Recent Streetsblog NYC posts about Highway Expansion

More Money Won’t Fix U.S. Infrastructure If We Don’t Change How It’s Spent

By Angie Schmitt | Feb 5, 2015 | No Comments

“America’s infrastructure is slowly falling apart” went the headline of a recent Vice Magazine story that epitomizes a certain line of thinking about how to fix the nation’s “infrastructure crisis.” The post showed a series of structurally deficient bridges and traffic-clogged interchanges intended to jolt readers into thinking we need to spend more on infrastructure. The idea […]

Washington Republicans: Put Seattle’s Highway-Borer Out of Its Misery

By Angie Schmitt | Jan 30, 2015 | No Comments

If nothing else, the politics of Seattle’s deep-bore highway tunnel fiasco keep getting more interesting. With Bertha the tunnel-boring machine stuck underground and “rescue” efforts literally destabilizing city neighborhoods, a pair of Republicans in the Washington State Senate introduced a bill to scrap the project before any more money is wasted. While putting a halt to […]

Can Seattle Stop Its Highway Tunnel Boondoggle Before It’s Too Late?

By Angie Schmitt | Jan 5, 2015 | No Comments

It’s been one year since the world’s largest tunnel boring machine, “Bertha,” got stuck 120 feet beneath Seattle. Before it broke down, the colossal machine had excavated just 1,000 feet of the two-mile tube that’s supposed to house a new, $3.1 billion underground highway to replace an aging elevated road called the Alaskan Way Viaduct. […]

The Great Traffic Projection Swindle

By Angie Schmitt and Payton Chung | Nov 20, 2014 | No Comments

This is the final piece in a three-part series about privately-financed roads. In the first two parts of this series, we looked at the Indiana Toll Road as an example of the growth in privately financed highways, and how financial firms can turn these assets into profits, even if the road itself is a big money loser. […]

How Macquarie Makes Money By Losing Money on Toll Roads

By Angie Schmitt and Payton Chung | Nov 19, 2014 | No Comments

This is the second post in a three-part series about the Indiana Toll Road and privately financed highways. Read part one. Macquarie Group, the gigantic Australian financial services firm with some $400 billion in assets under management, has made a lot of money in the infrastructure privatization game. The publicly traded company owns the Brussels Airport, […]

The Indiana Toll Road and the Dark Side of Privately Financed Highways

By Angie Schmitt and Payton Chung | Nov 18, 2014 | No Comments

This is the first post in a three-part series on the Indiana Toll Road and the use of private finance to build and maintain highways. In September, the operator of the Indiana Toll Road filed for bankruptcy, eight years after inking a $3.8 billion, 75-year concession for the road with the administration of Governor Mitch Daniels. […]

Show More Stories