part, on the level of risk involved. In addition, the public sector can potentially benefit from increased efficiencies in operations and life-cycle management, such as increased use of innovative technologies. Highway public-private partnerships can also potentially provide mobility and other benefits to the public sector, through the use of tolling. The highway public-private partnerships we reviewed all involved toll roads. These benefits include better pricing of infrastructure to reflect the true costs of operating and maintaining the facility and thus improved condition and performance of public infrastructure, as well as the potential for more cost effective investment decisions by private investors. In addition, through congestion pricing, tolls can be set to vary during congested periods to maintain a predetermined level of service, creating incentives for drivers to consider costs when making their driving decisions, and potentially reducing the demand for roads during peak hours. Although highway public-private partnerships can be used to obtain financing for highway infrastructure without the use of public sector funding, there is no “free money” in highway public-private partnerships. Rather, this funding is a form of privately issued debt that must be repaid. Private concessionaires primarily make a return on their investment by collecting toll revenues. Though concession agreements can limit the extent to which a concessionaire can raise tolls, it is likely that tolls will increase on a privately operated highway to a greater extent than they would on a publicly run toll road. Tolls are generally set in accordance with concession agreements and, in contrast to public-sector practices, allowable toll increases can be frequent and automatic. The public sector may lose control over its ability to influence toll rates, and there is also the risk of tolls being set that exceed the costs of the facility, including a reasonable rate of return if, for example, a private concessionaire gains market power because of the lack of viable travel alternatives. In addition, highway public-private partnerships also potentially require additional costs to the public sector compared with traditional public procurement, including the costs associated with (1) required financial and legal advisors, and (2) private-sector financing compared with public-sector financing. In addition to potentially higher tolls, the public sector may give up more than it receives in a concession payment in using a highway public-private partnership with a focus on extracting value from an existing facility. In exchange for an up-front concession payment, the public sector gives up control over a future stream of toll revenues over an extended period of time, such as 75 or 99 years. It is possible that the net present value of the future stream of toll revenues (less operating and capital costs) given up can be much larger than the concession payment received. Concession payments could potentially be less than they could or should be. Conversely, because the private sector takes on substantial risks, the opposite could also be true—that is, the public sector might gain more than it gives up. Using a highway public-private partnership to extract value from an existing facility also raises issues about the use of those proceeds and whether future users might potentially pay higher tolls to support current benefits. In some instances, up-front payments have been used for immediate needs, and it remains to be seen whether these uses provide long-term benefits to future generations who will potentially be paying progressively higher toll rates to the private sector throughout the length of a concession agreement. Both Chicago and Indiana used their lease fees, in part, to fund immediate financial needs. Both also established long-term reserves from the lease proceeds. Conversely, proceeds from the lease of Highway 407 ETR in Toronto, Canada, went into the province’s general revenue fund. Trade-offs from the public perspective can also be financial, as highway public-private partnerships have implications for federal tax policy. Private firms generally do not realize profits in the first 10 to 15 years of a concession agreement. However, the private sector receives benefits from highway public-private partnerships over the term of a concession in the form of a return on its investment. Private-sector investors generally finance large public-sector benefits early in a concession period, including up-front payments for leases of existing projects or capital outlays for the construction of new, large-scale transportation projects. In return, the private sector expects to recover any and all up-front costs, as well as ongoing maintenance and operation costs, and generate a return on investment. Furthermore, any cost savings or operational efficiencies the private sector can generate, such as introducing electronic tolling, improving maintenance practices, or increasing customer satisfaction in other ways, can further boost the return on investment through increased traffic flow and increased toll revenue. Unlike public toll authorities, private-sector firms pay federal income tax. Current tax law allows private sector firms to deduct depreciation on assets involved with highway public-private partnerships for which they have “effective ownership.” Effective ownership of assets requires, among other things, that the length of a concession agreement be equal to or greater than the useful economic life of the asset. According to financial and legal experts, including those who were involved in the lease of the Chicago Skyway in Chicago, Illinois, and the Indiana Toll Road, the useful economic life of those facilities was lengthy. The requirement to demonstrate effective asset ownership thus required lengthy partnership concession periods and contributed to the 99-year and 75-year concession terms for the Chicago Skyway and Indiana Toll Road, respectively. These financial and legal experts told us that as effective owners, the private investors can claim full tax deductions for asset depreciation within the first 15 years of the lease agreements. Determining the extent of depreciation deductions associated with highway public-private partnerships, and the extent of foregone revenue to the federal government, if any, from these deductions is difficult to determine because they depend on such factors as taxable income, total deductions, and marginal tax rates of private-sector entities involved with highway public-private partnerships. Financial experts told us that in the absence of the depreciation benefit, the concession payments to Chicago and Indiana would likely have been less than the $1.8 billion and $3.8 billion paid, respectively. However, foregone revenue to the federal government from tax benefits associated with transportation projects can potentially amount to millions of dollars. For example, as we reported in 2004, foregone tax revenue when the private-sector used tax-exempt bonds to finance three projects with private sector involvement—the Pocahontas Parkway, Southern Connector, and Las Vegas Monorail—were between $25 million and $35 million. The public interest in highway public-private partnerships can and has been considered and protected in many ways. State and local officials in the U.S. projects we reviewed heavily relied on concession terms. Most often, these terms were focused on, among other things, ensuring performance of the asset, dealing with financial issues, and maintaining the public sector’s accountability and flexibility. Included in the protections we found in agreements we reviewed were: Operating and maintenance standards: These standards are put in place to ensure that the performance of the asset is upheld to high safety, maintenance, and operational standards and can be expanded when necessary. For example, based on documents we reviewed, the standards on the Indiana Toll Road require the concessionaire to maintain the road’s condition, utility, and level of safety including a wide range of roadway issues, such as signage, use of safety features such as barrier walls, snow and ice removal, and the level of pavement smoothness that must be maintained. Expansion trigger requirements: These triggers require that a concessionaire expand a facility once congestion reaches a certain level. Some agreements can be based on forecasts. For example, on the Indiana Toll Road, when service is forecasted to fall below certain levels within 7 years, the concessionaire must act to improve service, such as by adding additional capacity at its own cost. Revenue-sharing mechanisms: These mechanisms require a concessionaire to share some level of revenues with the public sector. For example, on one Texas project, if the annual return on investment of the private concessionaire is at or below 11 percent, then the state could share in 5 percent of all revenues. If it is over 15 percent, the state could receive as much as 50 percent of the net revenues.