Annual Report Year 2009 - Civil and Environmental Engineering
Annual Report Year 2009 - Civil and Environmental Engineering
Annual Report Year 2009 - Civil and Environmental Engineering
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RESEARCH NEWS<br />
Infrastructure development<br />
Implementation is a catalyst for growth <strong>and</strong> progress<br />
Michael J.<br />
Garvin<br />
Over the roughly last two decades,<br />
alternative approaches for delivering<br />
infrastructure projects such<br />
as public-private partnerships (PPP) have<br />
received significant attention in the United<br />
States, particularly in Virginia.<br />
In northern Virginia, the Dulles Greenway<br />
was one of the first U.S. highway<br />
projects to be delivered by a PPP franchise<br />
agreement. The extension of the<br />
existing Dulles Toll Road was intended<br />
to provide a more attractive commuter<br />
route <strong>and</strong> serve as a catalyst of property<br />
development. Planning started in 1987,<br />
<strong>and</strong> a private consortium named TRIP II<br />
secured the right to develop the extension<br />
as a toll road. After a schedule slip, the<br />
toll road opened in 1995 <strong>and</strong> was soon in<br />
financial distress. To make matters worse,<br />
the Virginia Department of Transportation<br />
(VDOT) started improving Route 7,<br />
a competing free road, marginalizing the<br />
government’s commitment to the Greenway<br />
project.<br />
Seven years ago, VDOT issued a request<br />
for the private sector to join with the<br />
state to develop proposals for improvements<br />
to Interstate 81, one of the top eight<br />
trucking routes in the U.S., <strong>and</strong> considered<br />
to be operating in a subst<strong>and</strong>ard,<br />
even dangerous condition. Several studies<br />
occurred but the extensive changes to the<br />
corridor envisioned never materialized.<br />
These are just two examples cited by<br />
Michael J. Garvin, associate director of<br />
Virginia Tech’s Myers-Lawson School of<br />
Construction who is tenured through the<br />
Via Department of <strong>Civil</strong> <strong>and</strong> <strong>Environmental</strong><br />
<strong>Engineering</strong>. “Despite the recent economic<br />
turmoil, indicators suggest that the<br />
utilization of PPPs in the United States will<br />
not cease,” Garvin said. “The current conditions<br />
have made these arrangements<br />
more challenging to implement, but this<br />
is not necessarily a bad thing. The due<br />
diligence necessary with such projects is<br />
significant, so the economic situation is<br />
forcing decision-makers <strong>and</strong> analysts to<br />
sharpen their pencils.”<br />
Garvin recently co-authored a paper<br />
with Doran Bosso, a former Virginia Tech<br />
graduate student now with Skanska Infrastructure<br />
Development, titled, “Assessing<br />
Continued on next page<br />
4 | VIA REPORT | <strong>2009</strong>