Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Contents
1Externalities
o 1.1Traffic congestion
1.1.1Congestion pricing
o 1.2Pollution pricing
1.2.1Road space rationing
1.2.2Tradable mobility credits
2Funding and financing
3Regulation and competition
4Project appraisal and evaluation
o 4.1Appraisal
o 4.2Evaluation
5Social effects on poverty
6Car taxation
o 6.1Tax rates on acquisition
7See also
8References
9External links
Externalities[edit]
In addition to providing benefits to their users, transport networks impose
both positive and negative externalities on non-users. The consideration of these externalities –
particularly the negative ones – is a part of transport economics.
Positive externalities of transport networks may include the ability to provide emergency services,
increases in land value, and agglomeration benefits. Negative externalities are wide-ranging and
may include local air pollution, noise pollution, light pollution, safety hazards, community
severance and congestion. The contribution of transport systems to potentially hazardous climate
change is a significant negative externality which is difficult to evaluate quantitatively, making it
difficult (but not impossible) to include in transport economics-based research and analysis.
Congestion is considered a negative externality by economists.[2] An externality occurs when a
transaction causes costs or benefits to third party, often, although not necessarily, from the use
of a public good. For example, manufacturing or transportation cause air pollution imposing costs
on others when making use of public air.
Traffic congestion[edit]
Main article: Traffic congestion
Typical traffic congestion in an urban freeway. Shown here is I-80 Eastshore Freeway in Berkeley,
California.
Traffic congestion is a negative externality caused by various factors. A 2005 American study
stated that there are seven root causes of congestion, and gives the following summary of their
contributions: bottlenecks 40%, traffic incidents 25%, bad weather 15%, work zones 10%, poor
signal timing 5%, and special events/other 5%.[3] Within the transport economics
community, congestion pricing is considered to be an appropriate mechanism to deal with this
problem (i.e. to internalise the externality) by allocating scarce roadway capacity to users.
Capacity expansion is also a potential mechanism to deal with traffic congestion, but is often
undesirable (particularly in urban areas) and sometimes has questionable benefits (see induced
demand). William Vickrey, winner of the 1996 Nobel Prize for his work on "moral hazard", is
considered one of the fathers of congestion pricing, as he first proposed it for the New York City
Subway in 1952.[4] In the road transportation arena these theories were extended by Maurice
Allais, a fellow Nobel prize winner "for his pioneering contributions to the theory of markets and
efficient utilization of resources", Gabriel Roth who was instrumental in the first designs and upon
whose World Bank recommendation[5] the first system was put in place in Singapore. Reuben
Smeed, the deputy director of the Transport and Road Research Laboratory was also a pioneer
in this field, and his ideas were presented to the British government in what is known as
the Smeed Report.[6]
Congestion is not limited to road networks; the negative externality imposed by congestion is
also important in busy public transport networks as well as crowded pedestrian areas, e.g. on the
London Underground on a weekday or any urban train station, at peak times. There is the
classical excess in demand compared to supply. This is because at peak times there is a large
demand for trains, since people want to go home (i.e., a derived demand). However, space on
the platforms and on the trains is limited and small compared to the demand for it. As a result,
there are crowds of people outside the train doors and in the train station corridors. This
increases delays for commuters, which can often cause a rise in stress or other problems.
Congestion pricing[edit]
Main articles: Congestion pricing and Road pricing
Electronic Road Pricing Gantry at North Bridge Road, Singapore
Congestion pricing is an efficiency pricing strategy that requires the users to pay more for that
public good, thus increasing the welfare gain or net benefit for society.[7][8] Congestion pricing is
one of a number of alternative demand side (as opposed to supply side) strategies offered by
economists to address congestion.[9] Congestion pricing was first implemented in Singapore in
1975, together with a comprehensive package of road pricing measures, stringent car ownership
rules and improvements in mass transit.[10][11] Thanks to technological advances in electronic toll
collection, Singapore upgraded its system in 1998[12] (see Singapore's Electronic Road Pricing).
Similar pricing schemes were implemented in Rome in 2001, as an upgrade to the manual zone
control system implemented in 1998;[13][14] London in 2003 and extended in 2007 (see London
congestion charge); Stockholm in 2006, as seven-month trial, and then on a permanent basis
since August 2007[15] (see Stockholm congestion tax).
Pollution pricing[edit]
Main article: Pollution pricing
From 2008 to 2011, Milan had a traffic charge scheme, Ecopass, that exempted higher emission
standard vehicles (Euro IV) and other alternative fuel vehicles[16][17][18] This was later replaced by a
more conventional congestion pricing scheme, Area C.
Even the transport economists who advocate congestion pricing have anticipated several
practical limitations, concerns and controversial issues regarding the actual implementation of
this policy. As summarized by noted regional planner Robert Cervero:[19] "True social-cost pricing
of metropolitan travel has proven to be a theoretical ideal that so far has eluded real-world
implementation. The primary obstacle is that except for professors of transportation economics
and a cadre of vocal environmentalists, few people are in favor of considerably higher charges
for peak-period travel. Middle-class motorists often complain they already pay too much in
gasoline taxes and registration fees to drive their cars, and that to pay more during congested
periods would add insult to injury. In the United States, few politicians are willing to champion the
cause of congestion pricing in fear of reprisal from their constituents... Critics also argue that
charging more to drive is elitist policy, pricing the poor off of roads so that the wealthy can move
about unencumbered. It is for all these reasons that peak-periord pricing remains a pipe dream in
the minds of many."
Road space rationing[edit]
Main article: Road space rationing
Traffic congestion persists in São Paulo, Brazil, despite no-drive days based on license numbers.
Transport economists consider road space rationing an alternative to congestion pricing, but road
space rationing is considered more equitable, as the restrictions force all drivers to reduce auto
travel, while congestion pricing restrains less those who can afford paying the congestion charge.
Nevertheless, high-income users can avoid the restrictions by owning a second car.[20] Moreover,
congestion pricing (unlike rationing) acts "to allocate a scarce resource to its most valuable use,
as evinced by users' willingness to pay for the resource". While some "opponents of congestion
pricing fear that tolled roads will be used only by people with high income. But preliminary
evidence suggests that the new toll lanes in California are used by people of all income groups.
The ability to get somewhere fast and reliably is valued in a variety of circumstances. Not
everyone will need or want to incur a toll on a daily basis, but on occasions when getting
somewhere quickly is necessary, the option of paying to save time is valuable to people at all
income levels." Road space rationing based on license numbers has been implemented in cities
such as Athens (1982),[21] México City (1989), São
Paulo (1997), Santiago, Chile, Bogotá, Colombia, La Paz (2003),[22] Bolivia, and San
José (2005),[23][24] Costa Rica.
Tradable mobility credits[edit]
A more acceptable policy on automobile travel restrictions, proposed by transport
economists[25] to avoid inequality and revenue allocation issues, is to implement a rationing of
peak period travel but through revenue-neutral credit-based congestion pricing. This concept is
similar to the existing system of emissions trading of carbon credits, proposed by the Kyoto
Protocol to curb greenhouse emissions. Metropolitan area or city residents, or the taxpayers, will
have the option to use the local government-issued mobility rights or congestion credits for
themselves, or to trade or sell them to anyone willing to continue traveling by automobile beyond
the personal quota. This trading system will allow direct benefits to be accrued by those users
shifting to public transportation or by those reducing their peak-hour travel rather than the
government.[26][27]
Methods of funding and financing transport network maintenance, improvement and expansion
are debated extensively and form part of the transport economics field.[28][29]
Funding issues relate to the ways in which money is raised for the supply of transport capacity.
Taxation and user fees are the main methods of fund-raising. Taxation may be general
(e.g. income tax), local (e.g. sales tax or land value tax) or variable (e.g. fuel tax), and user fees
may be tolls, congestion charges or fares. The method of funding often attracts strong political
and public debate.
Financing issues relate to the way in which these funds are used to pay for the supply of
transport. Loans, bonds, public–private partnerships and concessions are all methods of
financing transport investment.
Appraisal[edit]
The appraisal of changes in the transport network is one of the most important applications of
transport economics. In order to make an assessment of whether any given transport project
should be carried out, transport economics can be used to compare the costs of the project with
its benefits (both social and financial). Such an assessment is known as a cost-benefit analysis,
and is usually a fundamental piece of information for decision-makers, as it places a value on the
net benefits (or disbenefits) of schemes and generates a ratio of benefits to costs which may be
used to prioritise projects when funding is constrained.
A primary difficulty in project appraisal is the valuation of time. Travel time savings are often cited
as a key benefit of transport projects, but people in different occupations, carrying out different
activities and in different social classes value time differently.
Appraising projects on the basis of their supposed reductions in travel times has come under
scrutiny in recent years with the recognition that improvements in capacity generate trips that
would not have been made (induced demand), partially eroding the benefits of reduced travel
times. Therefore, an alternative method of appraisal is to measure changes in land value and
consumer benefits from a transport project rather than the measuring benefits accruing to
travellers themselves. However, this method of analysis is much more difficult to carry out.
Another problem is that many transport projects have impacts that cannot be expressed in
monetary terms, such as impacts on, for example, local air quality, biodiversity and community
severance. Whilst these impacts can be included in a detailed environmental impact assessment,
a key issue has been how to present these assessments alongside estimates of those costs and
benefits that can be expressed in monetary terms. Recent developments in transport appraisal
practice in some European countries have seen the application of multi-criteria decision
analysis based decision support tools. These build on existing cost-benefit analysis and
environmental impact assessment techniques and help decision makers weigh up the monetary
and non-monetary impacts of transport projects. In the UK, one such application, the New
Approach to Appraisal has become a cornerstone of UK transport appraisal.
Evaluation[edit]
The evaluation of projects enables decision makers to understand whether the benefits and costs
that were estimated in the appraisal materialised. Successful project evaluation requires that the
necessary data to carry out the evaluation is specified in advance of carrying out the appraisal.
The appraisal and evaluation of projects form stages within a broader policy making cycle that
includes: