nep-tre New Economics Papers
on Transport Economics
Issue of 2012‒01‒25
four papers chosen by
Erik Teodoor Verhoef
VU University Amsterdam

  1. Do Traffic Tickets Reduce Motor Vehicle Accidents? Evidence from a Natural Experiment By Dara Lee
  2. Impacts of urbanization on national transport and road energy use: Evidence from low, middle and high income countries By Phetkeo Poumanyvong; Shinji Kaneko; Shobhakar Dhakal
  3. Increasing Returns in Transportation and the Formation of Hubs By MORI Tomoya
  4. An instrumental variable model of multiple discrete choice By Andrew Chesher; Adam Rosen; Konrad Smolinski

  1. By: Dara Lee (Department of Economics, University of Missouri-Columbia)
    Abstract: This paper analyzes the effect of traffic tickets on motor vehicle accidents. OLS estimates may be upward-biased because police officers tend to focus on areas where and periods when there is heavy traffic and thus higher rates of accidents. This paper exploits the dramatic increase in tickets during the Click-it-or-Ticket campaign to identify the causal impact of tickets on accidents using data from Massachusetts. I find that tickets significantly reduce accidents and non-fatal injuries. However, there is limited evidence that tickets lead to fewer fatalities. I provide suggestive evidence that tickets have a larger impact at night and on female drivers.
    Keywords: traffic tickets, motor vehicle accidents, natural experiment
    JEL: K32 K42 I18 R41
    Date: 2011–10–05
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:umc:wpaper:1119&r=tre
  2. By: Phetkeo Poumanyvong (Graduate School for International Development and Cooperation, Hiroshima University); Shinji Kaneko (Graduate School for International Development and Cooperation, Hiroshima University); Shobhakar Dhakal (National Institute for Environmental Studies)
    Abstract: Few attempts have been made to investigate quantitatively and systematically the impact of urbanization on transport energy use for countries of different stages of economic development. This paper examines the influence of urbanization on national transport and road energy use for low, middle and high income countries during 1975?2005, using the Stochastic Impacts by Regression on Population, Affluence and Technology (STIRPAT) model. After controlling for population size, income per capita and the share of services in the economy, the main results suggest that urbanization influences national transport and road energy use positively. However, the magnitude of its influence varies among the three income groups. Changes in urbanization appear to have a greater impact on transport and road energy use in the high income group than in the other groups. Surprisingly, the urbanization elasticities of transport and road energy use in the middle income group are smaller than those of the low income group. This study not only sheds further light on the existing literature, but also provides policy makers with insightful information on the link between urbanization and transport energy use at the three different stages of development.
    Keywords: Urbanization, Transport energy use, Development stages
    JEL: R49 Q41 Q56
    Date: 2012–01
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hir:idecdp:2-2&r=tre
  3. By: MORI Tomoya
    Abstract: The spatial structure of transport networks is subject to increasing returns in transportation, distance, and density economies. Transport costs between locations are thus, in general, endogenous, and are determined by the interaction between the spatial distribution of transport demand and these increasing returns, although such interdependence has long been ignored in regional models. By using a simple model, the present paper investigates the characteristics of viable hub structures (in terms of spacing and hierarchical relations) given the presence of density and distance economies in transportation.
    Date: 2012–01
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eti:dpaper:12005&r=tre
  4. By: Andrew Chesher (Institute for Fiscal Studies and University College London); Adam Rosen (Institute for Fiscal Studies and University College London); Konrad Smolinski (Institute for Fiscal Studies)
    Abstract: <p><p>This paper studies identification of latent utility functions in multiple discrete choice models in which there may be endogenous explanatory variables, that is explanatory variables that are not restricted to be distributed independently of the unobserved determinants of latent utilities. The model does not employ large support, special regressor or control function restrictions, indeed it is silent about the process delivering values of endogenous explanatory variables and in this respect it is incomplete. Instead the model employs instrumental variable restrictions requiring the existence of instrumental variables which are excluded from latent utilities and distributed independently of the unobserved components of utilities.</p> </p><p><p>We show that the model delivers set identification of the latent utility functions and we characterize sharp bounds on those functions. We develop easy-to-compute outer regions which in parametric models require little more calculation than what is involved in a conventional maximum likelihood analysis. The results are illustrated using a model which is essentially the parametric conditional logit model of McFadden (1974) but with potentially endogenous explanatory variables and instrumental variable restrictions. The method employed has wide applicability and for the first time brings instrumental variable methods to bear on structural models in which there are multiple unobservables in a structural equation.</p></p>
    Date: 2011–12
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ifs:cemmap:39/11&r=tre

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