Bridging the Gap Between Dollars and Digs

Last year, the American Society of Civil Engineers released its 2009 Report Card for America’s Infrastructure—assigning a cumulative grade of D to the nation’s infrastructure and noting a five-year investment need of $2.2 trillion from all levels of government and the private sector.

For its part, New Jersey posted a C-minus, yet both roads and bridges received a barely passing D. This is bad news for the real estate community, which relies on adequate public services such as roads, bridges, sewer systems and energy to ensure a project’s success. What’s more, it is virtually impossible for any business sector or community to succeed without the right infrastructure in place, says Jonathan Miller, partner and co-owner of Miller Ryan LLC in New York City, and author of the Urban Land Institute’s 2009 infrastructure report, done in conjunction with Ernst & Young. He also authored ULI and PricewaterhouseCoopers’ just-released Emerging Trends in Real Estate 2011 report.

“Economic travail and government deficits distract attention from dealing with the nation’s archaic and deteriorating infrastructure,” says Miller, who also pens the regular TrendCzar blog on GlobeSt.com. “Twentieth-Century interstates and insufficient mass-transit systems can no longer support population growth and commerce in many increasingly clogged metropolitan areas. Financing a makeover will cost trillions of dollars over the next three decades—money the country does not have or does not want to spend.” But, he believes, at some point, governments will be forced to institute various user fees and infrastructure taxes to pay for essential transport upgrades and new systems, including high-speed rail, light rail, subways and airports.

Here in New Jersey, relief in the form of federal stimulus money made its way to Trenton to the tune of $652 million for highway and bridgework alone. In all, New Jersey received about $10 billion in direct aid from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and an additional $7.5 billion in tax relief...

See the full story in the digital edition of Forum.