The effects of public private partnerships on road safety outcomes

Public Private Partnerships (PPP) have become common in providing high-quality infrastructure in many countries worldwide. One of the main reasons for PPP agreements is to improve efficiency and quality in the delivery of public services, as well as to boost investments for expensive projects. Despite PPPs having been particularly widespread in the case of the construction and rehabilitation of high-capacity road infrastructure, their impact in terms of road safety outcomes is still unexplored. This paper studies the effects of PPPs on road safety outcomes by taking advantage of the variety of production models provided in the Spanish highway network. Results based on a panel-data fixed-effects method show that the most relevant aspect influencing road safety outcomes is the quality of design of the road. However, we find evidence suggesting that privately operated highways (PPPs) are positively correlated with better road safety outcomes for roads with similar quality. This finding that should be confirmed by further research raises interest in the mechanisms that could produce this link between management models and road safety.