Transportation Public-Private Partnerships Will Weather The Storm
But Lessons Learned Will Bring Changes
Andrew Bary’s recent piece “The Long and Binding Road,” in Barron’s has been widely noticed. “The credit market collapse and political opposition have all but killed the U.S. highway privatization trend,” the respected commentator opined in his article. What is more, Bary wrote, the Indiana Toll Road deal “was one of the most illogical prices paid for any major piece of transportation infrastructure during the bubble period of 2005 to 2007,” suggesting that Macquarie made a huge miscalculation. Gov. Mitch Daniel’s comment (“It was the best deal since Manhattan was sold for beads…”) did not help, implying that the State got the better of the naive Macquarie. The article concluded, “for toll road investors, what had promised to be a pleasant ride has turned into a painful trip,” citing Macquarie’s shares tumbling 50% in the past year.