Public–Private Partnership Models for Smart Transport Infrastructure Development

The advancement of technology in recent years has caused a significant change in the local government approach to the investment in the critical transport infrastructure network. The integration of high technology regarding Internet of Things (IoT), Big Data, and Artificial Intelligence (AI) within infrastructure systems of ‘smart cities’ has changed the way to deal with significant problems in urban cities including traffic jams, environmental pollution, and rapid population increase. This requires both huge financial investment and expertise in developing ‘new’ smart transport infrastructure projects. Thus, this study aims to investigate barriers and review Public–Private Partnership (PPP) models for smart infrastructure development. Scopus and Web of Science indexed articles from 2000 until the present were selected for review, and the initial results indicate that the selection of PPP model depends on the characteristics of both ‘smart cities’ and ‘smart infrastructure’ defined within the specific context of cities. Furthermore, the outcome of the literature review also shows that service contracts, operation and management contracts, leases, concessions, and build–operate–transfer (BOT) contracts are identified as the most common PPP models applied for smart infrastructure development. In line with that, some important criteria for PPP model selection are proposed for smart transport infrastructure development.