Heike Link

Introducing Environmental Externalities into Transport Pricing: Measurement and Implications

Abstract It is European Commission policy to charge modes of transport according to the marginal social cost of their use of the infrastructure, including environmental costs. However, progress in implementing this process has been slow, partly because of the difficulty of measuring and valuing these costs. This need has led to a great deal of research in this area in recent years. The paper presents the results of some of this research, and in particular of the European Commission‐funded Unification of Accounts and Marginal Costs for Transport Efficiency (UNITE) project. UNITE used the Impact Pathway Approach developed in the ExternE project series to provide a bottom‐up methodology for the estimation and valuation of marginal social costs of transport, taking into account the diversity of circumstances in terms of location (e.g. population density, and speed and direction of winds) and time of day. The paper first explains the approach used for the measurement and valuation of environmental costs and then presents results on both total and marginal costs. It then discusses the results of a parallel project using the same methodology that estimated the marginal social cost of road use at a very disaggregate level for different vehicle types, locations, types of road and times of day for Great Britain. The results show that off the main network and outside the conurbations, private cars are currently overcharged, but elsewhere they are charged too little, particularly in the main conurbations. Buses, and even more so heavy goods vehicles, are undercharged to a greater extent. Only a kilometre‐based charging system capable of charging at different rates by vehicle type, type and location of road, and time of day is capable of reflecting all these differences; due to the development of global positioning satellite (GPS) technology, such systems are now becoming available.

About Attitudes and Perceptions: Finding the Proper Way to Consider Latent Variables in Discrete Choice Models

We provide an in-depth theoretical discussion about the differences between attitudes and perceptions, as well as an empirical exercise to analyze its effects. This discussion is of importance, as the large majority of papers considering attitudinal latent variables, just consider those as attributes affecting directly the utility of a certain alternative while systematic taste variations are rarely taken into account and perceptions are normally completely ignored. The results of our case study show that perceptions may indeed affect the decision making process and that they are able to capture a significant part of the variability that is normally explained by alternative specific constants. In the same line, our results indicate that attitudes may be a reason for systematic taste variations, and that a proper categorization of the latent variables, in accordance with the underlying theory, may outperform the customary assumption of linearity.

Acceptability of the German Charging Scheme for Heavy Goods Vehicles: Empirical Evidence from a Freight Company Survey

Abstract While several European and national studies have dealt with the acceptability of road pricing schemes for passenger transport, only sparse research is available on this issue for freight transport. Against this background, the paper deals with the acceptability of the German road user‐charging scheme for heavy goods vehicles by the road haulage industry. It presents the findings of an internet‐based survey with German road freight operators from which responses on a variety of attitude questions and on a stated‐preference exercise regarding the use of revenues were collected. The study shows that the German transport industry recognizes the severity of transport‐related problems such as neglected road maintenance and congestion. The general idea of distance‐related road user charging is accepted but the scheme is not considered to be effective in reducing traffic on motorways or increasing efficiency of transports. Using the charging revenues within the road sector, e.g. without any form of cross‐subsidising other modes of transport, is decisive for making the charging scheme acceptable for German road hauliers. This is reinforced by the responses on the stated preference exercise where a trade‐off between charge level and use of revenues has been revealed. German hauliers would even accept higher charges than currently raised if revenues were used for road maintenance and relief of bottlenecks.

The Value of a Statistical Life in a Road Safety Context — A Review of the Current Literature

Abstract This paper summarizes the state-of-the-art for assessing the value of a statistical life (VSL) as a component of the costs of road accidents. It focuses on the most popular approaches for assessing the VSL, with respect to its theoretical foundations, current state-of-research and empirical evidence. Our paper also provides a first (to our knowledge) compendium of results for the VSL based on Stated Choice (SC) methods. Among the analysed alternatives, the willingness-to-pay (WTP) appears to be the leading approach for assessing the VSL and the SC methods represent the current state-of-the-art for determining the WTP for non-market goods. We conclude that the SC approach overcomes some of the most important shortcomings of the alternative approaches and offers a significant flexibility that can be used to address its own limitations. We also identify a significant need for research, as a gap between the methods employed in research (SC methods) and the state-of-the-practice (other methods) has emerged.

Prognose des Ersatzinvestitionsbedarfs für die Bundesverkehrswege bis zum Jahre 2020

In Deutschland steigen die zur Substanzerhaltung und zur Modernisierung der Verkehrsinfrastruktur notwendigen Ausgaben nicht zuletzt aufgrund des hohen Anlagevermoegenswertes an. Die Untersuchung des Deutschen Instituts fuer Wirtschaftsforschung (DIW) prognostiziert im Auftrag des Bundesministeriums fuer Verkehr, Bau- und Wohnungswesen den Finanzbedarf fuer den Ersatz und die Erhaltung des Bundesverkehrswegenetzes bei qualifizierter Substanzwertsicherung fuer die Jahre 1999 bis 2020. Empirische Basis der Untersuchung sind die Investitionen und die Entwicklung des Anlagevermoegens aller Bundesverkehrswege - getrennt fuer Ost- und Westdeutschland vom Zeitpunkt der deutschen Einheit bis zum Jahr 1998. Vom Auftraggeber wurden zwei Investitionsvarianten vorgegeben, die Grundlage fuer das DIW-Anlagevermoegensmodell waren. Ergebnisse der Untersuchung sind im einzelnen nach Ost- und Westdeutschland differenzierte Prognosedaten (1999-2020) fuer: Brutto-Anlageinvestitionen, Brutto-Anlagevermoegen, Netto-Anlagevermoegen, Vermoegensabgaenge, Altersstruktur des Brutto-Anlagevermoegens sowie die Entwicklung des Ersatzinvestitionsbedarfs fuer die qualifizierte Substanzwertsicherung der Bundesverkehrswege.

A generalized approach for measuring the marginal social costs of road transport in Europe

ABSTRACT Social marginal cost pricing requires bottom-up calculations of social marginal costs for all circumstances. Because this is not practicable for policymaking, we suggest an approach to generalize available cost estimates and present results from this for two case studies. We conclude that in the peak period congestion costs are the most important externality of road use, and that accidents, wear and tear, and noise costs all appear to be more important than global warming. This suggests that the policy priority should be measures to tackle the other elements of transport externalities alongside global warming costs.

Liberalization of the Interurban Coach Market in Germany: Do Attitudes and Perceptions Drive the Choice between Rail and Coach?

In January 2013 the interurban passenger transport market in Germany was liberalized and several coach carriers emerged offering an alternative to the Deutsche Bahn, a state owned rail monopoly. The coach carriers have attempted to position themselves not just through lower prices but also through product differentiation, for example marketing their services as the most ecological way to travel. Hence, it is important to consider attitudes and perceptions when analyzing this market. One year after liberalization we conducted a stated-choice experiment among students and employees at the Technical University of Berlin, where participants had to choose between different interurban public transport alternatives (regional and intercity trains or interurban coaches). Additionally, the experiment gathered perception and attitudinal indicators used to construct latent variables. Our results show that attitudes and perceptions indeed affect the way individuals choose between different transport modes and, therefore, they must be taken into account when analyzing the interurban passenger market in Germany.