Beltway Toll Plan May Need Va. Funds / Rising Costs Strain Private Partners
Source: By Eric M. Weiss, Washington Post, Monday, October 23, 2006
A privately backed plan to build express toll lanes on the Virginia portion of the Capital Beltway, which was promoted as a way to ease traffic without using taxpayer money, has become so expensive that the firms behind the project could require more than $100 million in public funds to make it work, according to state transportation officials. ……. Virginia and Maryland leaders have been counting on privately funded highways as a quick, cheap way to ease congestion when there is little public money to build big projects. Now the changes in the Beltway plan, as well as delays in a similar project on Interstates 95 and 395, have politicians and transportation officials wary. "I think it demonstrates the risks involved in seeing privatization as a panacea," said Gerald E. Connolly (D), chairman of the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors.