Airport Toll Roads

I read Aerotropolis, by Kasarda. Kasarda speaks of the importance of surface transportation access to airports.  Kasarda once missed a plane, while waiting in traffic within walking distance of the airport. The fundamental premise of an airport is that time is valuable (else you'd go by some other mode). Where the time-savings occurs doesn't matter--it can be on the airplane (by making the airplane faster) or on the ground, by making access to the airport faster.

For cars on a highway, the main source of delay is congestion. One commonly advocated solution to congestion is 'congestion pricing'. Ie, 'surge' pricing, except for road-space rather than cars. When the road is not congested, driving on it is free. But the more demand for road space there is (and the more congested things get) the higher the price you pay for road space.

Reading up on Dulles Airport, which is accessed by the Dulles Toll Road, and the idea is much on my mind: running a road like an airport. When the demand is low, prices are low to fill the seats. But when demand is high, the price rises, and only travelers who really need the speed are willing to pay for it.

Makes me wonder if we couldn't make congestion pricing more acceptable by introducing 'bereavement fares'--if you have to fly, on zero notice, because someone died, the airlines charge you the ticket price as if had been bought 3 weeks ago. Be nice to offer that for congestion tolls--if it was an emergency, the charge is negated.

Congestion Pricing and a Utah Highway Corporation

Re: congestion pricing

Charging for what used to be free, and charging for something that is as basic an input to the daily life of many people as the food they eat, is a political non-starter. The experience of Manhattan, a literal island, with excellent transit access, suggests how very very difficult this is politically. Don't know if you are following the efforts to impose it there or not--but every special interest group is gunning like mad for a carve-out. (London saw plenty of them). 

Every limited access highway should have congestion pricing imposed ASAP. Using roadway capacity (and producing pollution) is a cost to the public, and the public should be paid for suffering it. (And to recoup the public investment).  Maybe we should be operating our limited access facilities at arms length--a regulated utility like Questar or Utah Power, where similar network phenomena are in effect.  But that's not possible, because freeway lane miles are (nominally) part of the national network. Still, there ought to be a 'Utah Highway Corporation', the only agency permitted to add capacity on limited access facilities, and charged with adding it only when financially feasible.  

Uber as a congestion pricing beach-head?

From CityLab:

"The policy journey of São Paulo, Brazil, a vast metropolitan region of 20 million people, has been telling. The city council initially banned all ride-hailing services via apps, spurred on by allies of the taxi industry. Other parties, recognizing the inevitable popularity of Uber as well as two more homegrown companies, 99 and Easy Taxi, pushed back. The compromise allows the companies to operate, but charges them for the use of streets per mile. A sliding scale was established—more if in the city center during peak hours with only one passenger; less for more passengers, cars in underserved areas, electric vehicles, women drivers, and accessible vehicles. A standing committee meets regularly on whether the charge needs to be modified. In the process, the city gets some raw data that can help with mobility policy.

The charges—for the privilege of using a public asset, the roadways, for commercial purposes—are estimated to bring in $50 million per year. Nearly a year after the policy was set, the experiment is going well, said Ciro Biderman"

In Defense of Land Use Regulation

Arguably, any public regulation of land, by limiting the either the use or potential use a land-owner can make of the land. Yet a total lack of regulation of land is neither fair nor reasonable, as things which happen on your neighbors property directly affect yours. The oldest case would likely be mandatory building set-backs so as to provide fire-breaks. More recent cases would be 'public nuisances'; if your neighbor begins to use their garage as a concert space, the whole neighborhood suffers from the sound, while receiving none of the benefit. *

*I joined the 'Market Urbanism' group on Facebook, because I'm interested in congestion pricing and dynamic pricing for parking. Instead, I find myself engaged in debates about the virtues/values of land-use regulation. (As an urban planner, I'm generally for it). But it is forcing me to sharpen my rhetorical skills, so I suppose that's a plus.

Car Pool Lanes Statistics

Car Pool Lanes, according to SLC Trib.
Take a look quick, before the pay wall goes up for this week!

Break down of users goes like this:
60% - Car pool
30% - Easy Pass Users
4% - Clean Fuel
2% - Motorcycles
1% - Buses

The car pool lane is 10 mph faster than the regular lanes. About 9,000 people bought transponders. Seems to me that there is an untapped market for congestion pricing out there.