Recently in Transportation Category

Source: By Dan Mihalopoulos, Chicago Tribune (IL), June 3, 2009

 

City Hall's inspector general blasted Mayor Richard Daley's parking meter lease Tuesday, alleging the administration gave up the potential for hundreds of millions in additional cash when aldermen rapidly rubber-stamped the deal. 

While Inspector General David Hoffman put an official seal on what critics have been saying for months, the scathing report comes amid public outrage. Anger over the parking meter meltdown has yet to subside in a rare case where a blunder is sticking to a mayor who has outrun many controversies during his two decades in office.

 

Source:  By Irwin Block, The Gazette, May 28, 2009
 

 ...... In an analysis made public yesterday, researcher Marc Hasbani of UQÀM's accounting sciences departments concludes that "in spite of substantial revenue," there is no evidence the privatized arrangement is more efficient than it would have been under city management.

...... His main recommendation: The city should take control of parking meters and recover the estimated $1 million a year it is losing under the current system.

 Source: By Rob Lovitt, MSNBC,  9:36 a.m. ET, Wed., May 6, 2009

 

 ........ According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, the nation's infrastructure is in such dire shape that it would take $2.2 trillion over the next five years to reverse decades of underfunding and neglect. The shortfall for transportation infrastructure alone is pegged at more than $800 billion.  

State and local governments are simply unable (or unwilling) to fill the gap. The proposed solution: sell or lease public assets to private companies that would provide money upfront in return for the right to run the operation and keep most of the revenue.

 Source: By Jon Hilkevitch, Chicago Tribune (IL), May 5, 2009

 

LAZ Parking, a company that does business in 16 states and brings in more than $200 million annually, was poorly prepared to take over Chicago's parking meters when the handoff from the city took place Feb. 13, the firm acknowledges.  

It relied heavily on mall security guards and workers from a temporary job-placement agency -- all with no experience in the parking industry -- to reprogram the city's approximately 36,000 meters and change over the decals that provide drivers with rates and rules, company officials said.

Source: By Karen Pierog, Reuters, Thu Apr 23, 2009 4:50pm EDT

The demise of a deal to lease Chicago's Midway Airport to private operators may put the brakes on the privatization of bigger and high-profile government assets as the global recession eats into the availability of financing.

Financing for future deals may become more selective even as increasing numbers of state and local governments turn to leasing their assets to bolster coffers diminished by the sagging economy.

Source: Mid Hudson News (NY), April 24, 2009

 

The Port Jervis City School District Board of Education Thursday night approved a $59 million 2009-2010 academic year budget which includes the privatization of student transportation.

...... There are 100 district employees who work in the transportation department and are represented by the CSEA. Some may get picked up by the private company, but they would lose in the end, said union spokeswoman Jessica Ladlee. "It's lower wages, minimum benefits," she said. "Right now, we have workers here who have invested many, many years with the district, but they are not quite at retirement age, so it puts them in a very tough position because they had years in the state retirement system but they are not quite where they need to be in order to receive a full pension."

Source: BY FRAN SPIELMAN, Sun Times (IL), April 20, 2009

 

Mayor Daley's $2.5 billion plan to privatize Midway Airport collapsed today for lack of financing, leaving taxpayers with a $126 million down payment, but no apparent way to shore up city pensions and rebuild Chicago's aging infrastructure.

Source: By Ken Draper, City Watch LA (CA), April 10, 2009

The Mayor's budget is due in 10 days. At a press conference on Monday, he offered a glimpse at some of what he will likely offer in the face of a $530 million City budget deficit: city worker sacrifice and possible public-private partnerships that could produce more than a billion dollars.

....... No detail on what those partnerships might look like, but sources have said that privatization of the City's parking elements ... lots, meters, ticketing ... are an example of what the Mayor had in mind.

Source: By James B. Kelleher James B. Kelleher, Reuters,Thu Mar 19, 8:43 pm ET

 

As they struggle to close ballooning budget deficits amid the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, many U.S. state and local governments will be tempted to follow the example of Chicago.  The third-largest U.S. city has raised billions of dollars in recent years turning public assets over to private businesses that then run them as for-profit enterprises.

...... "The devil is in the details -- as future generations to come will learn," said Pat Andrews, editor of Alltolled.com, a Web site dedicated to preventing more highway privatizations in the state of Indiana, another pioneer of such transactions.

......... Elliot Sclar, a professor at Columbia University in New York, sees the P3s as just the latest product Wall Street bankers have dreamt up to make a buck - and one taxpayers will pay to clean up. ........

Source: By Jon Hilkevitch, Chicago Tribune (IL),  March 26, 2009


Chicago is sending out its own mechanics--and billing the private company now responsible for operating parking meters in the city--in a belated effort to catch up on a torrent of problems that include broken meters and inaccurate signs about parking rates and enforcement, officials said Wednesday.

Indications of a more urgent approach to fixing the problems became apparent Monday morning when the Tribune observed meter inspectors and repair personnel working downtown.

It followed a Tribune story on Friday that exposed the broad scope of the problems and how drivers and business owners are angry at the city, which watched rates quadruple this year as part of a 75-year deal to lease 36,000 meters to Chicago Parking Meters LLC for almost $1.2 billion.

Related March 20, 2009 article from the Tribune: Chicago parking meters: Changes leave drivers angry, confused