Cintra completes financing of LBJ project
Link to article here.
Two notable things in things article. One, Mr. Jones erroneously assumes that because Kay Bailey Hutchison lost the primary battle to Rick Perry that it means Texans want their freeways sold to Spain and to be subsequently charged 75 cents a mile to drive. Second, note the underhanded plan by TxDOT to do a backdoor CDA for I-35 to Denton County using pass through financing after the Legislature said "no" to CDAs and foreign-owned toll roads last year. As usual, TxDOT thinks it answers to no one and doesn't get the "message" from Texans and their lawmakers...it just keeps creating loopholes from thin air so it can railroad Perry's agenda to sell Texas freeways to foreign companies in sweetheart deals.
Cintra says LBJ financing 'completed'
Rodger Jones/Editorial Writer
This just in from Cintra US, an arm of the Spanish-led investor group heading the massive rebuilding and partial-tolling of LBJ Freeway:
LBJ Infrastructure Group, LLC (LBJIG) announced today that financing for the LBJ Express project has been completed ahead of schedule to begin construction and operation of this anticipated roadway. The company is expected to administratively complete the process over the upcoming days.
This achievement marks a major milestone in the long-awaited re-development and expansion of a major traffic corridor in the Dallas area - a project that will help reduce travel delays, enhance safety, provide mobility choices and help reduce the carbon footprint often associated with idling traffic. The project is also expected to create thousands of new jobs.
If you want to mark your calendars, the Cintra announcement says work starts in 2011 and ends in 2016. Many drivers will be more interested in the toll rates that will be set for the LBJ speed lanes. Plans called for a 50 mph average speed, with tolls to be set high enough to clear the riff-raff out of the way. Rates will start at 75 cents a mile, according to a policy set by the Regional Transportation Council.
Cintra is also heading the North Tarrant Express project to the west of us, another highway expansion involving toll lanes and free lanes. Both roadways represent (I think) the biggest highway construction PPPs under way in the U.S. -- a fact that gets politicians worked up in Austin (even though they won't raise the gas tax to build these roads the old-fashioned way).
The political fireworks over Spanish money has mostly fizzled since Cintra was pushed out of the SH 121 toll project. KBH hammered away at foreigners during her run at Rick Perry this year, but most people are glad to have the cash regardless of who's writing the checks. Austin sure isn't.
Transportation officials hope to also harness private money to help build the I-35E project from northern Dallas County into Denton. The road is overloaded, there's not tax money to rebuild it, and a new idea called "pass-through tolling" is being pushed for the project. Private investors would be paid per vehicle for the cars and trucks they put through. It's being pushed as something different from the "CDA" model used for LBJ and N. Tarrant Express, but is sure walks like a duck.