Implications of Private-Public Partnerships on the Development of Urban Public Transit Infrastructure

Abstract

Recently, design-build-operate-transfer-style private-public partnerships have gained popularity both with left-wing and with right-wing governments as a means of effectively delivering large-scale transportation infrastructure projects. Proponents suggest that introducing competition and market forces into the procurement of public infrastructure can make decision making more accountable, contribute to greater technological innovation, and reduce the potential for construction-cost escalations that consistently have plagued transportation projects. However, this article shows that in the case of a new rapid-rail development in Vancouver, Canada, the private-public-partnership method of project delivery has been largely incongruent with increased accountability while failing to drive technological innovation or limit cost escalations during the planning process.

A nested framework for transparency in Public Private Partnerships: Case studies in highway development projects in India

“…Following Siemiatycki (2006), this evidence confirms that PPPs face challenges in terms of transparency, as private sector actors demand confidentiality. This shows how transparency was restricted in the case of partnership formation following Florini's (2007) definition:…”

What's the Secret?

“…And yet the Vancouver-Richmond link has been repeatedly passed over in favor of other priorities (see Figure 1): first for the Expo Skytrain line (a type of automated light rail) that ran east from Vancouver to Burnaby, New Westminster, and Surrey; and later for the Millennium Skytrain line that ran east from Broadway along the Lougheed corridor. Each of these projects was delivered directly by the government, and the processes were highly politicized and lacked transparency and accountability (Siemiatycki, 2006a).…”

“…Stakeholders including labor unions, a coalition of businesses expecting to be affected by the construction, environmentalists, social justice advocates, and even many local politicians complained that they could not be meaningfully involved in the planning process because key documents remained confidential (Siemiatycki, 2006b). …”

“…The United States Department of Transportation has an extensive webpage that covers public/private partnerships and provides information on pertinent federal and state level legislation at http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/ppp/legislation.htm 3. I describe the delivery of the Canada Line as a DBFO public/private partnership, the politics that surrounded the project, and the potential for the new rail line to meet its forecasted expectations in greater detail in Siemiatycki (2006aSiemiatycki ( , 2006b. 4.…”

Public-Private Partnerships to Address Global Environmental Problem: Sino-US Cooperation on Climate Change and Energy

“…In these cases, even when public-private corporations exist and progress at considerable levels, the roles and effectiveness are easily underestimated because nation-affiliated confrontation does not always completely ease in the short term. This is the reason why studies on public-private relationships and their implications for global environmental governance are still few compared with other fields of research.Research on PPPs traditionally focuses on cooperation in or between developed countries, such as the United States, Germany, Sweden, the UK, Norway, and Canada, by means of studies on the service industry, business community, local economics, urban development, and, recently, emergency management (Beauregard, 1998;Carter, 2008;Dewulf, Blanken, & Bult-Spiering, 2012;Hodge & Greve, 2007;Savas, 2000;Siemiatycki, 2006; Walzer & Jacobs, 1998; Westeren, 2000). However, there is an obvious lack of theoretical perspectives to analyze the cooperation between public and private actors in both developed and developing countries.…”