Investigating the Network System Effects of Mileage Fee

Fuel taxes have been the main source of transportation funding in the United States (US) for the last nearly six decades. Recently, there have been increasing concerns regarding this funding mechanism because the revenue from fuel taxes cannot keep up with the increasing needs for transportation infrastructure repair and rebuild. To address the critical needs in transportation finance, the concept of mileage fee (MF) has received much attention lately as an alternative way to generate transportation revenue. Under this concept, drivers are charged based on the total number of miles traveled and where the travel took place. Compared with fuel taxes, MF can generate stable revenue regardless of fuel efficiency or alternative fuels which are one of the major reasons for decreasing or steady revenue from fuel taxes. While the current research on MF mainly focuses on the technologies, public acceptance (such as privacy issues), and other financial considerations, few studies looked at the system effects of such a concept. MF, similar to other major transportation policies (such as congestion pricing), is expected to have significant impacts on driver behaviors. Since drivers make their decisions individually who are however connected by the traffic network, MF policy may generate complicated network effects as a result of driver' (potentially heterogeneous) responses. The implication is that, if not thoroughly investigated and properly designed, MF may produce unintended consequences that is not desirable from either the system manger's or the public's perspective.

• Record URL:
  http://www.utrc2.org/search/site/Investigating%20the%20Network%20System%20Effects%20of%20Mileage%20Fee%20

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Completed
• Funding: $166199.00
• Contract Numbers:

  49997-30-25

• Sponsor Organizations:

  University Transportation Research Center

  City College of New York
  Marshak Hall, Suite 910, 160 Convent Avenue
  New York, NY  United States  10031
• Project Managers:

  Eickemeyer, Penny

• Performing Organizations:

  Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

  Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering
  110 8th Street
  Troy, NY  United States  12180
• Principal Investigators:

  Ban, Xuegang

• Start Date: 20140301
• Expected Completion Date: 0
• Actual Completion Date: 20140831
• Source Data: RiP Project 40142

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Behavior; Congestion pricing; Drivers; Fuel taxes; Mileage-based user fees; Revenues
• Uncontrolled Terms: Consequences
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Finance; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01571786
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: University Transportation Research Center
• Contract Numbers: 49997-30-25
• Files: UTC, RIP
• Created Date: Jul 30 2015 1:00AM