When Infrastructure Projects get a Bad Rap

Backlash instead of buy-in

Infrastructure projects, including those implemented in the Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode, are critical to India’s economic growth, yet they have frequently been facing public backlash. While quality issues or poor structuring of a project can lead to time and cost delays, the flak is sometimes not due to flaws in the project itself, but because of avoidable missteps in communication, planning, and execution. Three such issues currently dominate social media outrage:

• Extended tolling on national highways beyond the original concession periods,

• Concretisation of roads in Mumbai, and

• User Development Fees (UDF) at PPP airports (a separate analysis will be done of this as it is more complex).

This piece examines the first two, focusing on how the government’s failure to communicate clearly, enforce quality, and phase projects responsibly, seems to have eroded trust in critical infrastructure initiatives.

A) Tolling Beyond Concession Periods: Policy Justification vs. Public Perception

Many PPP highway projects were initially marketed with the understanding that tolls would cease once the concession period ended and construction costs were recovered. However, the government has increasingly extended tolling periods—sometimes indefinitely—citing maintenance, upgrades, and traffic management needs. This has led to accusations of “perpetual tolling” and broken promises. The Government’s rationale is largely valid but poorly explained. Contrary to popular perception, extending tolls is not inherently unreasonable. Governments worldwide use toll revenues to:

• Maintain and upgrade aging highways (beyond initial construction costs).

• Fund new infrastructure (e.g., bypasses, interchanges, or intelligent transport systems).

• Manage congestion (via dynamic pricing on high-traffic corridors).

Global precedents include:

• France: Many highways operate under long-term concessions. The Paris-Lyon Autoroute, tolled for 50+ years now, helps fund road maintenance and expansions.

• USA: States like Texas and Florida use toll revenues to finance new works even after initial projects are paid off. The Florida Turnpike has been tolled since 1957, to fund new highway segments.

• Japan: Some expressways remain tolled decades after construction to subsidize less profitable rural routes. Te Tomei Expressway has been tolled for over 50 years.

India’s Policy Framework: The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) follows a hybrid model where:

• Some tolls are removed post-concession (if the road requires minimal upkeep).

• Others are retained (if upgrades or high maintenance costs are anticipated).

So why the backlash? There seem to be two critical failures:

1. Zero Transparency: There is no information in the public domain of which roads will remain tolled, for how long, and why, nor is there clarity on how toll revenues are being allocated (e.g., maintenance vs. new projects).

2. Declining Quality: Of late, there have been complaints of tolled highways suffering from poor upkeep, potholes, and delayed repairs—despite high toll rates, leading to negative public sentiment (“Paying first-world toll rates for third-world infrastructure”).
   
   This can be fixed, at least to a large part, by four steps:

1. Publish a Toll Road Dashboard online (and keep it up-to-date): List every tolled highway, its concession end date, and future tolling status (with justification). For example: “Delhi-Mumbai Expressway: Tolls extended until 2035 to fund eight new interchanges.” And it would be great if it has a section showing "Where Your Toll Money Goes" (e.g., 60% maintenance, 30% new projects, 10% tech).

2. Enforce Strict Maintenance Standards: Mandate that tolled roads meet ISO-certified quality benchmarks (with penalties for lapses, one of the standard KPIs in PPP contracts).

3. Introduce Performance-Linked Tolling: Reduce tolls if road conditions deteriorate (similar to airport UDF rebates for poor service).

4. Public Consultations: Hold town halls to explain toll extensions and address grievances (as is often done for metro rail fare hikes).

This would dispel the myths that surround the toll policy. Very few are aware that tolls are not pure profit - typically, in a good system, 70 per cent of the toll fee funds maintenance.

B) The Concretisation Debate: Good Policy, Bad Execution

The Case for Concrete Roads: Concrete roads offer significant advantages over asphalt:

• Longer lifespan (20-30 years vs. 10-15 for asphalt).

• Lower maintenance costs (resistant to potholes, weather damage).

• Better fuel efficiency (smoother surface reduces vehicle wear and tear).

However, poor implementation can turn a sound policy into what seems a wasteful spectacle, as in Mumbai’s Rs. 12,000 Crore concretisation gamble: In 2023, the BMC announced a plan to make all roads pothole-free by replacing asphalt with concrete. Two years later, 700 km of roads are under construction, causing massive traffic disruptions and jeopardising pedestrian movement, apart from increasing dust and noise pollution. Quality issues have emerged, with reports of uneven surfaces, drainage problems, and premature cracks. And the initiative is already seeing cost overruns - delays have reportedly inflated expenses by an estimated 15-20%.

What went wrong? Primarily, the reasons appear to be:

1. Premature Digging up of Functional Roads: Many asphalt roads with 5-7 years of residual life were demolished unnecessarily. The best practice is replacement only at end-of-life (as done in Germany’s autobahn upgrades), which is also financially wise.

2. Poor Phasing and Planning: No prioritization of high-traffic corridors. Contrast this with Delhi’s phased concretisation (2010-2020), focused on arterial roads before local lanes.

3. Lack of Public Accountability: No real-time progress tracking (project monitoring dashboard).

A smarter approach to concretisation would have been,

1. Prioritization based on traffic volume & road condition:

   • Tier 1: High-volume highways and bus routes (maximizes public benefit).

   • Tier 2: Residential roads (only after Tier 1 is 80% complete).

2. Adopting a “Zero Waste” Policy: Reuse excavated asphalt for rural roads or landfill (as is done in the Netherlands).

3. Leveraging Technology: Use AI-based road condition surveys (like Singapore’s LTA) to identify candidate roads for replacement.

4. Setting Transparent Milestones: Publish quarterly updates on costs, completion rates, and quality audits. A quarterly contractor’s scorecard for works-in-progress showing project completion vs milestone would be a good idea, along with Toll Booth QR codes for instant complaint-logging (this was piloted in Karnataka)

Restoring credibility to government execution of ambitious infrastructure projects can ultimately be only through good execution and communication. To regain public confidence on the Tolling policy, explain why tolls are needed (e.g., “Your ₹50 toll funds 2 km of resurfacing yearly”), deliver flawless road quality and prove it with third-party audits (like Japan’s highway disclosure reports) - an ‘Explain → Deliver → Prove’ model.

For concretisation, phase projects to minimize disruption, monitor execution via public dashboards (with a catchy name, say, “MumbaiConcreteWatch.in"!), adapt rollout based on feedback (e.g., pause low-priority lanes during monsoons) - a ‘Phase → Monitor → Adapt’ model.

And, finally, for all PPP projects, highlight the contractual KPIs in the concession agreement, the defined service-level agreements (e.g., “Potholes repaired within 48 hours”) and penalties for not meeting them (e.g., toll rebates for unmet targets). This could lead to buy-in instead of a backlash.