“The market is still trying to figure out what a social infrastructure P3 is,” says Orion Fulton, Senior Manager with Arup Transaction Advice. The Canadian fixed-price concession model with private finance worked well for the Long Beach Courthouse P3 and will be tested in a few months for a new Judicial Complex in Indianapolis.

But that model didn’t fit the Long Beach Civic Center project. Combining real estate development, urban revitalization and DBFOM delivery of  large public buildings under an affordability cap using a P3 model requires great flexibility, he says.