Transportation
DOT Offers $3.9B TIFIA Loan for Georgia Toll Lanes Project
The State Route 400 Express Lanes Project would add tolled express lanes along 16 miles of the highway north of Atlanta.
The U.S. Dept. of Transportation says it will provide a loan of as much as $3.89 billion to the public-private partnership behind Georgia’s $4.6-billion State Route 400 Express Lanes Project. DOT officials say the funding approval marks the largest Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA) loan amount for a single borrower.
The project is focused on a 16-mile stretch of State Route 400 north of Atlanta between the North Springs MARTA station in Fulton County and an area about 1 mile north of McFarland Parkway in Forsyth County. The plan calls for new express lanes to be built in each direction, which would use a dynamic toll system. Project scope also includes some bridge refurbishments, and it will help facilitate a bus rapid transit line from the North Springs MARTA to the planned Windward Parkway MARTA Park and Ride in order to provide a connection to MARTA’s Red Line trains.
Last year, the Georgia Dept. of Transportation and State Road and Tollway Authority selected SR 400 Peach Partners as their private partner to design, build and operate the project. The concessionaire is a consortium of ACS Infrastructure, Meridiam, Acciona Concesiones, Acciona Construction, Dragados and Parsons. As part of the agreement, SR 400 Peach Partners will pay a $3.8-billion concession fee to GDOT and then will maintain and operate the toll lanes for 50 years.
“Securing TIFIA federal credit assistance is an essential milestone for the SR 400 Express Lanes Project,” said Javier Gutierrez, CEO of SR 400 Peach Partners, in a statement.
DOT’s TIFIA program provides financial assistance in the form of low-interest loans, loan guarantees and credit lines for significant transportation projects. Last month, DOT announced that it updated its TIFIA program policy to finance up to 49% of eligible project costs, up from 33% in most cases. Congress amended the program to increase the cap to 49% in 2012, but DOT generally reserved the higher funding level for projects meeting goals around rural or transit development.
“Through the improved TIFIA program and innovative partnerships like the SR 400 project, we’re reducing taxpayer waste, accelerating construction timelines, and helping people get where they want to go safer,” U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said in a statement.
Combined with up to $3.4 billion in Private Activity Bonds DOT previously allocated to the project, the agency is supporting it with investments totaling more than $7 billion. While design and construction are estimated to total $4.6 billion per GDOT, federal officials say total eligible project costs for the loan through TIFIA total more than $11 billion. DOT did not immediately answer follow-up questions from ENR, but a GDOT representative said via email that the $11-billion figure includes financing costs, reserve funding, interest during construction and the concession fee that SR 400 Peach Partners will pay GDOT, in addition to the construction costs.
Eligible costs under the TIFIA program include expenses related to development and construction, as well as “capitalized interest necessary to meet market requirements, reasonably required reserve funds, capital issuance expenses, and other carrying costs during construction.”
GDOT expects construction on the project to start late this year. Substantial completion is scheduled for 2031.
