Abstract: Transportation economists view urban traffic congestion as an imbalance of supply and demand, caused by the lack of market pricing of roadway use. Road pricing, in which higher prices are charged at peak times and lower prices are charged during off-peak hours could help alleviate this imbalance. There is strong political opposition to road pricing, but recent congestion pricing pilot programs suggest that technically and operationally successful forms of road pricing can be developed. The most successful programs thus far have high-occupancy/toll (HOT) lanes allowing vehicles not meeting the car-pooling requirement to purchase excess capacity in those lanes. The article suggests that a reform of highway finance is necessary to make road pricing feasible since the current financing and ownership of U.S. roadways is too convoluted. New technologies, such as electronic toll collection systems, vehicle-miles-traveled technologies, and a global positioning system-based virtual tolling system, could also help make road pricing a reality. This article suggests a new approach in which the road system becomes a public utility, run either as government utility or franchised to private firms on a long-term basis. The article concludes by suggesting the following policy changes: defederalize the highway system; convert high occupancy vehicle lanes to HOT lanes; use annual registration fees for local streets and roads; end double taxation of paying both tolls and fuel taxes; enact public-private partnership laws; and develop national standards for electronic tolling.
Publication Year: 2001
Publication Date: 2001-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
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Cited By Count: 1
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