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Carpooling and Congestion Pricing: HOV and HOT Lanes

Author

Listed:
  • Hideo Konishi

    (Boston College)

  • Se-il Mun

    (Kyoto University)

Abstract

It is often argued in the US that HOV (high occupancy vehicle) lanes are wasteful and should be converted to HOT (high occupancy vehicles and toll lanes). In this paper, we construct a simple model of commuters using a highway with multiple lanes, in which commuters are heterogeneous in their carpool organization costs. We first look at the HOV lanes and investigate under what conditions introducing HOV lanes is socially beneficial. Then we examine whether converting HOV lanes to HOT lanes improves the efficiency of road use. It is shown that the result depends on functional form and parameter values. We also discuss the effect of alternative policies: simple congestion pricing without lane division; and congestion pricing with HOV lanes. The analysis using specific functional form is presented to explicitly obtain the conditions determining the rankings of HOV, HOT, and other policies based on aggregate social cost.

Suggested Citation

  • Hideo Konishi & Se-il Mun, 2009. "Carpooling and Congestion Pricing: HOV and HOT Lanes," Boston College Working Papers in Economics 719, Boston College Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:boc:bocoec:719
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    Cited by:

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    2. Louis-Philippe Beland & Daniel A. Brent, 2018. "Traffic and the Provision of Public Goods," Departmental Working Papers 2018-04, Department of Economics, Louisiana State University.
    3. Furuhata, Masabumi & Dessouky, Maged & Ordóñez, Fernando & Brunet, Marc-Etienne & Wang, Xiaoqing & Koenig, Sven, 2013. "Ridesharing: The state-of-the-art and future directions," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 28-46.
    4. Julie Bulteau & Thierry Feuillet & Sophie Dantan & Souhir Abbes, 2023. "Encouraging carpooling for commuting in the Paris area (France): which incentives and for whom?," Transportation, Springer, vol. 50(1), pages 43-62, February.
    5. Michael Janson & David Levinson, 2013. "HOT or Not: Driver Elasticity to Price on the MnPASS HOT Lanes," Working Papers 000111, University of Minnesota: Nexus Research Group.
    6. Zang, Guangzhi & Xu, Meng & Gao, Ziyou, 2020. "High-occupancy vehicle lane management with tradable credit scheme: An equilibrium analysis," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 144(C).
    7. Saxena, Aditya & Gupta, Vallary, 2023. "Carpooling: Who is closest to adopting it? An investigation into the potential car-poolers among private vehicle users: A case of a developing country, India," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 11-20.
    8. Su, Qing & Zhou, Liren, 2012. "Parking management, financial subsidies to alternatives to drive alone and commute mode choices in Seattle," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 42(1-2), pages 88-97.
    9. Bento, Antonio M. & Hughes, Jonathan E. & Kaffine, Daniel, 2013. "Carpooling and driver responses to fuel price changes: Evidence from traffic flows in Los Angeles," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 41-56.
    10. Cohen, Maxime C. & Jacquillat, Alexandre & Ratzon, Avia & Sasson, Roy, 2022. "The impact of high-occupancy vehicle lanes on carpooling," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 186-206.
    11. Deakin, Elizabeth & Dock, Fred & Garry, Gordon & Handy, Susan & McNally, Michael & Sall, Elizabeth & Skabardonis, Alex & Walker, Joan & Rheinhardt, Karl, 2020. "Calculating and Forecasting Induced Vehicle-Miles of Travel Resulting from Highway Projects: Findings and Recommendations from an Expert Panel," Institute of Transportation Studies, Research Reports, Working Papers, Proceedings qt15d2t2gf, Institute of Transportation Studies, UC Berkeley.
    12. Daniel A. Brent & Austin Gross, 2018. "Dynamic road pricing and the value of time and reliability," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(2), pages 330-349, March.
    13. M Rouhani, Omid, 2016. "Social welfare analysis of HOV to HOT conversion," MPRA Paper 75816, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    14. Zhong, Lin & Zhang, Kenan & (Marco) Nie, Yu & Xu, Jiuping, 2020. "Dynamic carpool in morning commute: Role of high-occupancy-vehicle (HOV) and high-occupancy-toll (HOT) lanes," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 98-119.
    15. Xiao, Ling-Ling & Liu, Tian-Liang & Huang, Hai-Jun & Liu, Ronghui, 2021. "Temporal-spatial allocation of bottleneck capacity for managing morning commute with carpool," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 177-200.
    16. Button, Kenneth, 2020. "The Transition From Pigou’S Ideas On Road Pricing To Their Application," Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Cambridge University Press, vol. 42(3), pages 417-438, September.
    17. Julie Bulteau & Thierry Feuillet & Sophie Dantan, 2019. "Carpooling and carsharing for commuting in the Paris region: A comprehensive exploration of the individual and contextual correlates of their uses," Post-Print hal-02113257, HAL.
    18. Yao, Jia & Cheng, Zhanhong & Shi, Feng & An, Shi & Wang, Jian, 2018. "Evaluation of exclusive bus lanes in a tri-modal road network incorporating carpooling behavior," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 130-141.
    19. Yuan, Fangfang & Wang, Xiaolei & Chen, Zhibin, 2024. "Assessing the impact of ride-sourcing vehicles on HOV-lane efficacy and management strategies," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 35-52.
    20. Ke, Jintao & Yang, Hai & Li, Xinwei & Wang, Hai & Ye, Jieping, 2020. "Pricing and equilibrium in on-demand ride-pooling markets," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 411-431.
    21. R. Lamotte & A. de Palma & N. Geroliminis, 2020. "Impacts of Metering-Based Dynamic Priority Schemes," THEMA Working Papers 2020-14, THEMA (THéorie Economique, Modélisation et Applications), Université de Cergy-Pontoise.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    HOV lanes; HOT lanes; congestion pricing; transportation economics;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • R41 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Transportation Economics - - - Transportation: Demand, Supply, and Congestion; Travel Time; Safety and Accidents; Transportation Noise

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