New Jersey has 651 structurally deficient bridges
As New Jersey wrestles with how it will pay for its crumbling roads and bridges once the Transportation Trust Fund runs out of money in two years, Pennsylvania is looking to enter into a public-private partnership to reconstruct its spans.
Color New Jersey’s transportation commissioner intrigued.
"Anytime you can get the private sector to have skin in the game, everybody saves money," said Commissioner Jim Simpson, who plans to float the idea, among other options, before New Jersey’s Legislature.
"With respect to heavy-duty infrastructure, somebody needs to have skin in the game to watch the costs, because these projects outlive many of the political appointees like commissioners and boards of directors," he said. "The only people who are really going to watch the budget are the people who have something to lose."
Under the plan by Pennsylvania, 500 structurally deficient bridges would be replaced within five years. The winning bidder, referred to as the "development entity," would design, build, finance and maintain the bridges and be reimbursed over a period of 25 to 35 years.
In its "request for qualifications," Pennsylvania’s DOT wrote:
"The Project is expected to create efficiencies through economies of scale, innovation and optimal risk allocation that will allow PennDOT to deliver more bridges at a lower whole life cost than a traditional design, bid, build procurement. The Project will also help improve the connectivity of the Commonwealth’s transportation network, while minimizing the impacts on the traveling public. The improved connectivity, including removal of weight restrictions on new bridges, will increase the efficiency of freight and commercial movements which benefit the economy of the Commonwealth."
Meanwhile, Pennsylvania also increased its gas tax by 9.5 cents per gallon at the beginning of the year, allowing a larger pot of money to fix bridges.
What’s in it for the bidders?
"In simplest terms, they will have guaranteed work, said PennDOT spokeswoman Erin Waters-Trasatt, adding that the successful bidder could design bridges similarly and save costs on design work.
Because the winning bidder will be paid for reaching milestones, the bidder will have a stake in properly maintaining the bridges.
STATE STILL THE OWNER
Waters-Trasatt noted that while the bidder will finance and maintain the bridges, PennDOT would retain ownership and its workforce would continue to do basic maintenance such as snow removal.
Pennsylvania has nearly 4,500 bridges considered structurally deficient — the largest number in America — or close to one-fifth of the 25,000 state-owned bridges. The average age of the spans is more than 50 years old.
New Jersey is close to the middle of the pack nationwide, with about 10 percent of its 6,557 bridges, or 651, deemed structurally deficient. New Jersey’s most famous decrepit bridge, the Pulaski Skyway between Newark and Jersey City, is undergoing a $1 billion rehabilitation that will close northbound traffic toward New York for up to two years beginning April 12.
OPT FOR GAS-TAX HIKE?
State Assemblyman John Wisniewski (D-Middlesex), who chairs the Assembly Transportation Committee, said some economies of scale could likely be realized with a public-private partnership — referred to in the industry as a PPP or P3 — but cautioned against looking at it as a cure-all.
"There’s room for a variety of different methods to secure the funding for transportation, but what has to be made explicit before embarking is the decision as to who is going to pay the bill," he said.
"My frustration with P3s and other novel ways of funding transportation is that they are often presented as a fairy tale solution."
Wisniewski is a proponent of increasing New Jersey’s gasoline tax — one of the lowest in America — as a way to
help provide a dedicated funding source for New Jersey’s roads, bridges and transit projects.
So is Janna Chernetz, New Jersey advocate for the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, a regional transportation policy watchdog group.
"Exploring the concept of PPP to help address New Jersey’s structurally deficient bridges is certainly an option," she said.
"However, the real focus must be on identifying sustainable revenue sources for the Transportation Trust Fund. The gas tax, which has not been raised since 1988, is the best way to increase revenue and reduce dependency on debt so that New Jersey can pay for much-needed transportation projects."
INCENTIVE NEEDED
Simpson, the transportation commissioner, said that the way construction projects are done in New Jersey at the moment, there is no compelling incentive to reduce costs.
"The professional engineers that we all get, they’re all on the meter. Click, click, click, click — the meter is going," he said. "The contractors, by nature, are looking for change orders and anything that they can get, because they’re already getting hammered at the lowest price — it’s low-bid."
"If you don’t have the money to knock out all these bridges you have to get done, you get the private sector," he added.
"They’ve got the money. They knock it all out and then you pay every year. Meanwhile, the bridges are all done early. Instead of tackling 10 bridges a year, you tackle 100 bridges a year."
RELATED COVERAGE
• Report: Many N.J. bridges need repairs, more funding
• Pulaski Skyway lane closures to begin later than initially thought