Governments today face substantial challenges to maintain or expand roadway infrastructure in light of increasing pressure to retain/improve social programs, while reducing debt. The resulting diversion of traditional funding levels away from roadway projects potentially precludes lifecycle extensions and service improvements needed to support economic development. Current trends to defer, or do nothing, in order to reduce infrastructure expenditures cannot continue. Clearly, a need exists for financing alternatives to fund current and future initiatives. One method to finance roadway projects is to collect tolls.The recent trend in toll road development in Canada reflects the need to balance highway network expansion without increasing public debt. While toll roads are not new to Canada -- Yonge Street extending north of Toronto, Ontario was operated as a toll road from the 1830's to the 1890's -- the approach to developing these facilities has evolved into a complex pre-bid assessment of reward and assumed risk. Developers bidding on these toll road initiatives are often provided with traffic forecasts by the government road authority during the proposal call. These forecasts, generally prepared by/for the owner to confirm the viability of a preconceived highway configuration, are often not truly reflective of the needs of the Developer. This paper has been prepared to explore the Developer's perspective on toll road forecasts, based on the recent experience of Canada's most prominent toll road provider/operator, Canadian Highways International Corporation and its consultant partners, Proctor & Redfern Limited of Toronto (engineering/ forecasting), BZW of New York (financing), and ICON Systems Limited of Toronto (engineering). (A)
Abstract