United States Department of Transportation
i
Toll-Managed Lanes: Benefit-Cost Analyses of Seven Projects
-
2018-05-23
-
[PDF-1.44 MB]
Details:
-
Creators:
-
Corporate Creators:
-
Corporate Contributors:
-
Subject/TRT Terms:
-
Publication/ Report Number:
-
Resource Type:
-
Geographical Coverage:
-
TRIS Online Accession Number:01701623
-
Edition:Year 25 Final Report
-
Corporate Publisher:
-
Abstract:Toll managed lanes are expressway lanes where tolls are used--often in combination with preferred access for high occupancy vehicles and other special traffic management techniques-to improve the highway’s capacity, speed or reliability. Such lanes, and particularly a variant called High Occupancy Toll (HOT) lanes, have become popular with transportation policymakers as a way of maintaining free-flowing traffic on existing lanes while also, in some cases, financing the construction of new lanes in congested urban areas. This study examines whether toll-managed lanes are as beneficial as they are popular. The heart of the analysis is the application of a simplified social benefit-cost analysis to seven projects. In brief, the results suggest that toll-managed lanes, while promising, are not a surefire strategy for managing congestion. Only two of the seven projects have benefit-cost ratios above 1.0 using our base case assumptions about the value of travel time saved and the discount rate, although three others approach or exceed 1.0 with more optimistic but plausible assumptions. The most successful generate not only a significant savings of around 4 to 5 minutes per trip for motorists who switch to the managed lane but also smaller per-trip savings for the large majority of motorists who continue to use the general-purpose lanes. It is important to acknowledge, however, that these calculations depend upon some uncertain assumptions about the value of travel time savings and improved reliability.
-
Format:
-
Funding:
-
Collection(s):
-
Main Document Checksum:
-
Download URL:
-
File Type:
