Highway Investment Research Articles

Meta-Analysis on the Indirect Impacts of Highway Investment: Evidence from Japan

Meta-Analysis on the Indirect Impacts of Highway Investment: Evidence from Japan

Investigation of The Use of Nano Powder On Roller Compressible Fibrous Concrete Roads

Despite the fact that our country's road network is inferior to that of industrialized countries, the volume of motor traffic is increasing. Thus, optimal solutions are imperative during both project and construction phases of highway investments. Concrete superstructures offer an alternative to flexible superstructures in various regions globally, including airport runways, warehouses, urban roads, streets, highways and industrial buildings. The objective of this study was to enhance the compressive and flexural strength of concrete and provide resistance against abrasion. To achieve this, a roller compressible concrete (RCC) mixture design was developed by incorporating basalt fiber, nano TiO2, and nano Fe2O3 additives. The experimental results were subjected to statistical analysis via the technique of analysis of variance (ANOVA). The findings of the study indicated that the strength performance of the optimal RCC mixture design reinforced with nano powder and fibers was superior to that of conventional concrete. Upon examination on a material basis, it was determined that the compressive strength exhibited an increase when the water/binder ratio was utilised within the range of 0.38–0.4. As the utilisation of nano-Fe2O3 and basalt fiber materials increased, their compressive strength exhibited a corresponding enhancement. The incorporation of basalt fiber into the composite material resulted in an increase in flexural strength at all ratios where it was utilised. It can be concluded that basalt fiber has the greatest potential for enhancing flexural strength. The optimal water-to-binder ratio for flexural properties is between 0.34 and 0.38. While nano powders can have a positive impact, they cannot achieve the maximum level of strength. For improving abrasion resistance, it was established that reducing the water/cement ratio, using fly ash, basalt fiber, and nano Fe2O3 in the mixture decreased abrasion. However, the usage of nano TiO2 did not have a significant positive effect. The material with the least effect on compressive, flexural and abrasion resistance was identified as nano TiO2. When materials other than nano TiO2 are utilised in accordance with the established optimal mixture calculation, the durability of the resulting RCC road will reach the requisite standard.

Impacts of highway induced land use changes on transport demand

Highway investment appraisals usually do not account for land use changes triggered by the investment. However, previous studies argue that new highways promote sprawling land use development associated with greater car dependency and increased motorized transport demand. This paper aims to increase the knowledge of how land use changes resulting from new highways impact transport demand. We model induced transport demand from seven highway investments, assuming both fixed and dynamic land use between the build and the no build scenarios. When land use is allowed to change, relocation of population is estimated with a regression model building on existing dynamics between population density and job accessibility. Our results indicate that land use changes resulting from highway investments impact induced transport demand. Highways that provide substantial travel time savings near urban areas are found to generate most induced transport demand from land use changes. However, induced demand from land use changes constitute a modest proportion of total induced demand resulting from the highways.

Research on investment evaluation of highway projects based on system dynamics model

<abstract> <p>Aiming at the deficiencies presented by the traditional methods of highway project investment evaluation, the proposed highway investment evaluation method was based on system dynamics. First, we constructed an evaluation index system from profitability, solvency, and risk resistance and clarified the positive and negative causality within the investment evaluation system of highway projects; second, we determined the boundaries of the system dynamics model and divided it into six sub-systems, namely, income, cash flow, investment evaluation, profit, cost, investment and financing, and liabilities; and then, we established the system dynamics model of highway investment evaluation based on the sub-systems. The model made up for the limitations of the traditional discounted cash flow method; finally, taking the China's Yunnan Province an Expressway project as an example, using VENSIM software simulation, we get the evaluation results of the system dynamics model and make a comparative analysis with the discounted cash flow method, which showed that the calculation inaccuracies of the NPV and other financial indicators were in a reasonable range, and the evaluation method had strong operability and practicability. The system dynamics investment evaluation model provided a systematic, intuitive, whole-process investment evaluation method, which provided a theoretical basis for the analysis and decision-making of the investment effect of highway projects.</p> </abstract>

A Visualization Study of Highway Investment Based on Network Analysis

The proportion of highways in infrastructure investment is growing and playing a significant role. It has many advantages in all aspects of social life and has become a timely subject of recent research. However, the existing literature lacks a systematic review of the current research status of highway investment. Thus, this study aims to conduct a scientometric analysis of the existing literature on highway investment to provide an overview of its current state of research. Using the Web of Science Core Collection database, this study conducted searches and screenings of 614 documents related to highway investment from 2013 to 2023. Subsequently, VOSviewer software was employed to perform a visual analysis of source journals, authors, countries/regions, article citations, and keywords. The results reveal that Transportation Research Record is identified as the most influential journal in the field of highway investment. Bullock, Darcy M. has published the greatest number of articles. In addition, the United States has published the largest number of studies and contributed significantly to the advancement of highway investment. Benjamin Faber has received the highest number of citations and normalized citations. Through co-occurring keywords analysis, keywords such as “risk”, “influence”, “investment decision”, and “infrastructure investment” receive more attention. The findings of this research can contribute to providing researchers and scholars with a more comprehensive understanding of the current research status of highway investment and its key issues.

JUE insight: Infrastructure and Finance: Evidence from India’s GQ highway network

We use data from Reserve Bank of India to study the impact of India’s Golden Quadrilateral (GQ) highway project on finance-dependent activity. Loan volumes increase by 20%–30% in districts along GQ and are stronger in industries more dependent upon external finance. Loan growth begins with increases in average branch size and in places with more pre-GQ loan activity. New branch openings come later, consistent with short-run adjustment costs to expanding branch networks. These patterns are not evident in placebo tests using delayed investments in NS-EW highways. Results suggest the depth of initial financial infrastructure shapes how infrastructure investments impact localities.

The Value of Better Vehicle Occupancy Estimates for Project Prioritization

Transportation projects are increasingly evaluated based on how they improve person throughput, which requires knowing the passenger car occupancy. Yet obtaining occupancies is labor intensive, leading agencies to rely on statewide values. How useful are locality-specific vehicle occupancies? A case study of 38 candidate Virginia highway investments showed an occupancy change of .15 randomly applied to one-half of the projects affects 24% to 42% of project rankings if locality-specific occupancies are used. Occupancy is not the only data element affecting project prioritization, but it is an underlooked one. The study showed that an occupancy uncertainty of .15 is equivalent to an uncertainty of 3.90% in the discount rate or 13.2% in assigned traffic volume. As these investments had a mean value of $17 M, this study demonstrated that when project prioritization metrics are based on person throughput, city-or county-specific occupancies are an integral component of a data-driven prioritization process.

Learning-assisted intelligent risk assessment of highway project investment

Highway project has the characteristics of large investment scale and high investment risk. Aiming at the problem of investment risk management, this paper takes 15 highway investment projects in recent ten years as the research object, and establishes an investment risk index system including 12 first-class indexes and 30 second-class indexes. The hierarchical weight model of highway engineering investment risk assessment is proposed. The intelligent evaluation of highway engineering investment risk by extreme learning machine and broad learning system algorithm is discussed. The comparative experimental results show that the improved intelligent evaluation model can evaluate and predict the investment risk of highway engineering projects more effectively. The R-square value of the improved intelligent evaluation model is increased by 0.35, and the accuracy is greatly improved. It can provide decision support for highway engineering project investment risk management.

Research on the Multi-attribute Evaluation Model for the Investment Results of County-level Highways in New Urbanization

County-level highway, as a transport carrier to expand the external economic exchanges of rural areas, plays an important role as a hub in the rural road network system, and it is an important infrastructure for the country to promote the construction of new urbanization. In order to ensure the sustainable development of county-level highway, according to the relevant policies in China, the research on the investment effect evaluation of county-level highway projects has been regarded as a focus in the “14th Five-Year Plan”. Therefore, evaluating the investment benefits of the in-service county-level highways by identifying key evaluation factors has become an important research topic for new urbanization development. Since there is a lack of a comprehensive and reasonable evaluation index system. Therefore, this paper has taken the policy applicability and maximization of comprehensive benefits as the research goal, and started from five criteria, including new urbanization development ability, road network construction ability, economic benefits, social benefits and environmental benefits. Later, 14 second-level factors including industrial development ability, coverage of road network structure and national economic evaluation conclusion, etc., as well as a total of 58 third-level factors including the growth rate of the number of townships service industries and service industries, the increase of highway transport tools and regional urbanization growth rate, etc. were screened and constructed as the investment effect evaluation system. Subsequently, according to the characteristics of gray fuzzy of county-level highway indexes, this paper established a hybrid model applicable to the multi-attribute investment effect evaluation of new urbanization county-level highway, which used the game combination weighting method (GCWM), to combine the entropy power method and hierarchical analysis method to assign weights and reasonably calculate the comprehensive weights of indexes, and on this basis, it combined grey Euclid relational analysis method (GERAM) and the attribute theory to rank the correlation degrees of evaluation objects and further classify the investment effect level of the project. Finally, the hybrid model was applied to the county-level highway under the new urbanization construction demonstration counties to derive the optimal solution, as well as the optimization paths and measures for other auxiliary solutions. The results of this study provide an effective theoretical basis for the evaluation of the investment yield of rural transportation infrastructure with the support of policies, and provide a reliable practical method for the developing countries to achieve the maximum comprehensive benefits of the county-level highway investment programs with limited funds.

Two-Stage Robust Optimization Under Decision Dependent Uncertainty

In the conventional robust optimization (RO) context, the uncertainty is regarded as residing in a predeter-mined and fixed uncertainty set. In many applications, however, uncertainties are affected by decisions, making the current RO framework inapplicable. This paper investigates a class of two-stage RO problems that involve decision-dependent uncertainties. We introduce a class of polyhedral uncertainty sets whose right-hand-side vector has a dependency on the here-and-now decisions and seek to derive the exact optimal wait-and-see decisions for the second-stage problem. A novel iterative algorithm based on the Benders dual decomposition is proposed where advanced optimality cuts and feasibility cuts are designed to incorporate the uncertainty-decision coupling. The computational tractability, robust feasibility and optimality, and convergence performance of the proposed algorithm are guaranteed with theoretical proof. Four motivating application examples that feature the decision-dependent uncertainties are provided. Finally, the proposed solution methodology is verified by conducting case studies on the pre-disaster highway investment problem.

Are the compensations given to mining enterprises due to the overlapping with other investments in Turkey enough? Expectations of compensation for profit deprivation

Generally, there can be very high differences among the alternative investment costs of the other activity which overlaps with mining. This situation can oblige the overlapping of the alternative investments of these activities that overlap with mining in the available location with mining sites due to not being able to be preferred. There is no mistake in shutting down mining activities completely or partially in these kinds of investment overlaps. However, are mining operations, whose activities have been finalized due to not being foreseen beforehand and who experience investment loss, given compensation for profit deprivation and investment losses? Are the investment costs of mining operations covered precisely? In these kinds of investment overlaps in Turkey, particularly license and land use fees of mining enterprises are not paid, compensation for profit deprivation are not paid by considering proved mineral reserve, and investment costs are given only to a limited extent. This situation occurred e.g. in Izmir as a result of the overlapping of 15 mining operations with a highway investment project route. The expectation of mining enterprises in Turkey and the opinion of doctrine considering Turkish Constitution and legislative provisions are that all mining investment losses to met completely and compensation for profit deprivation to met to a certain extent. In the answers given to the question asked for mining enterprises through SurveyMonkey program in 2018, most of the enterprises request that compensation for lost profit is given from the proved reserved to a certain extent due to mineral reserve losses. Along with the available investment costs foreseen in Turkish Mining Regulation, several times more of six-month operating costs determined as profit deprivation in nationalizations can be given to all mining enterprises whose activities are terminated in these investment overlaps. Or, a different method can be applied in the calculation of compensation for profit deprivation. In this method, it is suggested that a new calculation for compensation for profit deprivation shall be made by considering pit sale prices and proved reserves. There are distinctions made as the operations -whose proved reserves are determined according to UMREK, The operations whose proved reserves are not determined according to UMREK (or whose proved reserves determined in mining operating projects), “mining enterprise whose proved mineral reserve is determined according to UMREK (congruent with CRIRSCO), or not determined according to UMREK (considered mining operating project in Turkey), “open-pit or underground mining operation” and “mining operation providing or not providing additional added value by processing the minerals in their country and facilities.” Considering these differences, it was suggested to apply different compensation rates.

Crowd-in Effect of Highway Capital on Private Investment in the United States

This paper examines the impacts of public transportation infrastructure investment on private investment and whether public infrastructure investment tends to “crowd in” or “crowd out” private investment. “Crowding in” refers to situations where public investment encourages private sector investment, whereas “crowding out” refers to situations where public investment discourages private sector investment. This analysis applies the vector autoregression (VAR) methodology for an empirical study. Using national-level annual data from 1947 to 2017 in the United States, estimation results suggest that public investment in highways tends to crowd in private investment after an initial and temporary crowding-out effect. Most of the positive impacts on private investment accrue within 3 years after the initial public investment. The incremental impact diminishes almost completely after roughly 10 years. Alternative model specifications and sensitivity analyses further confirm the robustness of the model specification by yielding consistent and positive crowd-in effects within the first 3 to 5 years after the public investment.

Assessment of the socio-spatial effects of urban transport investment using Google Maps API

We analyze the spatially distributed impacts of transport investment in urban highways and public transport with a novel methodology based on the capabilities of online technology to replicate the (unobserved) condition without highways. This is based upon the intensive use of Google Maps API (GMA) to obtain travel times between each origin-destination pair at a highly detailed level to reveal the effects of new infrastructure on different zones and groups within a city. Santiago is used as a case study, as the city introduced 150 km of urban highways, a reorganization of surface transit, and new subway lines in a relatively short period. We show that the high-income segment of the population has been the most favored, simultaneously increasing the difference between transit and car travel times in those areas where car ownership is low, stimulating the acquisition of a car.

Economic evaluation of transportation projects based on different financing methods: at the framework of financial computable general equilibrium model

Purpose- The purpose of this study is to develop a first fully functional Turkish Financial Computable General Equilibrium (FCGE) model that analyzes the economic impacts of infrastructure investment projects under different financing options. We examine three alterantive financing methods, i.e., public financing with tax revenues and government bonds, public financing with region specific tax policy and private financing. Methodology- The study employs Financial Computable General Equilibrium (FCGE) model. The FCGE model integrates the real economy with the financial one, and traces the flows of financial and real resources among economic agents at the same time. Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) models typically are comparative static equilibrium models of interregional trade and location based in microeconomics, using utility and production functions with substitution between inputs. The transport system enters the spatial economy through the costs of transport services. Transport sub models are applied to feed CGE models with cost changes in the transport sector as a result of policy measures. Our model is composed of a multi-regional financial CGE model and a transport network model. Turkish Multi Regional Computable General Equilibrium model constitutes of 11 regions. The model includes ten producers, one regional household, one national (or central) government and the rest of the world. Findings- The model is designed to analyze the economic effects of fiscal policies such as the transportation investment expenditures and alternative financing approaches on economic growth and welfare. It is possible to estimate growth and distributional effects of each project based on the financing method once the information on the investment expenditures, the construction location and the changes in the accessibility generated by the project are injected into the FCGE model. As a first attempt, we builded a Financial Social Accounting Matrix (SAM) for Turkey that FCGE models need, containing the details of financial institutions and transaction of agents’ assets and liabilities. The model specifies the behaviours of ten different sectors, one household, a central government, and the rest of the world. The model is designed to analyze the impacts of highway development with different financing strategies. We examine three alterantive financing methods: it can (a) public financing with tax revenues and government bonds, (b) public financing with region specific tax policy or (c) private financing. Conclusion- The main contribution of this research is to develop a first fully functional FCGE model to analyze the economic impacts of the infrastructure investment projects and their financing options on growth and welfare in Turkish economy. We develop a first fully functional Turkish Financial Computable General Equilibrium (FCGE) model that analyzes the economic impacts of infrastructure investment projects under different financing options. There are a number of ways to finance highway infrastructure investment: fuel taxes, user fees, trust funds etc. This Financial CGE model is expected to assess the consistency of highway investment programs under different financing options, so the government can make a decision on an approval for the project based according to their benefits and costs on national level.

Total-factor energy efficiency change of the road transportation industry in China: A stochastic frontier approach

The mismatch between the supply and consumption of energy indicates that it is important to promote energy efficiency in the road transportation industry which is high in energy consumption. This paper employs a stochastic frontier approach to measure the total-factor energy efficiency (TFEE) change of the road transportation industry in China. Then, a novel two-dimensional matrix is used to illustrate the energy efficiency of the road transportation industry in China’s eight economic areas. The combination of these approaches leads to the following conclusions: (a) The annual TFEE growth rate of Chinese road transportation systems has slowed down in recent years, but the average annual TFEE growth has reached 17.34%. (b) Both technological change and scale efficiency change boost the TFEE growth, and technical efficiency change hinders the TFEE growth. (c) Almost all regional road transportation industry TFEE scores increased during the study period, but the growth rates were significantly higher in the Northern Coastal and Eastern Coastal areas than in other areas. Finally, this paper suggests increasing investment in highways to expand the operation scale, developing advanced technology for high-quality development of the industry, and carefully designing measures to improve transportation technical efficiency according to regional economic development orientations.

Synergy effects of highway investments on the Turkish economy: An application of an integrated transport network with a multiregional CGE model

We develop a Multi-Regional Spatial Computable General Equilibrium (TurkSCGE) model for economic analysis of highway projects, estimating their impacts on regional welfare and economic outcomes in Turkey. The framework integrates a transport sub-model that estimates minimum distances with a multiregional Computable General Equilibrium model that estimates economic aggregates. TurkSCGE identifies eight sectors in each of 11 regions. Three experiments explore the impacts of decreases in transportation margins from ‘distance shortening’. The three highway projects involved are estimated to yield a combined increase in GDP of 1.6%. However, the new highways in eastern Turkey, connecting eastern regions to each other and the west are shown to be best options for improving welfare in poorer regions.

Highway Investment Contribution Rate based on Input-output Model

Highway Investment Contribution Rate based on Input-output Model

Reconsidering the Challenges of Earmarked Taxes for Highways

A prominent theme in US federal infrastructure policy is the near-term insolvency of the Highway Trust Fund (HTF), the dedicated financing stream for highways and public transit. The HTF is projected to exhaust its reserves by 2022 and require more than $170 billion in cumulative general revenue transfers by 2029, leading to widespread funding uncertainty for nationally-significant surface transportation infrastructure and a dramatic increase in the national debt. This paper examines three countries - Japan, England, and Australia - that chose to eliminate earmarked taxes for highways and examines whether their infrastructure benefited as a result. International outcomes were mixed as to whether federal investments in highways and road quality remained robust following the intervention. But such a solution, with stringent safeguards, could provide an answer to the HTF solvency issue in upcoming surface transportation reauthorization legislation.

Study on Sustainable Development Highway Traffic

The rapid development of road traffic has provided a driving force for socio-economic development. By analyzing the current status of highway transportation development and investment in environmental protection of highway transportation, it is concluded that only by coordinating the relationship between the development of highway transportation and environmental protection can sustainable highway transportation be realized. By analyzing the practice of highway transportation development, this paper concluded that sustainable transportation development can only be achieved by adhering to resource conservation, environmental protection and technological innovation.

On the Effects of Infrastructure Investments on the Regional Economic Mix in Portugal

In this paper, we deal with the issue of the effects of infrastructure investments on the regional mix of economic activity in Portugal. To address this issue we use a new data set for infrastructure investments in Portugal at the level of the NUTS II. We use a region-specific VAR approach, which considers, for each region, not only the effects of infrastructure investments in the region itself but also the regional spillover effects for each region from infrastructure investments elsewhere. Our results can be summarized as follows. First, we find that the largest aggregate effects are for investments in municipal roads, airports, ports, and education. Second, regional spillovers are very important across the board, and are particularly relevant for municipal roads and highways. Third, we find that for road transportation infrastructures, investments in national roads shift the regional concentration of economic activity towards North, Lisbon, and Alentejo, while investments in municipal roads have the same effects for Centre and investments in highways once again in North, Lisbon and Alentejo. For other transportation infrastructures the shifts in regional economic composition occur in North and Alentejo for railroad investments, Lisbon, Alentejo, and Algarve for airport investment, and Centre and Algarve for port infrastructure investments. Finally, investments in both education and health shift the regional output mix towards North and Centre, and in the case of health Alentejo as well. Accordingly, the aggregate effects of infrastructure investments hides a wide variety of effects across regions and across different infrastructure assets. Being mindful of these differences is fundamental in designing policies that help with aggregate economic performance without increasing regional disparities.