05-25-07
Contact: Paul Griffo
Telephone: (202) 366-4043
U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary E. Peters today announced two Houston transit projects that will ultimately serve the city’s two main airports will take part in a U.S. Department of Transportation pilot program that would evaluate the benefits of forming public-private partnerships for federally funded transit construction projects.
“Our goal is to demonstrate that partnerships between the public and private sector in transit construction will lead to greater innovation and lessen the burden on taxpayers,” Peters said.
Both the North Corridor and Southeast Corridor Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) projects will provide improved access to the Houston central business district (CBD). The North Corridor is a 5.4-mile BRT line extending from a planned intermodal terminal at the existing Hardy rail yard north of the CBD to the Northline Mall Transit Center. It also includes a 0.6-mile light rail extension from the existing University of Houston-Downtown Light Rail Station to the planned terminal.
A dedicated route would be shared by both the North Corridor BRT line and the planned (and locally-funded) East End BRT service operating between neighborhoods east of downtown and the Northline Mall. The North Corridor BRT project is a first phase of a planned 24-mile rapid transit line from the CBD to George H. Bush Intercontinental Airport.
The Southeast Corridor is a BRT line extending from the current Main Street Light Rail system in the CBD to the Palm Center park-and-ride near Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. The BRT line would provide service to the University of Houston-Downtown, Texas Southern University, and the Texas Medical Center. The project is the first phase of a planned 13-mile rapid transit line from the CBD to William P. Hobby Airport.
Unlike conventional procurement methods of contracting for new construction, in which specific jobs are bid out separately, public-private partnerships transfer responsibility for performing construction and operating responsibilities to a single private entity or a consortium of private companies.
“The object of public-private partnerships is to better reduce and spread risks associated with new construction,” said Federal Transit Administrator James S. Simpson. “We believe that this arrangement, which has worked so well in highway construction and operations, can be effectively carried over to public transportation.”
The Public-Private Partnership Pilot Program, known as Penta-P, was authorized by the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU) for certain new “fixed guideway capital projects,” meaning public transit systems that use rail or a dedicated road, such as a BRT system.
These pilot programs will allow the USDOT to study whether the arrangement speeds completion, allows more reliable projections of project costs and benefits, and improves project performance.
The pilot will study projects that, among other things, use methods of procurement that integrate risk-sharing and streamline project development, engineering, construction, operation, and maintenance. The amount and terms of private investment in such projects is a significant factor in selecting projects to participate in the program.
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