Behavioural responses to vehicle emissions charging

Road pricing as an economic construct is not a new phenomenon in transportation research. Whilst fuel taxation and tolling of roads are common ways of raising revenue in many countries, these initiatives are primarily aimed at road infrastructure financing. Worldwide there has been growing interest in pricing structures designed to also manage the growing levels of traffic congestion and, in recent times, an increasing focus on generating reductions in carbon emissions from vehicle ownership and use. This paper presents a stated choice experiment undertaken in response to the increasing interest in the environmental externalities of travel behaviour. The aim of this choice experiment is to identify the potential to switch to more fuel efficient cars that emit lower emissions, under differing pricing and technology scenarios. Results indicate that annual and variable emissions surcharges targeted very specifically to vehicle emission rates have a noticeable role in modifying vehicle purchasing decisions.     

A basic mathematical model for evacuation problems in urban areas

Real life situations like floods, hurricanes or chemical accidents may cause the evacuation of a certain area to rescue the affected population. To enable a fast and a safe evacuation a basic mixed-integer evacuation model has been developed that provides a reorganization of the traffic routing of a certain area for the case of an evacuation. This basic problem of evacuation minimizes the evacuation-time while prohibiting conflicts within intersections. Our evacuation model is a dynamic network flow problem with additional variables for the number and direction of used lanes and with additional complicating constraints.Because of the size of the time-expanded network, the computational effort required by standard software is already very high for tiny instances. To deal with realistic instances we propose a heuristic approach.     

Simulation des temps de parcours du transport ferroviaire régional du bassin de vie stéphanois dans le cadre du projet Bahn.Ville

The French-German research project Bahn.Ville, dealing with Rail oriented development and intermodality in German and French urban regions, has consisted in identifying the principles and factors of success of an urban development oriented towards rail, and in testing them in the agglomeration of Saint-Étienne. One of the research-actions focussed on identifying and anticipating the potential impacts in terms of urban development of a new transport system, of the tram-train type, on an existing railway line. The effect of the insertion of new stops on the global journey time is one of the criterion of the evaluation of new stops. A simulation method of the journey times is presented in this paper. The interest and the limits of this approach, regarding the rolling stock choice and the insertion of new stops, are emphasized.     

膨胀土对公路路基沉降的影响分析

与一般的土体不同,膨胀土具有吸水膨胀、失水收缩的特殊工程特性.简要介绍了膨胀土的成分与结构、物理化学性质、膨胀与收缩特性和膨胀土路基病害,并对膨胀土对公路路基的沉降变形与沉降量进行分析.     

Demand for taxi services: new elasticity evidence

This paper investigates the factors that influence the choice of, and hence demand for taxis services, a relatively neglected mode in the urban travel task. Given the importance of positioning preferences for taxi services within the broader set of modal options, we develop a modal choice model for all available modes of transport for trips undertaken by individuals or groups of individuals in a number of market segments. A sample of recent trips in Melbourne in 2012 was used to develop segment-specific mode choice models to obtain direct (and cross) elasticities of interest for cost and service level attributes. Given the nonlinear functional form of the way attributes of interest are included in the modal choice models, a simple set of mean elasticity estimates are not behaviourally meaningful; hence a decision support system is developed to enable the calculation of mean elasticity estimates under specific future service and pricing levels. Some specific direct elasticity estimates are provided as the basis of illustrating the magnitudes of elasticity estimates under likely policy settings.     

Traffic Noise in Europe: A Comparison of Calculation Methods,Noise Indices and Noise Standards for Road and Railroad Traffic in Europe

The demand for inland freight transport in Europe is mainly met by road transport, leading to unsustainable impacts such as air pollution, greenhouse gas emissions and congestion. Since rail transport has lower externalities than road transport, a modal shift from road to rail is an accepted policy goal for achieving a more sustainable and competitive transport system. However, intermodal road–rail transport is mainly competitive for long-distance transport, and as a consequence, the potential for modal shift is limited. The cost efficiency of road–rail intermodal transport is particularly sensitive to pre- and post-haulage (PPH) costs, since this activity typically has a larger cost compared with its share of the total distance in the transport chain. For intermodal transportation over shorter distances, for example, below 300 km and where there are substantial PPH activities at both ends of the chain, the competitiveness of the intermodal transport system compared with that of direct road is low. Improving the efficiency of PPH activities is, therefore, of utmost importance for the competitiveness of the intermodal transport system. This paper looks into the issue of improving the cost efficiency of an intermodal transport chain by implementing an innovative and flexible legal framework regarding the PPH activities in the chain. By extending the legal framework with exemptions for longer vehicles in PPH, the cost efficiency could be greatly improved. The purpose of such a framework is to allow and enable, for PPH exclusively, the use of 2?×?40 foot or even two semi-trailers using only one vehicle in the context of the Swedish regulatory framework. This paper develops a strategic calculation model for assessing and investigating the consequences of such a framework and investigates the framework's potential in terms of cost efficiency. The model in combination with a sensitivity analysis of input variables gives a comprehensive understanding of the effects of PPH under different circumstances. From the results, it is evident that there are substantial positive effects associated with a PPH framework of longer vehicles. Results indicate that a typical shipper may experience cost reductions of about 5–10% of the total costs of the intermodal transport chain. In summary, a more innovative and flexible legal framework regarding vehicle length in the PPH links can contribute to a greater modal shift, improved cost efficiency and more environmentally friendly transportation systems.     

Book reviews

Practice, Politics and Policies—"The Politics of Transport”. By Enid Wistrich. (Harlow, Essex: Longman Group Limited, 1983.) [Pp. 185, with index.] £4·25.

Econometric Analysis and Railway Costing. By W. G. Waters, II and A. D. Woodland. (North Oxford Academic, 1984.) [Pp.132.] £12·95.     

Covariance, identification, and finite-sample performance of the MSL and Bayes estimators of a logit model with latent attributes

In this paper we discuss the specification, covariance structure, estimation, identification, and point-estimate analysis of a logit model with endogenous latent attributes that avoids problems of inconsistency. We show first that the total error term induced by the stochastic latent attributes is heteroskedastic and nonindependent. In addition, we show that the exact identification conditions support the two-stage analysis found in much current work. Second, we set up a Monte Carlo experiment where we compare the finite-sample performance of the point estimates of two alternative methods of estimation, namely frequentist full information maximum simulated likelihood and Bayesian Metropolis Hastings-within-Gibbs sampling. The Monte Carlo study represents a virtual case of travel mode choice. Even though the two estimation methods we analyze are based on different philosophies, both the frequentist and Bayesian methods provide estimators that are asymptotically equivalent. Our results show that both estimators are feasible and offer comparable results with a large enough sample size. However, the Bayesian point estimates outperform maximum likelihood in terms of accuracy, statistical significance, and efficiency when the sample size is low.     

Behavioural implications of preferences, risk attitudes and beliefs in modelling risky travel choice with travel time variability

The appropriate interpretation of a behavioural outcome requires allowing for risk attitude and belief of an individual, in addition to identification of preferences. This paper develops an Attribute-Specific Extended Rank-Dependent Utility Theory model to better understand choice behaviour in the presence of travel time variability, in which these three important components of choice are empirically addressed. This framework is more behaviourally appealing for travel time and travel time variability research than the traditional approach in which risk attitude and belief are overlooked. This model also reveals significant unobserved between-individual heterogeneity in preferences, risk attitudes and beliefs.