Exploring the willingness to pay for high-occupancy toll lanes under conditions of low familiarity

This study evaluates details of a progressive transportation development model, wherein high occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes are transformed into high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes. Although the management strategy of HOT lanes has been implemented for many years, the implementation of HOT lanes is limited in many regions, and thus, many people remain unfamiliar with the concept. This study aims to evaluate travelers' willingness to pay for HOT lanes based on a “low application” scenario in Shenzhen, China, wherein some HOV lanes are present and may potentially be transformed into HOT lanes, but not all area residents are aware of their intended purpose. According to the Diffusion of Innovation Theory, we leverage this situation to conduct a survey of perceptions and attitudes toward the HOT lanes and evaluate how these perspectives may translate to HOT lane utilization. We further proposed a hybrid utility and regret model considering the impacts of loss aversion caused by tolls or coordinated carpooling for single occupancy vehicles to explore relationships between travel behavior and surveyed demographic and socio-economic characteristics in the context of HOT lanes in places where they are unfamiliar. A sensitivity analysis is conducted to characterize any apparent changing influences. The results show that the model considering decision regret performs well, especially in the scenario with low tolls. Nearly 80% of travelers are willing to pay tolls for HOT lanes, even with limited prior exposure to the concept. The increased acceptance of HOT lanes can be expected to hurt total toll revenue, which may be triggered by easier access to carpool partners associated with the free pass. The study informs a deeper understanding of travelers’ willingness to pay for HOT lanes and helps policy-makers develop differentiated tolling strategies.