Roads/Highways

Congestion Pricing Can Be Equitable If a Portion of the Revenue is Returned to Drivers

Sallee, James, PhD
Tarduno, Matthew, PhD
2003

Economists have long argued in favor of congestion pricing, under which drivers pay a fee or toll to enter roadways during peak times. An increasing number of global cities have adopted or are considering pricing programs. Even so, these regimes remain relatively rare and controversial. One key concern with congestion pricing is fairness. Road pricing can pose a substantial burden for low-income drivers, many of whom have little option to avoid travel during peak times and limited opportunity to choose other modes of travel. Prior research has shown that congestion pricing regimes tend to...

The Expansion of California’s Freeway Service Patrol Program is Delivering Benefits to Motorists and the Environment

Mauch, Michael
Skabardonis, Alexander
McKeever, Benjamin
2019

The Freeway Service Patrol (FSP) program has the goal of reducing congestion by using fleets of roving tow and service trucks to quickly clear disabled vehicles and address other minor accidents on California’s freeway. The FSP program is jointly managed by Caltrans, the California Highway Patrol (CHP), and regional transportation agencies. Approximately $21.25 million in State transportation funds are provided each year to eligible regional transportation agencies for the FSP program using a formula-based allocation. The Road Repair and Accountability Act of 2017 (SB 1) directs an...

UC Berkeley Develops New User-Friendly Tool to Expedite the Evaluation of Connected Automated Vehicle Technologies

Fu, Zhe
Liu, Hao, PhD
Lu, Xiao-Yun, PhD
2020

Connected Automated Vehicles (CAVs) are similar to other automated vehicles with the distinguishing difference being that CAVs obtain information about road conditionsdirectly from other vehicles and infrastructure (e.g., traffic signals, road sensors) rather than relying solely on onboard sensors. Different CAV technologies are currently being tested and evaluated to assess the prospects for future implementation. These tests involve moving CAV-equipped vehicles on a physical test track and recording how the vehicles operate under different traffic conditions (Figure 1). Since it is...

Variable-Rate State Gasoline Taxes

Ang-Olson, Jeffrey
Wachs, Martin
Taylor, Brian D.
1999

Inflation and increased fuel economy have reduced the buying power of the revenues collected from state and federal motor fuel taxes. Because fuel taxes are almost always collected on a per-gallon basis, in most states they must be raised by specific acts of the legislature and it is becoming increasingly difficult to find the political support necessary to raise them. A number of states have experimented with fuel taxes that adjust automatically by being indexed to the price of gasoline, to the consumer price index, or to some indicator of highway construction and maintenance costs. This...

Sources of Information in Highways: A Bibliography

Krummes, Daniel C.
Ambler, Betty
Atwood, Paul
Bix, Janet
Clark, Laurel
Gallwey, John
Geary, Kay
Gutshall, Judy
Haake, Susan
Krummes, Daniel
Matis, Lynn
Motzkus, Gisela
Sweet, Robert
2001

This bibliography, containing over 650 entries, is intended to serve as a guide to the major sources of information on highways. While sources listed focus primarily on the United States and Canada, some international materials have been included. Though emphasis is on current publications, some materials of historical interest have also been included. Resources listed in the bibliography include both print and electronic materials, with many Internet sites falling within that latter category. The bibliography was a collaborative effort and was compiled by twelve members of the...

Understanding and Mitigating Capacity Reduction at Freeway Bottlenecks

Chung, Koohong
2005

Two freeway bottlenecks, each with a distinct geometry, have been investigated in an effort to understand traffic conditions leading to capacity losses (i.e., breakdown). One bottleneck is formed by a horizontal curve and the other by a reduction in travel lanes. These bottlenecks are shown to exhibit breakdowns after queues form immediately upstream. The vehicle accumulations that arise near these bottlenecks are shown to be good proxies for the mechanisms that trigger breakdowns. Evidence is provided to show that these losses can be recovered, postponed or even avoided entirely by...

Vehicle Reidentification and Travel Time Measurement Using Loop Detector Speed Traps

1998

This dissertation presents a vehicle reidentification algorithm for consecutive detector stations on a freeway, whereby a vehicle measurement made at a downstream detector station is matched with the vehicle’s corresponding measurement at an upstream station. The algorithm should improve freeway surveillance by measuring the actual vehicle travel times; these are simply the differences in the times that each (matched) vehicle arrives to the upstream and downstream stations. Thus, it will be possible to quantify conditions between widely spaced detector stations rather than assuming that...

Increasing Freeway Merge Capacity Through On-Ramp Metering

Rudjanakanoknad, Jittichai
2005

This research describes field studies of how on-ramp metering can increase the capacity of freeway merges. Some effects of on-ramp metering have been known for a long time. We have known that on-ramp metering can 1) increase freeway flow and speed upstream of a merge; and 2) reduce system-wide delay by alleviating gridlock-causing queues that have blocked off-ramps. However, past studies have not conclusively shown that on-ramp metering can increase the maximum outflow (capacity) of freeway merges. The experiments conducted in the present study verify that on-ramp metering can increase...

California’s Freeway Service Patrol Program Management: Information System Annual Report Fiscal Year 2004-05

Mauch, Michael
Skabardonis, Alex
2007

The Freeway Service Patrol (FSP) is an incident management program implemented by Caltrans, the California Highway Patrol and local partner agencies to quickly detect and assist disabled vehicles and reduce non-recurring congestion along the freeway during peak commute hours. The first FSP program was piloted in Los Angeles, and was later expanded to other regions by state legislation in 1991. As of June 2005, there were ten participating FSP Programs operating in California, deploying over 315 tow trucks and covering over 1,500 (center-line) miles of congested California freeways.The...

California’s Freeway Service Patrol Program: Management Information System Annual Report Fiscal Year 2014-2015

Mauch, Michael
Skabardonis, Alexander
2016

The Freeway Service Patrol (FSP) is an incident management program implemented by Caltrans, the California Highway Patrol and local partner agencies to quickly detect and assist disabled vehicles and reduce non-recurring congestion along the freeway during peak commute hours. The first FSP program was piloted in Los Angeles, and was later expanded to other regions by state legislation in 1991. As of June 2015, there were fourteen participating FSP Programs operating in California, deploying over 340 tow trucks and covering over 1,800 (center-line) miles of congested California freeways....