Policy implementation lessons from six road pricing cases

Abstract

The implementation of road pricing has been limited worldwide despite the notion that road pricing is generally considered to be a potentially effective measure to reduce externalities, in particular traffic congestion. By means of a content analysis of 106 scientific papers, this paper aims to identify and compare the detailed set of implementation factors for the four implemented road pricing cases of Singapore, London, Stockholm and the Norwegian cities, and the two not implemented cases of Hong Kong and Edinburgh. Policy implementation lessons are formulated to aid local and national authorities considering the implementation of road pricing. In contrast to other studies, this paper identifies a broad set of implementation factors for each empirical case (an average of 36). The cases have six generic implementation factors in common, the most prominent being political and public support. However, the generic factors only account for on average 27% of all the implementation factors listed. Consequently, authorities aiming to implement road pricing also need to take many case specific factors into account in the implementation process. Furthermore, the six cases show that policy implementation will only be successful when many factors positively contribute to the process which explains why it is such a precarious endeavour.