By KHURRAM SAEED

THE JOURNAL NEWS

All over the country, states are leasing their highways to private investors in exchange for huge lump sums of cash, usually to pay for looming deficits and aging infrastructure.

In return, investors get to collect - and raise - tolls on the roads for decades, and they secure tax benefits. States that haven't yet entered into the public-private partnerships are seriously considering doing so.

In recent years, a partnership of a Spanish company and an Australian company has leased both the 157-mile Indiana Toll Road and the eight-mile Chicago Skyway. The Toll Road lease is for 75 years at a cost of $3.8 billion, and the Skyway lease cost $1.8 billion for 99 years.

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Posted by pichu at February 11, 2007 1:28 PM