The project has been open for two and a half years with the first two annual monitoring reports issued. Car volumes are more or less as expected, but truck volumes are much lower than forecast.
In late May of this year, the Government granted MIG, as the sole owner of the M6 Tollway concession, permission to refinance the project by restructuring its $1.1 billion in debt so that the debt service on the project better matches the cash flow expected from the project over the 54 years of the concession. This will enable MIG to take out early profits from its investment in the project. The refinancing is expected to provide MIG with significant gains, amounting to about $700 million. Unlike most other PPP projects sponsored by the Government, MIG it is not required to share the gains derived from refinancing with the project's public sponsor, Highways Agency. This is because the concession team led by Macquarie assumed all of the risks for this project as a toll road, versus a shadow toll road.
Demonstrating its long-term commitment to the area, MIG has agreed to reinvest 30 percent of its refinancing gains to fund several neighboring public projects of great interest to the Highways Agency. These include a toll-free extension of M54 to the M6 Tollway plus expansion of an interchange at the southern end of the M6 Tollway. Both projects will improve accessibility to the facility. This represents a win-win solution for both public sponsor and private provider in the PPP, whereby the Highways Agency gets several priority projects built without cost to the public, while MIG receives the benefits of increased traffic volumes and toll revenues on its toll road as a result of the improved accessibility to other portions of the region's highway network, 70 percent of the proceeds from the debt restructuring, and a more positive public image for its contribution to the area's highway infrastructure. MIG also agreed to operate these additional facilities during the concession period.