Abstract

The financing of transport infrastructure has been discussed in this chapter as an issue between efficient pricing and political distribution. Historically, toll pricing and private investment in transport infrastructure has been frequent and important (e.g., in the railway era), and market orientation relevant. More recently, e.g., in the economic growth after the Second World War and the construction of large motorway networks as well as urban transit systems, public funding and operation has largely dominated. Economists, models for the return to some economic principles promoting an efficient allocation of funds, environmental resources, and users’ time are of limited relevance as long as distributional issues prevail. Therefore, the conclusion is that the increasing emphasis in the literature on analyzing and understanding the economics of transport policy and the mechanisms of collective choices in the sector will improve the feasibility of financing infrastructure via pricing. Document type: Part of book or chapter of book

Abstract

The Mexico City Metropolitan Area has been suffering severely from transportation externalities such as accidents, air pollution, and traffic congestion. This study examines pricing instruments to reduce these externalities using an analytical and numerical model. The study shows that the optimal levels of a gasoline tax and a congestion toll on automobiles could generate social benefits, measured in terms of welfare gain, of US$132 and US$109 per capita, respectively, through the reduction of externalities. The largest component of the welfare gains comes from reduced congestion, followed by local air pollution reduction. The optimal toll and tax would, however, double the cost of driving and could be politically sensitive. Still, more than half of those welfare gains could be obtained through a more modest tax or toll, equivalent to $1 per gallon of gasoline. The welfare gains from reforming the pricing of public transportation are small relative to those from reforming the taxation of automobiles. Although the choice among travel modes depends on specific circumstances, in the absence of road travel pricing that accounts for externalities, there will be potential for higher investment in roads relative to mass transit. Given the rapidly increasing demand for transportation infrastructure in Mexico City, careful efforts should be made to include the full social costs of travel in evaluating alternative infrastructure investments. Document type: Book

Abstract

Air transport delays have increased during the past decade both in Europe and US. The main reasons have been continuously growing air transport demand, constrained capacity of the system infrastructure, and disruption of services caused by bad weather, failures of the infrastructure components, facilities and equipment, and industrial action of the aviation staff. Growing demand combined with constrained infrastructure capacity and frequently disrupted by a bad weather have been identified as the most frequent causes of congestion and delays at large airports. Potential remedies have shown to be improvement of utilisation of the existing infrastructure capacity by introducing technological and operational innovations, physical expansion of this capacity, and management of access to the scarce infrastructure capacity. The first option has shown to have the very limited effect. In many cases, the second option has been impossible to be implemented due to the various political and environmental constraints in terms of land take in both the airport airside and landside area. The solution of management of access to the existing scarce infrastructure capacity (i.e., ?demand management) has recently been considered as an additional viable option to relief the congestion problem. This paper deals with modelling of management of access to a congested airport by using congestion charging. The complexity of setting up a relevant congestion charge (toll) based on the system delays imposed by an additional aircraft on itself and on the others during peak-periods has been particularly elaborated. For such a purpose, queuing model of a congested airport, as an essential tool for estimating the aircraft delays, particularly in cases of changes of the airport capacity caused by disruptions, is developed. The existing theory of congestion pricing is upgraded by an explicit introduction of the differences between particular customers - the aircraft - requesting service during peaks in terms of the arrival time, type (seat capacity, operational cost), type of flight (short, medium, long-haul), and actual number of passengers on board. These all are also the most important factors expected to influence a tool, which, if consequently applied, is expected to change in line with changes of these factors. This also illustrates controversy and complexity of implementing such tool, the process, which is under consideration (i.e., in a rudimentary phase) at some airports in the U.S. and Europe. KEY WORDS: air transport, airport, queuing theory, congestion pricing Document type: Part of book or chapter of book

Abstract

Using a nested multinomial logit model of car ownership and personal travel in Beijing circa 2005, this paper compares the effectiveness of different policy instruments to reduce traffic congestion and CO2 emissions. The study shows that a congestion toll is more efficient than a fuel tax in reducing traffic congestion, whereas a fuel tax is more effective as a policy instrument for reducing gasoline consumption and emissions. An improvement in car efficiency would also reduce congestion, fuel consumption, and CO2 emissions significantly; however, this policy benefits only richer households that own a car. Low-income households do better under the fuel tax policy than under the efficiency improvement and congestion toll policies. The congestion toll and fuel tax require the travel cost per mile to more than triple. The responsiveness of aggregate fuel and CO2 are, approximately, a 1 percent drop for each 10 percent rise in the money cost of a car trip. Document type: Book

Abstract

This study examines impacts on net social benefits or economic welfare of alternative policy instruments for reducing traffic congestion and atmospheric emissions in São Paulo, Brazil. The study shows that expanding road networks, subsidizing public transit, and improving automobile fuel economy may not be as effective as suggested by economic theories because these policies could cause significant rebound effects. Although pricing instruments such as congestion tolls and fuel taxes would certainly reduce congestion and emissions, the optimal level of these instruments would steeply increase the monetary cost of travel per trip and are therefore politically difficult to implement. However, a noticeable finding is that even smaller tolls, which are more likely to be politically acceptable, have substantial benefits in terms of reducing congestion and emissions. Among the various policy instruments examined in the study, the most socially preferable policy option for São Paulo would be to introduce a mix of congestion toll and fuel taxes on automobiles and use the revenues to improve public transit systems. Document type: Book

Abstract

Traffic congestion and its impacts significantly affect the nation's economic performance and the public's quality of life. In most urban areas, travel demand routinely exceeds highway capacity during peak periods. In addition, events such as crashes, vehicle breakdowns, work zones, adverse weather, railroad crossings, large trucks loading/unloading in urban areas, and other factors such as toll collection facilities and sub-optimal signal timing cause temporary capacity losses, often worsening the conditions on already congested highway networks. The impacts of these temporary capacity losses include delay, reduced mobility, and reduced reliability of the highway system. They can also cause drivers to re-route or reschedule trips. Such information is vital to formulating sound public policies for the highway infrastructure and its operation. In response to this need, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, sponsored by the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), made an initial attempt to provide nationwide estimates of the capacity losses and delay caused by temporary capacity-reducing events (Chin et al. 2002). This study, called the Temporary Loss of Capacity (TLC) study, estimated capacity loss and delay on freeways and principal arterials resulting from fatal and non-fatal crashes, vehicle breakdowns, and adverse weather, including snow, ice, and fog. In addition, it estimated capacity lossmore » and delay caused by sub-optimal signal timing at intersections on principal arterials. It also included rough estimates of capacity loss and delay on Interstates due to highway construction and maintenance work zones. Capacity loss and delay were estimated for calendar year 1999, except for work zone estimates, which were estimated for May 2001 to May 2002 due to data availability limitations. Prior to the first phase of this study, which was completed in May of 2002, no nationwide estimates of temporary losses of highway capacity by type of capacity-reducing event had been made. This report describes the second phase of the TLC study (TLC2). TLC2 improves upon the first study by expanding the scope to include delays from rain, toll collection facilities, railroad crossings, and commercial truck pickup and delivery (PUD) activities in urban areas. It includes estimates of work zone capacity loss and delay for all freeways and principal arterials, rather than for Interstates only. It also includes improved estimates of delays caused by fog, snow, and ice, which are based on data not available during the initial phase of the study. Finally, computational errors involving crash and breakdown delay in the original TLC report are corrected.« le Document type: Report