congestion pricing

407ETR are raising tolls differentially to boost revenues and to manage congestion. Toll changes announced today and effective Feb 1 2010 see an increase in the main peak hours premium from 10.3% to 16.3% over off-peak.

Bay Area Toll Authority's (BATA) oversight committee after public hearings and discussion is recommending to the board that different peak, off-peak and weekend toll rates for autos be introduced at their big Bay Bridge and flat rate toll increases be adopted at the other six bridges. Truck tolls would more than double. And for the first time in the Bay Area tolls would be collected from carpool vehicles (mostly 3 or more occupants.)

Helsinki Finland could become the fourth major city to adopt central city congestion tolls. They would follow Singapore, London and Stockholm. The city council voted Monday in favor of central area tolls in principle. There is no specific plan for tolls and where tolls would be levied but there has been discussion of a per kilometer charge or charges per zone.

Maryland authorities are proposing toll rates for cars of 25c to 35c/mile peak hours (6 to 9am, 4 to 7pm workdays) and 20c to 30c/mile offpeak - metric: 16c to 22c/km peak and 12c to 19c/km off-peak.

'Congestion pricing' broadly defined is any road use charge or toll adjusted according to the level of congestion.

Level of congestion can be measured either:

- real time as traffic density (dynamic pricing) or

- indirectly by time of day, weekday or weekend, seasons and other rough proxies for congestion

All the dynamic priced facilities are transponder-only. The others mostly have cash tolls as well, and in most cases, but not all, the differentials only apply to electronic tolls, that is those using a transponder.

Here is v3 of our list:

New York's loss in rejecting congestion pricing is Los Angeles potential gain. $213.6m of federal transit funds previously set aside New York City is now committed to supporting an ambitious variable tolls project on HOV lanes on some of the busiest freeways in the Los Angeles (LA) area.

Democrat legislators in a closed party meeting in the State Capitol in Albany decided today not to allow New York City congestion pricing to be put to a vote in the State Assembly. Democrat leader and assembly speaker Sheldon Silver claimed the opposition was "overwhelming" among Democrats. This he said, without explanation, was sufficient reason not to schedule a vote.

The new governor of New York David Paterson moved Friday (2008-03-21) to support New York City congestion pricing - one of the largest toll system projects going in the US. Paterson issued a statement of support and submitted an enabling bill to the legislature.

Toronto's 407ETR has announced a new toll policy in which tolls will be raised most aggressively on the busiest segments in peak hours. Light vehicle tolls (<5 tons) are increasing from 17.6c/km to 19.25c/km (28.3c/mi to 32c/mile) or by 9.4% in peak hours on the busy 8 and 10 lane central stretch between Highway 401 and Highway 404. (All based on Cc=USc)

That's a 1.65c/km increase (2.7c/mi). The toll increases will apply from Feb 1.

Firms bidding to build and operate New York City's central area congestion toll are virtually unanimous that the project faces catastrophe if the City attempts to proceed as planned. They say the scheme put out for comment by the City is unnecessarily complicated and expensive, and that the schedule is so rushed it may be impossible to meet. City officials have said they may have to adjust their plans.

US transport secretary Mary Peters has announced $838m of grants to New York City, San Francisco, Seattle, Minneapolis and Miami for congestion relief programs each of which involves tolls. The grants are part of an Urban Partners program under which 26 states and metro areas submitted proposals. The five selected were judged by USDOT to be the most effective.

New York's state legislative leaders, the state governor and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg finally reached agreement today on a deal which allows central area tolls (CAT) or congestion pricing to proceed. The deal is being interpreted slightly differently by the different participants and could still fall apart, but it is certainly a revival of what had looked dead on Monday.

New York state senate majority leader Joseph Bruno (Repub) is moving to have enabling legislation passed Monday for the central area toll (CAT) proposed for Manhattan south of 86th Street. He has appealed to Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (Democrat) to convene a meeting of the state Assembly (or lower house) to pass the legislation. The US Government has set "mid July" - apparently Monday - as a deadline for a submission with state legislative clearance.

Harris County commissioners on Tuesday this week (Jun 19) agreed to a set of toll rate policies designed to generate toll concession equivalent value for the county. But on Thursday (Jun 21) they backed down in the face of criticism, retreating to familiar public toll authority politics.

At Tuesday's meeting county commissioners voted unanimously in favor of:

Stockholm's central area toll is due to be restarted August 1 and it will rely mainly on cameras. A bill introduced in the Swedish parliament by the four-party coalition government provides for reinstatement of tolls at the 18 entry points to the central area, as during the seven month trial in 2006.