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on Transport Economics |
| By: | Llanto, Gilberto M.; Gerochi, Hope A. |
| Abstract: | The EDSA bus market is fiercely competitive. In theory, allowing competition among many bus operators is expected to result in cost-effective and reliable transport services, and efficient use of roads. However, in reality, the outcomes are far different: daylong traffic jam and poor bus service along Metro Manila's most important road artery. This paper examined an option proposed by some quarters that consolidating bus operation along EDSA will solve road congestion. It was thought that having fewer but bigger bus operators will be the solution. Based on a review of country experiences, this paper argues that one way to address road congestion and other market failures in the bus markets is to shift the regulatory framework for bus transport services from the current competition "in the market" (the status quo) toward competition "for the market". Bus consolidation is an initial step to relieve the roads of traffic congestion, but it is not a sufficient condition for sustainable quality bus service. However, casting bus consolidation within a competition for the market regulatory framework presents a better and more workable option for improving bus transport services in EDSA. The alternative regulatory approach called "competition for the market framework" provides a stronger incentive for bus operators to consolidate because a competitive tendering mechanism is used to select an optimum number of formal bus transport operators that will serve the market. Government takes more control of critical aspects of bus services (design of the bus network, quality standards, frequency, among others), which, thus, provide an opportunity to address the market failures that are inherent in liberalized urban bus markets. The government via its pipeline of bus rapid-transit (BRT) projects--including one being prepared for EDSA--seems to lean in favor of this framework. To be effective and to encourage the application of this new framework also to non-BRT corridors, complementary reforms have to be implemented in parallel and these would include improving the capacity of regulatory agencies, institutions (rules of the game), procurement, contract monitoring, and traffic management. |
| Keywords: | Philippines, urban bus market, market failures, consolidation, competition-for-the-market, competitive tendering, bus-rapid-transit system (BRTS), competition-in-the market, bus transport, traffic management, bus regulation, urban transport |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:phd:dpaper:dp_2017-10&r=tre |
| By: | Nicola Bianchessi (Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, University of Brescia); Michael Drexl (Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Deggendorf Institute of Technology); Stefan Irnich (Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz) |
| Abstract: | In classical routing problems, each customer is visited exactly once. By contrast, when allowing split deliveries, customers may be served through multiple visits. This potentially results in substantial savings in travel costs. Even if split deliveries are bene?cial to the transport company, several visits may be undesirable on the customer side: at each visit the customer has to interrupt his primary activities and handle the goods receipt. The contribution of the present paper consists in a thorough analysis of the possibilities and limitations of split delivery distribution strategies. To this end, we investigate two different types of measures for limiting customer inconvenience (a maximum number of visits and the temporal synchronization of deliveries) and evaluate the impact of these measures on carrier e?ciency by means of different objective functions (comprising variable routing costs, costs related to route durations, ?xed ?eet costs). We consider the vehicle routing problem with time windows in which split deliveries are allowed (SDVRPTW) and de?ne the corresponding generalization that takes into account customer inconvenience constraints (SDVRPTW-IC). We design an extended branch-and-cut algorithm to solve the SDVRPTW-IC and report on experimental results showing the impact of customer inconvenience constraints. We ?nally draw useful insights for logistics managers on the basis of the experimental analysis carried out. |
| Keywords: | Split delivery vehicle routing problem, Time windows, Synchronization, Maximum number of visits, Branch-and-cut |
| Date: | 2017–04–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jgu:wpaper:1706&r=tre |
| By: | Rema Hanna; Gabriel Kreindler; Benjamin A. Olken |
| Abstract: | In cities worldwide, the widespread use of single occupancy cars often leads to traffic congestion and its associated ill effects. Using high frequency data from Google Maps, we test whether high-occupancy vehicle (HOV) policies can be an effective tool to combat congestion. Using the unexpected lifting of Jakarta’s HOV policy, we show that after the policy was abandoned delays rose about 39 percent on affected roads during the morning peak—and nearly 69% during the evening peak. Importantly, this was not due to simply a substitution from other roads to the former HOV routes: the lifting of the policy led to worse traffic throughout the city, even on roads that had never been restricted or at times of the day when restrictions had never been in place. The increase in traffic persisted long after the policy was lifted. In short, we find that HOV policies can greatly improve traffic conditions. |
| JEL: | O18 R41 |
| Date: | 2017–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:23295&r=tre |
| By: | Karla Münzel; Wouter Boon; Koen Frenken; Jan Blomme; Dennis van der Linden |
| Abstract: | We analyze the diffusion of carsharing across 177 cities in five Western European countries (Belgium, France, Germany, The Netherlands, United Kingdom) and identify the influence of spatial, socio-demographic and institutional city characteristics. Carsharing can partially replace private ownership of vehicles with a service that allows the use of a car temporarily on an on-demand basis. It has the potential to satisfy individualized transportation demands in a sustainable and socially beneficial way and reduces urban problems like traffic and parking pressure in growing cities. We present the first study that explains the number of shared cars present in a city, while distinguishing between the traditional business-to-consumer (B2C) business model and the more recent peer-to-peer (P2P) business model. We find that carsharing per capita is highest in the largest cities. Moreover, carsharing is popular in cities with high educational level and many green party votes, and less popular in cities with many car commuters. Particularly striking are the differences between countries, with peer-to-peer carsharing being especially popular in French cities and business-to-consumer carsharing in Germany. We reflect on the findings in the light of (sustainable) mobility policy options. |
| Keywords: | sharing economy, carsharing, business-to-consumer, peer-to-peer, policy |
| Date: | 2017–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uis:wpaper:1703&r=tre |
| By: | Toshihiro Yokoo; Mihai Marasteanu; David Levinson (Nexus (Networks, Economics, and Urban Systems) Research Group, Department of Civil Engineering, University of Minnesota) |
| Abstract: | In a region well known for its severe weather, maintaining pavements to meet high standards remains a challenge. Changes in weather states (such as the freeze-thaw cycle) leads to distresses in the pavement materials. There exist claims that poor pavement quality reduces the ability of roads to drain and reduces the ability of vehicles to resist skidding, and is thus associated with more crashes. In order to improve road safety, several pavement maintenance treatments are carried out, such as “rout and seal cracks” and “hot-mix patching” for improving pavement roughness and distress (Tighe et al., 2000). Others have found that crash rate depends on the pavement type and pavement condition. Crash rate of tined pavement sites is larger than the rate of ground pavement sites. When the pavement condition is wet or icy, crashes are more likely than under dry conditions (Drakopoulos et al., 1998). , When the pavement condition is poor, severe crashes are more likely, but when the pavement condition is very poor, severe crashes are less likely to occur than poor pavement conditions (Li et al., 2013). In accident rate estimation models, the results indicate that most important independent variable is “AADT”, and “geometric design” (lane width and access control) and “pavement condition” (friction, serviceability index, and pavement type) are also important variables (Karlaftis and Golias, 2002). Our research proposes to statistically test such claims of a relationship between incident number and road quality, while controlling for traffic data (AADT and percent truck), segment length, crash conditions (date, road characteristics, and road surface), and pavement type. To investigate the relationship, we combine data from various sources. We then conduct a statistical analysis for ascertaining the effects of good road quality on incident number and severity. This paper describes the data, methods, hypotheses, and results in turn. |
| Keywords: | Road quality |
| JEL: | R41 R42 |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nex:wpaper:poorroads&r=tre |
| By: | Alireza Ermagun; David Levinson (Nexus (Networks, Economics, and Urban Systems) Research Group, Department of Civil Engineering, University of Minnesota) |
| Abstract: | This paper tests a group decision-making model to examine the school travel behavior of students 6-18 years old in the Minneapolis-St. Paul Metropolitan area. The school trip information of 1,737 two-parent families with a student is extracted from Travel Behavior Inventory data collected by the Metropolitan Council between the Fall 2010 and Spring 2012. The proposed model has four distinct characteristics including: (1) considering the student explicitly in the model, (2) allowing for bargaining or negotiation within households, (3) quantifying the intra-household interaction among family members, and (4) determining the decision weight function for household members. This framework also covers a household with three members, namely, a father, a mother, and a student, and unlike other studies it is not limited to dual-worker families. To test the hypotheses we developed two models, each with and without the group-decision approach. The models are separately developed for different age groups, namely students 6-12 and 12-18 years old. This study considered a wide range of variables such as work status of parents, age and gender of students, mode of travel, and distance to school. The findings of this study demonstrate that the elasticities of the two modeling approaches differ not only in the value, but in the sign in some cases. In 63 percent of the cases the unitary household model underestimates the results. More precisely, the elasticities of the unitary household model are as large as 2 times more than that of the group-decision model in 20 percent of cases. This is a direct consequence of model misspecification that misleads both long- and short-term policies where the intra-household bargaining and interaction is overlooked in travel behavior models. |
| Keywords: | Travel behavior, Group decision, School trips, Escorting children, Model misspecification |
| JEL: | R40 I20 C78 C35 D13 |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nex:wpaper:intrahouseholdbargaining&r=tre |
| By: | Huong, Trinh Thi Thu |
| Abstract: | SECO Working Paper 2/2017 by Trinh Thi Thu Huong |
| Abstract: | Transport cost is a critical component that structure price of goods at destination points in international trade. This research explored and analysed transport cost and its impact on export by investigating the relationship between transport cost and export of textile (a specific sector) in Vietnam (a developing country) from 2012 to 2014. |
| Date: | 2017–03–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wti:papers:1051&r=tre |
| By: | M. Keith Chen; Judith A. Chevalier; Peter E. Rossi; Emily Oehlsen |
| Abstract: | Participation in flexible contract work has increased dramatically over the last decade, often in settings where new technologies lower the transaction costs of providing labor flexibly. One prominent example of this is the ride-sharing company Uber, which allows drivers to provide (or not provide) rides anytime they are willing to accept prevailing prices for this service. An Uber-style arrangement offers workers flexibility in both setting a customized work schedule and also adjusting it throughout the day. Using high-frequency data of hourly earnings for Uber drivers, we document the ways in which drivers utilize this real-time flexibility and we estimate the driver surplus generated by this flexibility. We estimate how drivers' reservation wages vary in high frequency from hour to hour, which allows us to study the surplus and supply implications of both flexible and traditional work arrangements. Our results indicate that, while the Uber relationship may have other drawbacks, Uber drivers benefit significantly from real-time flexibility, earning more than twice the surplus they would in less flexible arrangements. If required to supply labor inflexibly at prevailing wages, they would also reduce the hours they supply by more than two-thirds. The implications of our findings for the future of flexible work are discussed. |
| JEL: | J22 L91 |
| Date: | 2017–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:23296&r=tre |
| By: | Arevik Gnutzmann-Mkrtchyan; Simon Lester |
| Abstract: | The Panel Report in Ukraine - Passenger Cars provides an opportunity to revisit an old debate over the role of safeguard measures in the WTO. With regard to the legal findings, the panel followed the established jurisprudence in this area, and found a number of violations of the Safeguards Agreement. With regard to the economics, we delve more deeply into the economic and political background of the safeguards investigation. Ukraine was hit by the economic crisis shortly after its WTO accession that significantly liberalized import tariffs on passenger cars. Next, we offer a de novo look at the injury and causation issues in this case, and discuss the challenges of an industry reliant on offshored production that sees a safeguard as a mechanism to attract FDI for production. We conclude with an assessment of the operation of the WTO?s safeguards regime, along with some tentative suggestions for reform. Overall, our examination of the economic analysis by the investigating authority and the legal review by the WTO panel raises questions about particular aspects of the domestic and WTO processes, but concludes that the system worked well in this case. |
| Keywords: | Safeguards, WTO disputes, Trade remedies trade protection, Ukraine |
| JEL: | F13 F53 F63 |
| Date: | 2016–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bel:wpaper:34&r=tre |
| By: | Kirmas, Alexander (RWTH Aachen University); Madlener, Reinhard (E.ON Energy Research Center, Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN)) |
| Abstract: | We examine the economic viability of second-life batteries from electric vehicles for load shifting and peak shaving in residential applications. We further investigate the expected impact of a growing number of residential storage systems on the electricity market. For the analysis a simulation model of a private household with integrated PV-storage system is used that is parametrized for an electricity demand of three people and a location in southern Germany. The conditions for which investments in second use batteries are profitable are examined for three scenarios. The central scenario S2 tackles an expected net increase in the electricity price by 4% per year. Upward and downward deviations from this price trajectory are covered by scenarios S1 and S3. For scenario S1, we find that investments in storage systems are profitable for all Li-ion battery costs assumed. In scenario S2, the breakeven battery price is found to be 107 € kWh-1, whereas in scenario S3 with the lowest electricity price growth the battery price has to be equal or lower than 73 € kWh-1 to maintain economic viability. |
| Keywords: | E-vehicle; Residential electricity; Battery storage; Load shifting; Peak shaving |
| JEL: | D12 Q41 |
| Date: | 2017–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ris:fcnwpa:2016_007&r=tre |
| By: | Andrew S. Green; Mark J. Kutzbach; Lars Vilhuber |
| Abstract: | Commuting flows and workplace employment data have a wide constituency of users including urban and regional planners, social science and transportation researchers, and businesses. The U.S. Census Bureau releases two, national data products that give the magnitude and characteristics of home to work flows. The American Community Survey (ACS) tabulates households’ responses on employment, workplace, and commuting behavior. The Longitudinal Employer-Household Dynamics (LEHD) program tabulates administrative records on jobs in the LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES). Design differences across the datasets lead to divergence in a comparable statistic: county-to-county aggregate commute flows. To understand differences in the public use data, this study compares ACS and LEHD source files, using identifying information and probabilistic matching to join person and job records. In our assessment, we compare commuting statistics for job frames linked on person, employment status, employer, and workplace and we identify person and job characteristics as well as design features of the data frames that explain aggregate differences. We find a lower rate of within-county commuting and farther commutes in LODES. We attribute these greater distances to differences in workplace reporting and to uncertainty of establishment assignments in LEHD for workers at multi-unit employers. Minor contributing factors include differences in residence location and ACS workplace edits. The results of this analysis and the data infrastructure developed will support further work to understand and enhance commuting statistics in both datasets. |
| Keywords: | U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD, LODES, ACS, Employer-employee matched data, Commuting, Record linkage |
| Date: | 2017–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cen:wpaper:17-34&r=tre |