congestion pricing

Big cities have lots of congestion. Big cities have lots of accessibility. Does this mean that accessibility causes congestion? Or vice-versa?[read more]

It’s 2004. Despite initial resistance to the idea being fierce, London has had a congestion charge for a year, and by the most important metrics, it’s been a success. Mayor Ken Livingston has been reciting statistics to anyone who will listen, parading reductions in congestion by 30 percent and average speeds at their highest since the...[read more]

Technology can be a powerful ally in the creation of sustainable cities, be it social, economic, or environmental sustainability. In 2011 we’ve explored numerous technological innovations and their effect on cities, and here’s 5 of the best:[read more]

As former mayor of Bogota, Enrique Peñalosa, said, "Trying to solve traffic problems by building more roads is like putting out a fire with gasoline." Photo by Joe Wolf. Congestion is not an easy beast to tame for cities around the world. Building more roads and increasing the capacity of public transport does little to improve...[read more]

Congestion pricing is gathering some inertia in cities worldwide for a few reasons; safety, money, and public desire are among the main ones. Unlike traditional mechanisms to deal with more cars such as, well, building new roads, congestion pricing has had a profound effect on the cities it has come to. Pricing schemes operate on the...[read more]

Credit: By K_GradingerEditor’s Note: This is a special guest post by Joe Peach, the founder and editor of “This Big City” - a sustainable cities blog exploring ideas for our urban world. Joe works as a freelance writer and all-round creative in central London, as well as studying for a Masters in Sustainable Communities and the Creative...[read more]

I don’t know what’s most strange about this Matt DeBord post on Felix Salmon’s congestion pricing piece in Wired, his insistence on making every policy discussion into a tribal battle between Team Car and everyone else, his bizarre suggestion that drivers have no problem with congestion, or the ludicrously hyperbolic assertion that...[read more]

It’s interesting to me that so many people find the idea of a VMT tax to be clearly ridiculous. At present, federal gas tax revenues are insufficient to cover spending on highways (to say nothing of all transportation needs), and spending on transportation is insufficient to cover critical needs (to say nothing of desirable expansions...[read more]

From Bloomberg: Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said his goal to speed up construction of 12 transit projects and ease congestion in the second-biggest U.S. city requires “creative” funding help from Washington. Villaraigosa is pushing a plan to complete about $20 billion of subway and rail-line work by 2019, 20 years sooner than...[read more]

Every few months I see articles and posts about congestion pricing as a means of "solving congestion." For example: How Does Congestion Pricing Work? and A Terrible Argument Against Congestion Pricing. Why such interest in something which has no future? Serious consideration of congestion pricing is so far out of step with popular...[read more]

David Owen, whom I referenced a few weeks ago, opened up a major can of worms with a recent piece in the Wall Street Journal: "How Traffic Jams Help the Environment." As the title suggests, he argues that congestion compels drivers to shift to alternative modes, and therefor there is no reason to attempt to alleviate it. Randal O'Toole...[read more]

Alice Rivlin and Benjamin Orr are recommending the nation move to a system in which vehicle miles traveled are tolled, with a toll that varies by congestion level. They suggest it be tested in a major metropolitan area first — Washington. What would this look like? The system might work like this: Vehicles would be fitted with a GPS...[read more]