Congestion pricing-charging a price to use highways that is high at peak hours and low at off-peak times-holds great potential for easing traffic congestion and reducing auto emissions in Southern California. New technology for nonstop electronic toll collection, coupled with increased public concern over congestion and auto emissions, makes implementation of such pricing more feasible today than in previous decades. But the political risks of charging for freeway use suggest the need for demonstration projects, both to introduce the public to the idea and to collect data so as to quantify its effects.

I. INTRODUCTION: WHY CONGESTION PRICING?

For more than three decades, economists have urged that direct pricing of road-use be employed in an effort to bring demand and supply into balance.,, To date, pricing for congestion-control (as opposed to the use of tolls to pay for road construction and operation) has seen only limited use, and only overseas. Singapore is thus far the only location of pricing instituted to limit vehicular traffic entering the central business district.

The implementation-or even serious consideration of the implementation-of congestion pricing in the United States has been held back by two problems, one technical and one political.

The technical problem has been the difficulty of instituting variable pricing with conventional methods-either toll booths or access-control stickers. Stickers-as used in Singapore-permit only a single price to be charged for access to a certain region or facility. Toll booths, in addition to being unpopular with users and causing additional congestion, do not lend themselves to variable pricing (being set up with fixed-price exact-change lanes, for example). The advent of automatic vehicle identification (AVI) systems eliminates this technical obstacle and makes it feasible to implement sophisticated pricing schemes in user-friendly ways.

But increased concern over vehicle emissions and congestion levels has made both ride-sharing and mass transit popular causes in the past decade. The idea that drivers should pay the full costs of their auto use has gained respectability-especially when seen in the context of achieving overall air quality goals. Increased awareness of the costs of congestion has diminished political opposition to the idea of congestion pricing.
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These changes are beginning to affect transportation policy overseas. Norway is considering the conversion of its toll rings around central business districts from flat-rate tolls (for raising highway funds) to peak and off-peak pricing for congestion controls. Trondheim has implemented electronic toll collection, and Bergen and Oslo are converting their manual toll-systems to electronic toll collection, as well. The Dutch government has announced plans for electronic congestion pricing in Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Utrecht, and The Hague as part of its National Environmental Policy Plan to reduce urban air pollution. Singapore plans to convert its sticker-based central-business-district pricing system to ...

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