Effects of Managed Lanes on Vehicle Miles Traveled
Thursday, September 29, 2022, from 1:00pm - 5:00pm PDT
Background
The National Center for Sustainable Transportation has a task order in place with the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) to organize and host a series of workshops around important transportation topics for Caltrans staff. For each workshop, the NCST convenes academic experts to share research and serve as a basis for discussion among Caltrans staff.
In the fourth workshop of the series, the NCST hosted a half-day, invite-only virtual workshop on September 29, 2022, for Caltrans leadership focused on the Effects of Managed Lanes on Vehicle Miles Traveled.
Workshop Goals
To meet state environmental goals, Caltrans is pursuing strategies to reduce vehicle miles traveled (VMT). VMT reductions can be achieved through various means, including mode shift, land-use development that facilitates shorter trips, and increased vehicle occupancy (e.g., through use of high-occupancy vehicle or high-occupancy toll lanes).
In general, pricing is considered an important tool for reducing VMT (as well as for achieving other goals, such as congestion reduction and revenue generation). Raising the price of travel should lead people to consume less. However, the reality is more complicated—if tolling is set to optimize travel flows in an express lane, producing speed and reliability benefits, this could lower the time-cost of travel and induce even more.
This virtual workshop addressed the following questions: 1) Under what conditions can Caltrans be confident that tolling will reduce VMT? 2) How can Caltrans measure that effect?
Presentations
- Induced demand with managed lanes: Theory and Practice (Link to PDF) - Presented by Professor Michael L. Anderson, UC Berkeley
- Empirical research and preliminary thoughts on induced travel (Link to PDF) - Presented by Jamey Volker, Postdoctoral Researcher, UC Davis
- An Operator's Perspective (Link to PDF) - Ray Traynor, Retired, San Diego Association of Governments
More Information
For more information about this workshop, please contact Eric Sundquist, Caltrans Sustainability Advisor. For information about upcoming research workshops, please contact Tyler Monson, Caltrans Division of Research, Innovation and System Information.