Economics of Urban Highway Congestion and Pricing offers the most
extensive examination to date of the relationship between congestion
tolls and highway capacity in the long run. This study breaks new ground
in the economic theory of optimal road capacity by including theoretical
contributions, empirical studies, and simulation experiments that all
pertain to the general topic reflected in the title. The book is
organized into four sections: 1) highway traffic flow; 2) commuter
choice of tollways versus freeways; 3) congestion pricing in the short
run; and 4) road capacity and pricing in the long run.
In particular, the first section on highway traffic flow examines the
chief models and empirical studies of vehicular flow on urban highways.
The second section of the book is a theoretical and empirical
examination of the choice that commuters make between urban tollways and
freeways. The third section is devoted to congestion pricing in the
short run, the time period in which the urban highway facilities are
taken as given. This section is the most important part of the book from
the standpoint of public policy. The fourth and last section of the book
considers road capacity and pricing in the long run, with the concluding
chapter gathering the authors' main results in one place and making
recommendations both for current policy and for future research.