A long-term effort to rebuild and maintain the nation's transportation infrastructure gained support from members of both parties in recent years, but disagreements about how to pay for those projects ultimately quashed any hopes of a deal.
The incoming Trump administration reportedly hopes to sidestep that question almost entirely, but critics are already questioning the plan's math.
The Wall Street Journal noted that President-elect Donald Trump called rebuilding "highways, bridges, tunnels, airports, schools, hospitals" one of his top priorities once in office, while his transition website vowed to invest $550 billion in those projects.
Details on the website were scant, but the Journal reported that the specifics are instead likely included in a proposal from Trump adviser and University of California-Irvine public policy professor Peter Navarro.
Navarro's plan, according to the paper, calls for tax credits of up to 82 percent on private investment in infrastructure projects.
The revenue lost from the tax incentives, meanwhile, would be replaced by taxes paid by contractors as well as income taxes from construction workers on those projects.
Under Navarro's calculations, the government would facilitate up to $1 trillion in infrastructure investment with essentially zero public dollars.
"With the Trump plan, there is no need to create a new government bureaucracy to make infrastructure loans," Navarro wrote. "The private sector is well equipped to do so, provided enough equity is invested, and that is what the Trump plan provides."
Industry experts, however, were skeptical of the proposal.
Analysts noted that most of the nation's construction workers are already paying income taxes -- and therefore would not be a reliable source to make up the tax credit revenue -- because unemployment is low in the sector.
In addition, although private investment can work for larger, more profitable projects -- such as toll roads -- smaller, routine maintenance efforts likely would not easily attract private dollars.
“These are sort of formulaic numbers that you could come up with to present something that looks like a plan," Pat Jones, who heads private toll operators group the International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association, told the Journal.