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In my earlier work on traffic congestion in Melbourne I was surprised to learn that the intersection between Springvale Road and the Whitehorse Road at Nunawading was judged by sampled RACV members to be the worst traffic-congested part of Melbourne. The interesting thing is that this intersection is a long way from Melbourne’s CBD. It [...] Ken Livingston, Mayor of London, argues that congested cities should mimic the successful London congestion pricing scheme. Of course I agree – all the major east coast cities of Australia for a start. In London it reduced congestion, didn’t damage retail sales (the city has just become more livable and convenient), increased use of [...] Critics of public transport pricing claim in The Age that public transport fares in Melbourne are ‘too high’ compared to other States – the State-by-State fare comparisons are here. Indeed this claim at might be true in a comparative sense and from the viewpoint of efficiently pricing such services at social marginal cost – the [...] The Victorian Government in their response to the VCEC Final Report , Making the Right Choices: Options for Managing Transport Congestion, have come down decisively against moves to implement (or even think about implementing) road congestion pricing. I made a submission to VCEC supporting pricing so I am disappointed but not terribly so. I half [...] Clive Hamilton has a piece on congestion in Sydney and its implications for immigration policy. Responses came from Jason Soon at Catallaxy and Phil at LP.I agree with Hamilton that Australia should be seeking quality immigrants with good moral character and not riff-raff who don’t share our values. I also agree that congestion is a [...] A tunnel is again being discussed linking CityLink with Melbourne’s Eastern Freeway. The project estimated to cost $10 billion would link the Eastern Freeway in the east of the city to the Tullamarine Freeway, CityLink and Melbourne’s west. An inquiry will be headed by Sir Rod Eddington who runs Victoria’s Major Events Association. The inquiry [...] In trying to dig out some facts on how Melbourne developed its road system I came across Max Lay’s, Melbourne Miles, The Story of Melbourne’s Roads, Australian Scholarly Publishing 2003.This is not my idea of light reading though Dr Lay obviously loves this stuff. My main finds in this book were parochial. I live north-east [...] It interests me that Melbourne’s urban transport problems have become an election issue in the current Victorian State elections. Like Sydney, Melbourne’s population is expected to grow strongly over the next 20 years and, while the city is expecting much higher levels of car travel, and hence much higher congestion, the public transport system has [...] In preparing classes on traffic congestion externalities in recent years I have touched on some other important externalities associated with driving. One very expensive externality is provision of free parking which is equivalent to a subsidy of 22 cents per mile for a US motorist taking the average journey to work. Another important cost is [...] This is a draft of a paper on urban traffic congestion I will present at The Australian-Melbourne Institute ‘Making the Boom Pay’ Conference, November 2-3, 2006. Comments are very welcome.Introduction Demand-based economic policies, such as congestion tolls and market-based curb-side parking charges, should be tools for addressing congestion in Australia’s large cities. These policies are [...] I am ambivalent about Mr Baillieu’s proposal to offer free public transport to young people and full time tertiary students in Victoria.Fares on buses and trains in Victoria are well above marginal cost (and a long way above social marginal cost given un-priced congestion externalities) but I do not believe these marginal costs are zero [...] London’s population is 3-4 times that of Melbourne, although it is 25 per cent smaller in area. Like Melbournians, Londoners prefer living in residential suburbs, segregated from industry and therefore have high car-dependence. Like Melbourne too, most jobs, retail, entertainment and educational institutions are located in central and inner suburbs while most people live [...] Melbourne’s has, or will have, two types of priced roads: The CityLink tolled roads that operate as a radial link from the North and from the East to Melbourne’s city centre and the proposed cross-town road, the Mitcham-Frankston Project that links the Eastern Freeway in Donvale to the Frankston Freeway near Seaford. Neither of these [...] My work on the economics of traffic congestion in Melbourne, with Andrew Hawkins, is published online at the VCEC website here . I think its not a bad study. It proposes a cordon pricing scheme for Melbourne’s inner city, pricing of the major arterials and the two big (current and proposed) cross-town roads. It is [...] |
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