Rail grade separations. Revamped locks and dams. Toll roads and bridges. Dredging. These components are some of the most "'glamorous parts of the infrastructure conversation in the U.S.," says Pierce Homer, the American Road & Transportation Builders Association's ports-and-waterways co-chairman and Moffatt & Nichol's transportation director.

Ports and inland waterways need an additional $6 billion to deepen harbors and overhaul river locks through 2020, says a new American Society of Civil Engineers report.