Road Pricing Research Articles

Road pricing and spatial distribution of traffic flow in radial-arc network

This paper discusses the effect of road pricing on the spatial distribution of traffic flow. The traffic flow density is derived for a circular city with a radial-arc network. The traffic flow density describes the amount of traffic as a function of position and allows us to identify the location of potential congestion areas. The analytical expression for the traffic flow density demonstrates how the size of the toll area and the toll level affect the spatial distribution of traffic flow. As the size of the toll area increases, the decrease in traffic flow inside the toll area becomes smaller. As the toll level increases, the increase in traffic flow at the boundary of the toll area becomes greater. The effect of the travel cost on the spatial distribution of traffic flow is also examined. These findings can be used to determine the size of the toll area and the toll level required to achieve a certain level of traffic congestion.

Sustainable urban rail funding: Insights from a century-long global dataset

In recent years, urban rail funding has become an increasing concern in some western cities. The underlying issues over ridership and funding has largely been driven by trends such as increasing teleworking and new transport modes like ridesharing, which are likely to further exacerbate funding issues in the aftermath of the worldwide health crisis. This paper contributes to the discussion through the examination of funding within urban rail transport, specifically the strengths and weaknesses of mechanisms that can be used to achieve sustainable, stable long-term funding. A unique, very long-term historical dataset of five large metros around the world was collected for this research, with the analysis based on evidence of actual practices, from a relatively rare organisational perspective. Key results include: i) appropriate fare-setting has been critical for long-term financial health, but is vulnerable to inflation effects and political interference; indexing is important but use of consumer prices has led to revenue erosion in real terms, since wage growth is typically higher. ii) How subsidies are generated can have varying impacts on funding stability and sustainability — dedicated taxes and cross-subsidies from road charges are typically better than direct grants as they are secured by legislation; they also reduce political changes and avoid competing claims from other types of government spending (health, education), as compared with grants. iii) Commercial revenue can be a valuable source for future growth, in light of increased resistance to taxation. Real estate-related revenues in particular can be substantial, as in Hong Kong and Tokyo, with historically faster growth than wages, while also capturing any further value increases from rail system improvements.

Just Who Should Pay for What? Vertical Equity, Transit Subsidy and Road Pricing: The Case of New York City

In this paper, equity and cross-subsidization issues associated with the congestion pricing scheme proposed as part of New York City’s PlaNYC are examined, as are initial usage patterns, user income distribution, and revenue distribution. We find that equity concerns surrounding the proposal are supported by economic analysis. If New York City is to revisit congestion pricing in the future and make it more politically palatable, it will need to find a way to mitigate these equity concerns.

Improving Metropolitan Transportation Efficiency With FAST Miles

In America’s large and severely congested metropolitan areas, carpools and express bus service could attract many more riders if they could operate between residential areas and job centers on free-flowing highways that provide premium service opportunities. FAST Miles attempts to eliminate recurring congestion on limited-access highway systems using a potentially more publicly acceptable form of road pricing, along with an integrated multimodal strategy to encourage shifts of solo-driving commuters to alternative modes. FAST Miles allocates to motorists a limited number of free miles for use in peak periods on limited-access highways. Every motorist would get a share of free peak-period use of FAST highway facilities “already paid for” through his or her taxes through free FAST Miles credits. Total outstanding credits would be limited to ensure that the metropolitan highway system does not get congested and that express bus services operate faster, providing better levels of service at a lower cost.The concept would include new express bus and carpooling services, improved passenger collection and distribution services at bus transfer stations, free transit trial periods, web-based multimodal trip-planning programs, and individualized marketing of alternative modes at employment centers and in residential areas. Preliminary sketch analysis suggests that FAST Miles could be self-financing. It also would introduce new possibilities for public-private partnerships.

Travel Demand Management: Lessons for Malaysia

The growth in the number of motor vehicles has exacted costs on both the Malaysian economy and environment. For reasons such as increasing disposable incomes and poor management of the public transportation system, the number of vehicles has grown unabated and, in fact, is aided by various contradictory policy measures such as national car projects and the existence of fuel subsidies.A phased, five-pronged Transport Development Management-based approach is recommended towards targeting a sustainable transportation system in Malaysia: (1) alteration of charges on road taxes and car insurance, (2) elimination of fuel subsidies, (3) imposition of fuel taxes and amendments in the bases for car taxation, (4) congestion charging, particularly in Kuala Lumpur, and (5) national road pricing. This move towards an eventual sustainable transportation system is presented for consideration.

Impact of Bus Priority Attributes on Catchment Area Residents in Dublin, Ireland

In many jurisdictions, political and infrastructural restrictions have limited the feasibility of road pricing as a response to urban congestion. Accordingly, the allocation of dedicated road space to high frequency buses has emerged as a second-best option. Analyses of the evidence emerging from this option emphasize the engineering and technical issues and do not systematically interrogate the customers, those in the bus catchment area that use or could potentially use the service. This paper attempts to correct for this asymmetry in focus by analyzing characteristics and preferences of users and non-users through a survey of 1,000 households for a particular quality bus catchment area in Dublin, Ireland. Preliminary findings are encouraging, both for the use of this policy instrument as one which can yield considerable consumer satisfaction, and in terms of modal share analysis, especially because the corridor under scrutiny represents a much higher socio-economic profile than Dublin or Ireland as a whole.

The Interrelationship between Road Pricing Acceptability and Self-Driving Vehicle Adoption: Insights from Four Countries

Driverless vehicles (i.e., autonomous and shared autonomous vehicles) are associated with many advantages for the transportation market. However, they may also increase the traveled miles on roads due to improved accessibility, thus aggravating congestion. Road pricing (RP) is a possible solution for mitigating traffic-related problems like congestion. Despite its benefits, RP is usually resented by the public, which may hinder its introduction. This study investigates the factors that may influence RP acceptability in the era of driverless vehicles and driverless vehicle adoption in the presence of RP. For this purpose, a survey was distributed in Hungary, Jordan, Ukraine, and Brazil. The study applied factor analysis, multiple linear regression, and multinomial logit modeling to examine RP acceptability and driverless vehicle adoption. All examined factors have a significant impact on mode choice. For instance, respondents willing to share their trips with others due to the application of RP, opted for shared autonomous vehicles, while those who enjoy driving were less likely to choose autonomous vehicles. In terms of RP acceptability, the respondents who were environmentally conscious in their trip planning showed more acceptance of RP. This study shows the significant impacts of the investigated factors on RP acceptability and driverless vehicle adoption.

Why all roads lead to a UK tax on electric vehicles [Analysis - Road pricing

With both cost of living and climate crises raging, the government needs to strike a balance between maintaining public funding and continuing to make electric vehicles an attractive option for householders. The government is facing increasing pressure to look seriously at a way of taxing motorists who drive electric vehicles (EVs), with the 2030 ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles otherwise set to leave the Treasury with a £35bn fiscal black hole.

전기자동차(Electric Vehicles)의 자동차 마일리지세 과세 방안 연구

Many major overseas countries, including South Korea, have long relied on so-called vehicle fuel taxes for fuel consumption, such as the oil flow tax, for most of their road finances. However, with the spread of fuel-efficient vehicles and the advent of the era of electric vehicles that do not consume fuel such as gasoline, tax revenues from vehicle fuel taxes are expected to plummet. Already, the United States and EU member countries are anticipating the advent of the EV era, and from the perspective of sustainability, they will add a tax on automobile fuel consumption in order to seek financial resources for roads. Convert to This is in progress.
 In the transition and conversion to taxation and charging of automobile mileage tax, the issue is whether the automobile mileage tax is to be levied as a tax or a contribution. In particular, in the case of charges, there is a problem as to whether they are non-tax charges, beneficiary charges, or user charges. In the United States, tax and non-tax contributions have been determined through extensive judicial precedents of various government agencies. As a result, there is a relationship between burden and revenue in ensuring the legitimacy of user fees or charges in fiscal revenue raising at levels including federal and state, and rules have been established to pay those who receive special benefits.
 Also, in the conversion to automobile mileage taxation, there is a Big Brother concern due to the aggregation of citizens' automobile driving information through collection procedures. In the United States, there are concerns that the automobile mileage tax system will act negatively on the privacy interests of citizens who are motorists. The car mileage tax charging and collection model program based on cutting-edge technology is characterized by the structure of private-public cooperation projects supervised by the government. It is said that it is necessary to prevent infringement of the privacy of the management body in advance and to prevent leaks.

Time-of-day pricing for toll roads under traffic demand uncertainties: A distributionally robust simulation-based optimization method

Road pricing has received increasing attention for traffic congestion mitigation, but traffic demand uncertainties cause a profound impact on its effectiveness. This study proposes a link-based time-of-day pricing distributionally robust simulation-based optimization (DRSO) model to minimize the worst-case expected total travel time (TTT). This model aims to answer where and how much to charge under origin–destination (OD) traffic demand uncertainties that are described by an ambiguity set of probability distributions, and is solved by a DRSO method with two stages. The first stage searches an infill sample after building two stochastic kriging models (i.e., SKG-I and SKG-II) to map the relation between the traffic demand uncertainty parameter and the average TTT for each decision sample, and that between the decision variable and the worst-case average TTT, respectively. The second stage introduces the optimal computational budget allocation (OCBA) method to distribute more simulation replications to more promising combination samples, which helps to improve the prediction accuracy of SKGs in promising regions. The DRSO method is first tested with an M/M/1 queuing problem, and numerical results show its outperformance compared with one counterpart algorithm. After that, it is applied to address the link-based time-of-day pricing DRSO problem on Anaheim network and two solution algorithms are also added for comparison. Numerical results show that the robust toll plan solved by the DRSO method outperforms no toll plan and two other toll plans solved by the comparison algorithms in handling traffic dynamics and different levels of traffic demand uncertainties. In conclusion, the DRSO method is promising to address the costly simulation-based optimization (SO) problems under uncertainties characterized by an ambiguity set of probability distributions.

Implications of static and dynamic road pricing strategies in the era of autonomous and shared autonomous vehicles using simulation-based dynamic traffic assignment: The case of Budapest

The advent of autonomous vehicles (AVs) and shared autonomous vehicles (SAVs) is expected to improve network performance and increase accessibility. However, the improved accessibility will most likely induce more vehicle miles traveled, which necessitates the use of travel demand management tools like road pricing (RP). This research deploys dynamic traffic assignment for Budapest network using “Visum” to investigate the impact of three RP schemes (static and dynamic) on network performance and social welfare in three proposed future traffic scenarios for the years 2030 and 2050. The 2030 scenario combines conventional cars (CC), AVs, and SAVs, where CC is the dominant private transport mode (Mix-Traffic Scenario), while the two scenarios for 2050 include AVs and SAVs only and are characterized by high adoption of AVs (AV-Focused Scenario) or wide usage of SAVs (SAV-Focused Scenario). The results revealed that the impact of RP schemes differs according to the different penetration rates of AVs and SAVs. Nevertheless, considering the social benefits gained, implementing a dynamic pricing strategy (Link-based Scheme) in the case of AV-Focused and SAV-Focused scenarios shows better outcomes compared to other pricing schemes. Conversely, the static pricing strategies (i.e., Bridge Toll and Distance-based Schemes) outperform dynamic strategies in the Mix-Traffic scenario.

No-queue road pricing: A comprehensive policy instrument for Europe?

European roads have become increasingly congested over the last decades. Addressing congestion is a multi-faceted issue. In the short term, adequate incentives may shift peak car travel to other times, roads or modes. In the longer term, investment projects should be prioritized to provide an efficient supply of road capacity. This also touches upon funding issues. This paper eclectically reviews the literature to demonstrate the potential of no-queue road pricing (NQRP, i.e., setting tolls responsive to real-time traffic conditions) to contribute to a European policy framework and address three challenges: (i) congestion management; (ii) investment project prioritization; and (iii) sustainable road funding. The limitations of NQRP and reasons why it has not been implemented anywhere in Europe yet are examined. Potential implementation issues are discussed, and a conceptual framework for socially acceptable NQRP is drafted.

Guardrails on priced lanes: Protecting equity while promoting efficiency

We examine the fairness of congestion pricing from two perspectives. First, using data from California’s six largest urban areas, we empirically estimate the share of the population that is both economically vulnerable and likely to be impacted by freeway congestion charges. Our estimates suggest that 13 % of households would fall into this category. Second, we consider ways to mitigate burdens for this group. In particular, we compare freeway use to use of other metered network infrastructure, like electricity grids and water systems. We suggest that assistance programs from these utilities provide useful lessons for protecting low-income drivers from road prices, and argue that policymakers would be less constrained in progressively redistributing congestion toll revenue than they would be in redistributing utility revenue.

Emissions and spatial distribution of air pollutants from anthropogenic sources in Jakarta

This study aims to develop emission inventory and emission spatial distribution of NOX, CO, PM2.5, PM10, NMVOC, BC, and SO2 from anthropogenic sources in Jakarta from 2015 to 2030, using 2015 as a baseline year. The results from this study can be very important to improve the emission data for Jakarta and contribute to the global emission model. Emissions of these pollutants were calculated using GAINS (Greenhouse gas Air pollution INteractions and Synergies) model, considering implementation of emission standards for transport and stationary combustion sources as well as policies stimulating accelerated electrification of vehicle fleets and vehicle scrapping programs. The impact of current policies to emission reduction was also evaluated in this study. The total 2015 emissions of NOX, CO, PM2.5, PM10, NMVOC, BC and SO2 were estimated at around 53 Gg, 144 Gg, 4.6 Gg, 6 Gg, 48.6 Gg, 1.2 Gg, and 20 Gg, respectively. The biggest contribution for NOx, CO, BC and NMVOC emissions originated from road transportation sector which contributed about 57%, 93% and 75%, 96% respectively, while for SO2, industrial combustion contributed about 67%. Heavy duty vehicles contribute the most NOx and BC emissions in the transport sector, while motorcycles emit the most CO. PM2.5 and PM10 in Jakarta are mostly emitted from road transportation and industrial combustion sectors, which contributed around 43%–46% for each sector. Heavy duty vehicles were still the highest contributor of PM2.5 emission in the transport sector. Based on emission spatial distribution and the AERMOD dispersion model, the highest concentration of all pollutants was found in the central of Jakarta, where traffic activities are very busy. Policy implementation could effectively reduce pollution levels in Jakarta. The accelerated implementation of electric vehicles, stringent emission standards, and transport management measures like electronic road pricing could significantly contribute to the reduction of PM2.5, PM10 as well as BC.

Diff-Price: Differential Pricing Scheme for Provisioning Safety-as-a-Service in Vehicular IoT Applications

In this paper, we propose a differential pricing scheme, named as <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Diff-Price</i> , to deliver customized safety services to the users at an optimal price and maximizing the profit of Safety Service Provider (SSP) using the Safety-as-a-Service (Safe-aaS) platform. None of the existing pricing schemes addresses the dynamic variation of price as the type of users and decision parameters requested by them vary. We assume road transportation as the implementation scenario of Safe-aaS. In order to deal with these issues, we formulate a pricing scheme, which renders different prices for the same decision parameters. The amount charged from the users are based on their type, decision parameters selected by them, and the duration for which they request the service. Additionally, the SSP allows suitable discounted price to the users, which is determined from their mode of payment and history of services availed. Further, to model the interaction between the users and SSPs, we design our problem as a multiple leader multiple follower non-cooperative Stackelberg game. We calculate the utility of SSPs and formulate an optimization problem to compute the optimal value of the basic price charged from the users. The exhaustive mathematical analysis and simulation results reveal that the proposed pricing scheme, Diff-Price improves the financial gain of the service providers as the number of users increases by 13.51%, 15.75%, and 14.173% respectively, compared to the adaptive incremental spot pricing scheme [1], differentiated cloud virtual-network as-a-service scheme [2], and smart road pricing system [3].

Tradable mobility permits in a monocentric city with pre-existing labor taxation: A general equilibrium perspective

This paper studies tradable mobility permit schemes in a monocentric city with a distorting labor tax, considering spatially differentiated allocations of permits to households. Numerical results show that an allocation of permits proportional to labor supply reaches about 99.9% of first-best welfare, clearly outperforming a scheme with lump-sum allocation of permits, and being more efficient than the second-best tax for levels of the labor tax of 20% or higher. This is due to the welfare gains of incentivizing labor supply, which has an effect similar to the revenue recycling effect of conventional road pricing, and that can be optimized by the social planner by exploiting spatial differences. Other alternatives, such as an allocation of permits proportional to distance from the CBD and a cordon-based scheme do not reach those high levels of efficiency. Our results provide insights into the efficiency of tradable driving permit schemes as an alternative to road pricing to tackle present externalities, showing that a spatial differentiation of the allocation of permits can be a powerful instrument in the hands of the regulator.

Combining Tradable Credit Schemes with a New Form of Road Pricing: Producing Liveable Cities and Meeting Decarbonisation Goals

This paper considers how the implementation of a tradable credit scheme (TCS) may be used to reduce road traffic and to contribute to the formation of liveable cities and global climate change commitments. The concept of applying TCS to individual road transport is familiar to transport researchers as a measure to regulate congestion and reduce transport-related emissions. Yet, it is not a strategy currently being considered by policy makers in the UK, despite the electrification of the road vehicle fleet and the associated loss of tax revenue presenting a rare opportunity to alter the economic instruments, which apply to road traffic. We consider how transport researchers can capitalise on this unique moment in transport history to shape transport policy. Our study uses qualitative methods, including a thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with transport stakeholders and experts, in addition to a literature review and document analysis. Data analysis is inductive, permitting the formation of new ideas about the potential benefits of TCS and the barriers to the application of TCS to real-world policy. Building upon the results of TCS experiments and the results of our analysis, we propose a novel potential form of TCS combined with road pricing to maintain government revenue, which incentivises road users to decrease road vehicle kilometres travelled and reduce pollution and congestion. The proposal contributes to the discussion on the governance of road transport and taxation.

Pricing vehicle emissions and congestion externalities using a dynamic traffic network simulator

• Road pricing is a potential tool for controlling traffic congestion and pollution. • We study cordon tolls using the dynamic traffic network simulator METROPOLIS. • A Gaussian dispersion model is used to compute the distribution of pollution. • Step tolls have only a small advantage over flat tolls for pricing emissions. • Health effects vary with location relative to the cordon(s) and wind direction. Road traffic is a major contributor to air pollution which is a serious problem in many large cities. Experience in London, Milan, and Stockholm indicates that road pricing can be useful in reducing vehicle emissions as well as congestion. This study uses a dynamic traffic network simulator that models choices of mode, departure time, and route to investigate the effectiveness of tolls to target emissions and congestion externalities on a stylized urban road network during a morning commuting period. The spatial distribution of four pollutants is calculated using a Gaussian dispersion model that accounts for wind speed and direction. Single and double cordon tolls are evaluated, as well as flat tolls that do not change during the simulation period and step tolls that change at half-hourly intervals. The presence of emissions externalities raises optimal toll levels, and substantially increases the welfare gains from tolling, although the proportional advantage of step tolls over flat tolls is lower than if congestion is the only externality. The individual welfare-distributional effects of tolling vary strongly with residential and workplace locations relative to the cordon, and also differ for the upwind and downwind sides of the city.

Managing mixed traffic with autonomous vehicles – A day-to-day routing allocation scheme

In presence of the emerging technology of automated vehicles, it is anticipated that the future traffic system would be comprised of mixed traffic with both self-driving autonomous vehicles (AVs) and human-driven conventional vehicles. It is imperative to propose new traffic management measures to manage the future traffic system, as complement of the existing ones such as road pricing schemes. This study seeks to take advantage of the controllable property of AVs’ routing choices to develop a day-to-day routing allocation scheme for a certain number of autonomous vehicles so as to drive the mixed traffic system into a desired traffic state. Specifically, we assume that all travelers are bounded rational and AV users are willing to accept route allocation with route travel cost not exceeding HV users’ indifference band. Therefore, the best-case bounded rationality user equilibrium (BRUE) flow pattern is in principle the most desirable traffic state out of all the BRUE solutions. This study proposes a day-to-day AVs’ routing allocation scheme by which the traffic system would be directed to evolve towards the desired best-case BRUE. The day-to-day traffic dynamics of HVs are proposed to follow a general framework, which can be further proved to be the BRUE rational behavior adjustment process (BRUE-RBAP). The condition for convergence is investigated under general assumptions. Numerical examples are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of this traffic management scheme.

Road pricing acceptability and persuasive communication effectiveness

To facilitate coercive policy implementation encountering public opposition, this study focuses on road pricing policy (1) to examine an integrated framework accommodating the relationships between participation in administration, trust in government, fairness, freedom infringement, public opinion, and policy acceptability; and (2) to analyze the effect of persuasive communication with request and advice methods on policy acceptability. Using data from 175 participants in Taiwan, results find that participation in administration increases procedural fairness, which and distributive fairness via scenario fairness improve acceptability; however, freedom infringement reduces acceptability. Public opinion affects acceptability directly and indirectly through scenario fairness. Moreover, persuasive communication does not change overall acceptability but improves acceptability in the ethical aspect and for males, the middle-aged and elderly, and mixed-mode users. Findings suggest that governments should introduce public participation into coercive policy formulation and apply persuasive communication to policy acceptability improvement.