[Texgreen] Toll Road Giant Buys Newspapers to Silence Critics

[margaret]

http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/15/1570.asp

Toll Road Giant Buys Newspapers to Silence Critics

Critics charge that the Macquarie purchase of American Consolidated=20
Media is designed to silence critics of a Texas toll road project

The Newspaper | January 28, 2007=A0

Australian toll road giant Macquarie agreed Wednesday to purchase forty=20=

local newspapers, primarily in Texas and Oklahoma, for $80 million.=20
Macquarie Bank is Australia's largest capital raising firm and has=20
invested billions in purchasing roads in the US, Canada and UK. Most=20
recently the company joined with Cintra Concesiones of Spain in a=20
controversial 75-year lease of the 157-mile Indiana Toll Road.

Sal Costello, the leading opponent of toll road projects as head of the=20=

Texas Toll Party, says the move is directly related to a 4,000-mile=20
toll road project known as the Trans-Texas Corridor. It will cost=20
between $145 and $183 billion to construct the road, expected to be up=20=

to 1,200 feet wide, requiring the acquisition of 9,000 square miles of=20=

land in the areas through which it will pass.

"The newspapers are the main communication tool for many of the rural=20
Texan communities, with many citizens at risk of losing their homes and=20=

farms through eminent domain," Costello wrote.

Many of the small papers purchased, most have a circulation of 5,000 or=20=

less, have been critical of the Trans-Texas Corridor. An article in the=20=

Bonham Journal for example, states, "The toll roads will be under=20
control of foreign investors, which more than frustrates Texans."=