Regional impacts of infrastructural programmes: ex-post assessment methodologies revisited

Abstract

The main purpose of the project reported in this article consists in contributing to the methodological debate, and to developing a methodology on ex-post evaluation of public investments in large infrastructures. Within this scope, the research was developed in the Northern Region of Portugal, in order to identify how much past investment in infrastructures (carried out throughout the last decade) engendered a sustainable regional economic growth, and to what extent they were able to reduce inter-regional inequalities. It is proposed the development of an integrated and interactive set of tools to support regional planning decisions concerning the aggregate ex-post evaluation of these kinds of investments. This ex-post assessment of the regional impact of past public investments is likely to improve current regional development policies through: (i) analysis and computation of the regional benefits that accrued from public investments already performed, (ii) support to the definition of transparency and efficiency criteria in the application of public resources, (iii) redesign of future policies for public investments, and (iii) support to more balanced inter-regional development policies.