While there remains a great deal of hope in state capitols that P3s can provide some assistance in financing infrastructure, it has been tempered somewhat in recent years by the realization that P3s are simply not applicable to all situations. For one thing, obtaining public and political support to implement tolling is often difficult. As GAO's 2008 report points out, opposition to tolling stems from the public's belief that fuel taxes and other dedicated funding sources already pay for roads and thus tolling is seen as a form of double taxation. The inequity of tolling is another factor that prompts opposition. Lower-income groups have a harder time paying tolls than those with higher incomes. The nature of P3s would also seem to favor congested areas of the country with enough traffic to generate profits through toll revenues. The private sector also must see an investment opportunity and a need for more highway capacity or more efficient operations. That could leave out rural areas.24
There may also simply not be enough private capital to go around. Between $340 billion and $600 billion in private capital is available for investment in infrastructure around the world, the Congressional Research Service estimates. Its report also suggests private funding for infrastructure is unlikely to amount to more than 10 percent of the ongoing needs of highways in the U.S. over the next 20 years and a much smaller share of transit needs.25
Moreover, USA Today reported last year that leasing of government assets by private firms has all but stopped as credit dried up in the credit crunch. The economy made investors skeptical, analysts said. The companies that bought the Chicago Skyway and Indiana Toll Road suffered from buyer's remorse. Macquarie Infrastructure Group reported in 2009 that its toll road investments, including the Skyway and Toll Road, had lost one-third of their value. The newspaper also cited, among other things, the failure of Florida's "Alligator Alley" section of I-75 across the Everglades to attract bids when it was put up for auction last May as further proof that perhaps we've seen the last of such sell-offs for awhile.26
Not so fast, others say.
"The market has really died down for that recently, both in the willingness of governments to get into them and in the availability of private capital," National Association of State Budget Officers Executive Director Scott Pattison told Governing magazine in February. "(But) I wouldn't be surprised if we start to see a lot of interest in this as states start to recover over the next three to five years and beyond."27