The Value-priced Express Lane
Cars are great and convenient, but there’s room for improvement. The carpool lane, for instance. There’s plenty of room there, but what if I’m driving without a passenger? The extra lane could do extra-duty as a value-priced express lane.
I’m on my way to work, say driving on I-26 from Beaverton into downtown Portland. Up ahead traffic is at a stand-still. I look to the electronic display above the toll entrance. Four dollars. To get to the meeting on time, this morning it’s worth it. A double mocha Americano with extra whip? Heck, I’m going to drive in the express lane. Click! A sensor camera photographs my license and windshield. I’ve got two weeks to pay the toll at participating grocery stores. I don’t mind. I’m making good money, and I know the four dollars goes directly to pay for the new lightrail and overhead wires for the cities’ electric bus fleet. Of course, I plan to sell my car and afford myself one of those new cars: electric vehicles have free access to express lanes.
Seeing as people will pay for convenience – especially when you’re talking traffic jams – an express lane can pay for itself, and create a revenue stream to finance a more sustainable transportation infrastructure. The pricing would be dynamic: reduced when traffic is light, and as high as twenty dollars when traffic is at a standstill.
Intelligently placed along a corridor that connects well-paid employees with their place of work downtown, lane-pricing provides a double service: relieving congestion while paying for new infrastructure. Congestion-pricing exists in Stockholm and London. Mayor Bloomberg of New York City tried to get congestion-pricing passed in Albany, but it didn’t fly. Maybe Portland can implement a variation on the European model: something more in line with America’s need for speed. Okay, you want to go fast, now you can buy it – and rationalize the expense as a contribution to the creation of progressive transportation infrastructure.
As long as there’s the free option, studies show people accept lane-pricing. A simple study of the highways serving the neighborhoods most able to pay for an express lane, and then installing an electronically-monitored toll entrance and a strip of highway dividers… Okay, it will be more than a simple study, it will have to be a serious look at proven use of high occupancy toll (HOT) lanes in other cities and how to best fit a value-priced express lane to Portland.
It’s like the Smart Grid, but with cars. Check out Steve Lohr’s article in the NYTimes: Bringing Efficiency to the Infrastructure
For a testimony presented to lawmakers (or lawgivers. Generous. Kind. The U.S. Congress … no really, see for yourself): The Role of Road Pricing in Reducing Traffic Congestion
What do you think about using a value-priced express lane to generate revenue for transportation infrastructure in Portland?
Tags: HOT lanes, Portland Oregon, transport infrastructure, value-priced express lane
