– Diana Furchtgott-Roth is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former chief economist at the U.S. Department of Labor. The opinions expressed are her own. —
Christmas Day in most cities will be serene, free of weekday traffic jams as workers enjoy a Thursday that is free of normal routines. Many commuters wish that the free-flowing driving could last all year long. Traffic congestion wastes drivers’ time and gasoline, pollutes, reduces employment, and pushes businesses and shoppers away from cities.
There is hope. New global positioning system technology and congestion pricing can reduce traffic jams. In mid-January, 10,000 transportation professionals, including people from the incoming Obama administration, will convene in Washington D.C. at meetings of the Transportation Research Board, part of the National Academy of Sciences, to discuss solutions.
Road use varies with time of day. Time-of-day pricing can encourage drivers to shift non-essential trips to less busy hours, and eliminate some trips altogether.
London’s system of road pricing, with cars charged $16 to enter the center, is held up as a model for other cities. But its main flaw is that drivers pay flat fees, and are not charged by miles driven or by routes taken.
A better scheme would be to have drivers pay per mile, with higher charges on more heavily-used streets and in periods of heaviest congestion.
With prices of transponders and GPS falling, sophisticated and efficient systems are now possible. In some places they are optional, with drivers volunteering to participate in exchange for a reduction in license plate fees or even a credit against fuel taxes.
Here’s how this could work. GPS devices could be given to drivers who choose to participate—one per car—and drivers pay as easily as they are now paying for cell phones or E-ZPass tolls. Participating motorists could be exempt from license-renewal fees, but would pay road charges instead, charges that could vary by type of road used and time of day. Driving in rush hour along a busy road would cost more than driving on a little-used road late at night.
In Oregon, GPS-based distance measurements are designed to replace fuel taxes it now levies to pay for the use of its roads (for the full report, click here). Oregon would not immediately require all vehicles to have GPS. At least to start with, motorists would have a choice of paying either fuel taxes or mileage charges.
Efficiency in road pricing would relieve congestion. But it raises the politically thorny question of what to do with the revenue. In my view, cities must resist London’s unpopular inclination to use revenues to finance increased general spending, a measure defeated in New York and in Manchester, England.
To be acceptable to voters, a new road charging scheme should:
• Use advanced GPS-based systems, of the kind being pioneered in Oregon;
• Apply congestion pricing as part of a more general reform of financing road use, such as phasing out fuel taxes;
• Use monetary incentives, such as abolishing annual licensing fees or introducing new charging schemes on a voluntary basis; and
• Ensure that new revenues improve financing and use of roads, rather than for public transportation.
Employers could help, too. Some firms could enable employees to avoid high-priced peak driving rates by allowing flexible schedules or even telecommuting.
Critics claim congestion pricing is unfair to lower-income drivers. But if the system were voluntary, only those who wanted to participate would do so, and could receive rebates of fuel taxes.
Alternatively, low-income motorists could be given credits on their bills—cash incentives—to take part, ensuring that they have the opportunity to save money by avoiding peak-hour driving.
To reduce pollution and protect themselves from choking on traffic, cities must find a way to reduce congestion and enable people to travel more quickly and easily.
This Christmas Day, as we enjoy uncongested roads, we should think of a way to keep them like that all year round.
You can contact Diana Furchtgott-Roth at dfr@hudson.org. For previous columns, click here.
Pricing mileage is not an efficient way to reduce congestion and pollution. Basically it will just make various entities lots of money since people HAVE to get to work and to the store, etc. What we need is:
More railroads.
More commuter trains.
More buses.
More monorails.
More car pooling.
More bicycle trails.
More De-suburbanization.
Mass transit is the only efficient way to take traffic off the roads and make life easier for commuters. It might even stop the current trend of building ever more "forever" toll roads that punish the middle and lower classes.
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GOOD LUCK. With the infrastructure stimulus package obsessed w/ roads & bridges, we’ll spend the next 3 years sitting in traffic. Three engineers confer around a pickup without a single construction worker in sight amidst the 10 miles of orange cones.
Eisenhower built highways that increased national efficiency in goods transit & travel (and encouraged Federal civil rights reform through interstate commerce). The dot com prosperity was from online systems that increased efficiency. But the stimulus package will decrease efficiency–counterintuitive to stimulus (except for state unions).
“Christmas Day in most cities will be serene, free of weekday traffic jams as workers enjoy a Thursday that is free of normal routines. Many commuters wish that the free-flowing driving could last all year long.”
It can but doesn’t. Ignoring traffic lights that just stop traffic flow, there is a simple reason for this phenomenon, it’s because the roads infrastructure as its presently designed is only able to accommodate the vehicle flow rates that are much reduced.
Once you add the extra vehicles then it can no longer do so.
Add peak traffic and you will always have the same problem no matter how much money you throw at it.
All current roads intersections create the jams gridlock and congestion. Yes every single one.
No matter what electronic gadgetry you have in any vehicle its utterly useless if the roads infrastructure just cannot work and give free flow.
There is a comment that is frequently used that you cannot build your way out of congestion.
That is the most absurd and incorrect statement and is wrong.
If you build a Liquid Flow Traffic intersection infrastructure then you get Liquid Flow Traffic.
I’m Jozef Goj the engineer, inventor, designer of Liquid Flow Traffic intersections.
I asked a simple question.
How can I drive across town in peak traffic and never have to stop at a single intersection?
Followed by the second question all engineers must ask.
Is it foolproof?
The answer is Liquid Flow Traffic
What I can say and will continue to state that it is stupidity itself to invest into the 21st Century with infrastructure, namely intersections, that are unable to answer the question I posed.
For that you need 21st Century technology http://www.ubtsc.com.au.
If you are to reconstruct the economy, for the sake of the people, do not use outdated infrastructure that has never solved transportation problems in the past, will never solve them today and will hinder forever the growth of tomorrow.
Take a giant step into the 21st Century with ‘Liquid Flow Traffic’.
Invest in the future not the past.
Gee, this sounds a lot like cable TV. At first it was: “We’ll charge you nothing, but if you want more channels and stuff, you pay your cable provider. Just by coincidence the cable company turned out the most politically connected and wealthiest group in town who were awarded a monopoly. Then they sold that monopoly to Time Warner or one of those guys and they, and the local elected officials all walked away grinning.
Then cable rates doubled and doubled again. And now that we became sometime viewers of CNN, TBS and perhaps HBO, almost everyone kept their service. Now they go to DTV and we absolutely need the cable system and the fees are sure to continue their inexorable rise. Meanwhile, these private entities that have turned a free, advertiser supported medium into an expensive advertiser supported medium. And all that money can go to politicians, their campaigns or to their relatives in undisclosed third party arrangements.
We pay for telephone by the minute. We should pay for roads by the mile. What we have now is socialized roads. It is like giving everybody free telephone service.
The fuel tax is a small fraction of the cost of roads. It doesn’t pay for planning new roads, or for buying land for new roads, or for actually constructing new roads. It doesn’t pay for the environmental impact of the new roads.
Free parking on the street is another form of subsidy for car owners. Why is it that they can store their 5000 pounds of metal on the street for free? We all pay for the streets but those who park on the streets are getting much more benefit; they should pay for what they get according to how much they get.
It is interesting that the same people who oppose Social Security want socialized roads. Social Security is not subsidized; it has had a surplus since the early 80’s and is projected to have a surplus for at least another 10 years.
The very first thing to do is to stop people from driving who don’t need to drive. “If you can work at home, work at home.” Businesses are not taking advantage of this for some reason. Modern technology can make this work quite easily. Businesses can save a lot of money by doing this.
As an added incentive to doing this companies should receive a tax break if they have x% of American workers telecomuting.
Of cours this will not work for every profession, but there are many people clogging up the roadways who simply do not need to be there.
Thanks for reading
This only works to reduce congestion in areas where people who can’t afford to pay the fee want to go. I’m not sure how this really reduces the daily drive from sub/ex-urb to financial districts around the world….except perhaps for the service workers. Class segregation via taxes?
Let’s keep socialism alive! Keep our roads and highways socialized! This thing of paying for what you get is capitalism; we don’t want that.
It is true that the fuel tax doesn’t pay the real cost of road maintenance. But road maintenance should be paid by bonds similar to the bonds used to pay for road construction. If road construction is socialized, why can’t road maintenance also be fully socialized?
Let’s keep our libertarian traditions: socialism for everything that benefits us. We don’t want to pay for what we get.
In addition to the elitist tone of this solution, there is one more teensy widdle problem with this genius’s plan. I would fight to my last day against the government knowing exactly where I am at any time. Perhaps the liberals don’t think this should be an issue. Sure. Then why don’t you all just sign up for implanted devices to track yourself? Like the barcode on your neck, which is coming. Lady, shut up. Let the roads be crowded. If you don’t like driving in congestion, then don’t drive. Simple. Another example of the free market solving it’s own problem. Perhaps you would like a 900 BILLION DOLLAR bailout for the GPS companies, too. I hate government meddlers, and this lady is a Queen Bee of that vermin. HANDS OFF of us. LEAVE US ALONE. STOP, STOP, STOP making stupid, offensive new laws. Repeal two old laws if you want to pass a new one! “DON’T TREAD ON ME” !!!!!!!!! We could use that flag again!
To Mike from the Midwest:
I think you just said it man. Being a city dweller from the Northwest I always forget those important details of life in other parts of the country. Real easy for ME to say sell your house and move close to the city, but I don’t own a house, and here people are buying. More people like you need to speak out so people like me don’t lull ourselves into thinking public transportation will save the world.
Good on ya man
While Ms. Furchtgott-Roth’s prescription for relieving congestion seems reasonable on its face, it has several unsavory presumptions and consequences. First it assumes that driving is a social good that should be preserved. The most effective way to reduce congestion is for commuters to shift to mass transit, a change that brings large environmental and political benefits. Do we really want to push drivers off congested roads? Cars are inherently unsafe, and we can well imagine the hazards to cyclists, pedestrians, children and animals if commuters start using neighborhoods and side streets, particularly if they turn up during off-hours and late night.
Ms. Furchtgott-Roth also ignores the noise and air pollution caused by additional cars. Her congestion plan does not attack the basic problem– too many car trips, not enough alternatives. Instead it displaces the problems caused by cars into new areas. A more effective approach would be to tax trips into the city on a flat rate, and then to use the funds to develop healthy, comfortable alternatives to automotive transportation.
This is a great idea. Let’s end traffic congestion in 2009!
Still no cure for cancer. Still no solution for world hunger. Let’s not feed the poor, that’s not too important. Why don’t we just sink more money into making roads less congested so my trip to work can be 30 minutes long instead of 45. Merry Christmas to all, finally the world can rejoice as we have solved a major problem.
And let’s add a the following features; a carbon tax, a luxury vehicle tax, parking and vehicle operator enforcement section and wrap the whole thing up in some sort of progressive income scale. At all time the driver’s number should be displayed on all four sides of the car. The driver’s number would be the same as the one the government stamps on your forehead when your born. If you are shaking your head in agreement, your as sick as the author.
Public transportation is the correct answer. Create more subways, right-of-ways, and an overall increase in routes with more intervals. Anything other than that will be seen as an expense of doing business. We have had flextime for many years now and most still choose to work a 9-to-5 schedule with 8:00am being the worst time for traffic.
I would work hard to oppose any sort of tax like this. I don’t mind paying fuel tax, which I think fairly reflects to what degree you use the roads. Small compacts use less Fuel A to B but literally have a smaller footprint and put less stress on infa- structure, Large trucks use more fuel and wear down roads quicker.
Additionally being what most would consider low income it would be difficult to swallow another lump sum tax. The fuel tax is literally taken out by the quarter which I can handle. That and the fact that ppl at my income would probably be exempted from the tax and large shipping firms would lobby out of said tax means that burdens would be unfairly shouldered by a smaller portion of the population.
Why so many people drive to an office so they can use a phone and a computer is crazy. Both of these things are right at home. Just so the boss can see you at your desk? If your project is on schedule, who cares when and how you did the work! OK, so a factory, store or warehouse needs staff on hand to get the work done, everybody else can stay home and save a lot of ga$ money.
Good points about low- vs. high-income. I wonder how it would go over to make the congestion fees so many thousandths of a percent of the nominal value (as in excise tax) of the vehicles. Just a thought.
We need the mileage charge idea to replace fuel tax with plug-in electric vehicles. You can’t put red dye in electric energy, as they do in diesel to make sure you’re not burning home heating oil (with no tax). Gasoline is also taxed for highway maintenance. That money has to keep coming from somewhere, somehow. Oh, sure, we can make plug-ins free for some years to give them a leg up, but not indefinitely.
I also realized that in situations in which you can’t add roads (e.g. without knocking down buildings) but you can add public transportation to get people from and to the same places, in that particular case, using congestion fee money seems fair. You’re relieving the congestion (and the drivers will thus pay less in congestion fees in the future).
I see a privacy issue though; the government would know everywhere you’d been.
To Joseph:
Better the vicissitudes of politics than those of private investors! Look what that has gotten us, letting those with merely large amounts of cash run things — everything from feudalism to shadowy financial omni-corporations; both have failed, then and now. The age of the bourgeoisie is long over, deal with it.
At least government can be held accountable and even overthrown — the rich can always weasel their way out of failure by way of unethical practices.
With so much going on and so many people losing so much during this holiday season, to focus on the perennial nuisance of the wealthy, a.k.a. “waiting in line”, is off the mark if not flatly offensive.
Better to figure out how to teleport.
Diana does not go far enough. Are not roads too important to be left to the vicissitudes of politics? Would it not be better to have them provided by private suppliers, as are food, water, telecommunications and most of our other necessities?
Private owners would have to respond to customers’ priorities and generally provide the roads that road users (and property owners) would be prepared to pay for. And, like hotels, airlines and theaters, would vary prices in response to costs and demand. Modern GPS-based road pricing make this possible, without invading the privacy of vehicle owners.
The Obama alternative may well be $3 a gallon fuel taxes to force the sales of “Green” cars made by GM and other nationalized manufacturers.
What exactly is wrong with public transportation? Could you post an opinion?