01373331

Component

Congestion pricing in cities is seen as desirable from an economic point of view but difficult politically. A variety of revenue and cost-sharing arrangements have been proposed as ways of creating ballot-box winning coalitions where 'winners' outvote losers from a self-interest point of view. However, these proposals generally ignore the roles of institutions, governmental and otherwise, in the control of revenues raised by pricing. These institutions can confound political alliance schemes that aim to build coalitions favouring congestion tolls. This paper examines the failure of New York City to impose a congestion pricing cordon, even though there was significant US Federal government funding available as an inducement to pass it. The role of institutional arrangements turned out to play a key role in this failure, with lessons for the political viability of other proposed schemes.

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee ABE25 Congestion Pricing

01362476

12-0443

English

15p

2012

Transportation Research Board 91st Annual Meeting

Digital/other

Cities and towns; Congestion pricing; Cost sharing; Economics; Operating revenues; Policy making; Political factors; Traffic congestion; Urban areas

New York (New York)

Finance; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Policy; I10: Economics and Administration; I73: Traffic Control

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2012 Paper #12-0443

TRIS, TRB

Feb 8 2012 4:54PM