Southfield — A different route for financing road projects is enabling the state to finish a project to rebuild Interstate 75 in Oakland County up to 10 years ahead of schedule, state officials said Monday.
“We came out last year and announced this modernization project and we took a pay-as-you-go approach,” said Michigan Department of Transportation spokesman Rob Morosi. “We heard from communities, motorists, and stakeholders that this was going to take too long. So we looked at a different way of financing to accelerate this project.”
He made the comments Monday during a news conference held at MDOT’s Metro Region Office in Southfield. He was joined by Tony Kratofil, MDOT’s Metro Region engineer, George Spakouris, vice president of KPMG Corporate Finance LLC, and Joe Pavona, special advisor to Gov. Rick Snyder on Public Private Partnerships.
Under a different financing system that uses a private investment model instead of state and federal money, Morosi said MDOT will be able to speed up the timeline for the project.
Instead of doing the project piecemeal and the state footing the bill for every step of construction, contractors pay for its materials, construction and maintenance and will be reimbursed by MDOT. As a result, contractors have an incentive to do work on or ahead of schedule.
READ MORE AT: http://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/oakland-county/2017/09/18/mdot-may-finish-75-oakland-co-2020/677158001/