In a perfect world, lots of things would be different. Unfortunately, it's an imperfect world and Pennsylvania has found out what hard choices this world demands.

Last week the state discovered that its solution to a transportation funding crisis is no solution. On Thursday, the Federal Highway Administration announced that it had rejected placing tolls on Interstate 80 because it did not meet congressionally mandated requirements.

A solution to a crisis has gone back to being a crisis -- a serious one that will shortly leave a $500 billion hole in the effort to fix deteriorating roads and bridges and fund ailing public transportation systems such as the Port Authority of Allegheny County.

Drastic situations require drastic measures. With great reluctance, we think it may be time to reconsider Gov. Ed Rendell's plan to lease the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

This is how events have unfolded to bring us to this place: After a bipartisan panel found that Pennsylvania needed $1.7 billion a year to meet its transportation challenges, the Legislature passed Act 44 last year. Together with raising tolls on the existing turnpike by 25 percent starting in January, the legislation proposed tolling 1-80 to provide a steady revenue stream.

With the federal government now rejecting the tolling, thus confounding the main assumption of Act 44, the Legislature has to come up with a Plan B -- and quickly. Bonds floated by the turnpike commission under Act 44 will forestall an immediate impact, but the day of reckoning will come in two years.

Instead of tolling I-80, the Rendell administration has pushed leasing the turnpike to a private operator. Indeed, it went ahead and solicited bids and its choice is a Spanish-based consortium, Abertis/Citi Infrastructures, which is offering to pay $12.8 billion upfront for the right to operate the turnpike for 75 years. Its offer will expire soon if not acted upon; originally the deadline was Sept. 30, but the company says it would be willing to extend it through the legislative session. Gov. Rendell believes Jan. 1 is the final cutoff date.

The leasing proposal has met with resistance, some of it for reasons of self-interested preservation, such as from the turnpike commission itself. The Post-Gazette's past objection has been philosophical: We believe that roads and bridges are a core government responsibility. But if we stand on this principle and nothing is done, it will inevitably mean that the state's duty to fix crumbling roads and bridges will be jeopardized (and the death knell of the Port Authority and other transit systems will be sounded).

After meeting recently with consortium officials, we felt that some of our concerns had been alleviated. The company is no stranger to such ventures, bringing a wealth of experience from Europe. It promises to upgrade the turnpike, for example, by laying fiber optic cables so that surveillance cameras can be installed at regular intervals to monitor emergencies and improve response times. It would negotiate with union employees. And if the company doesn't fulfill its responsibilities, the contract would allow the state to take back the turnpike.

Does anybody have a better idea when doing nothing is not an option? (Raising the gas tax seems a nonstarter.) While the Post-Gazette doesn't favor privatizing other roads and bridges, these special circumstances do argue for giving the turnpike leasing proposal a second look.