Public-private partnerships – such as those proposed for upgrading Kansas City International Airport – have grown increasingly popular in recent years as cities look for innovative ways to finance transportation projects.

Advocates see great value in private-sector involvement in shoring up America’s aging and increasingly inefficient and unsafe infrastructure. Opponents counter that such partnerships turn too often into giant giveaways to corporations.

Adam Shaw, a leading authority on public-private partnerships, examines how they work, why they can be among the most effective means of dealing with infrastructure issues, and how they could pose problems for governments. He is an executive vice president of WT Partnership, a consultancy firm specializing, among other things, in various forms of public-private partnerships.