Harvey Hammond, chairman of HNTB Corp., was talking about the firm's future as it marks its 100th anniversary this year—as well as the future of funding improvements to the nation's bridges, railways, ports, tunnels and major highways. "The infrastructure needs and demands will always be there," he says. "The question is: How do we respond to [them]?"
For U.S. states and infrastructure managers who are puzzling over how to pay for upgrades to many of these aging systems, it's the question of the moment.