Reason

There's value in retaining local or regional toll authorities, and doubtful validity to claims that consolidation into a state toller will bring increased efficiencies - according to a Reason Foundation paper by Robert Poole and Daryl Fleming.

Reason's website has a great YouTube interview with Donald Shoup of UCLA.

With a self-mocking one-liner Shoup says: "I'm out to save the world one parking space at a time."

He's been researching parking,  and reporting on it, driven by a conviction that it needs to be priced flexibly so markets clear - much the same way many of us feel passionately about the need for proper pricing of road use.

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A Reason Foundation report on the Pennsylvania Turnpike by Robert Poole (Bob) and myself (Peter Samuel) has got some attention. Bob did all the work and I got all the controversy!

Reason Foundation has published a critique of the report on alternatives for the Pennsylvania Turnpike by three academics commissioned by the Democratic Caucus of the state house. The Reason critique is written by Robert Poole and myself and is an analysis of the profs report titled "For Whom the Road Tolls: Corporate Asset or Public Good" (FWTHT) authored by Gary J Gray, Penn State, University Park, Patrick J Cusatis, Penn State Harrisburg and John H Foote, Harvard.

Reason TV has a terrific video on how the private sector and pricing could help alleviate traffic congestion.

It's a vivid portrayal of the problem narrated in a relaxed easygoing style.

Then it casually throws in the solutions - toll express lanes, Australian style tunnels, and letting the private sector hustle up the money. TV at its very best.

Roadspace is a valuable and scarce commodity, expensive to provide, needing professional management, careful maintenance, intelligent adaptation to changing demand, planned rehab and reconstruction, and prudent imaginative investment.