Welfare losses of road congestion: evidence from Rome

Antonio Russo; Martin Adler; Federica Liberini; Jos van Ommeren

doi:10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2021.103692

Welfare losses of road congestion: evidence from Rome

Antonio Russo, Martin Adler, Federica Liberini, Jos van Ommeren

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

11 Citations (SciVal)

Abstract

We estimate the marginal external cost and welfare losses due to congestion for a large number of roads in Rome, Italy. We show that the marginal external cost is substantial, equaling about two thirds of the private time cost of travel. About one third of this cost is borne by public transport users. Our results imply that policies designed to reduce congestion can result in important welfare gains.

Original language	English
Article number	103692
Number of pages	18
Journal	Regional Science and Urban Economics
Volume	89
Early online date	27 May 2021
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2021.103692
Publication status	Published - 31 Jul 2021
Externally published	Yes

Funding

We thank Rome's Mobility Agency (Agenzia per la Mobilita) and the Italian regulator for public sector strikes (Commissione di Garanzia per gli Scioperi) for kindly providing data. We would like to thank Alex Anas, Richard Arnott, Pierre-Philippe Combes, Gilles Duranton, Dan Jaqua, Ismir Mulalic, Luis Rizzi, Ken Small and Erik Verhoef for insightful comments. We are grateful to audiences at UC Irvine, University of Toronto, Newcastle University, London School of Economics, VU Amsterdam, Brno University of Technology, Vienna University of Economics and Business, Institut d'Economia de Barcelona, Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, Danish Technical University, GATE Lyon, PUC Santiago, the UEA meeting in Minneapolis, the IIPF conference in Lake Tahoe, the International Trade and Urban Economics workshop in St Petersburg, the Verkehrsökonomik und –politik Conference in Berlin and the meeting of the Italian Society for Transport Economics. All errors are our responsibility. We acknowledge financial contribution by the European Research Council-OPTION program.

Funders	Funder number
Agenzia per la Mobilita
Commissione di Garanzia per gli Scioperi
European Research Council-OPTION
Italian Society for Transport Economics
UEA meeting in Minneapolis
University of California, Irvine
Newcastle University
University of Toronto
Technical University of Denmark
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

Keywords

Deadweight loss
Marginal external congestion costs
Public transport

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Economics and Econometrics
Urban Studies

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

Access to Document

10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2021.103692

https://hdl.handle.net/2134/16627582.v1

Cite this

@article{c23f92c9fdad4debb5667221454eeff5,

title = "Welfare losses of road congestion: evidence from Rome",

abstract = "We estimate the marginal external cost and welfare losses due to congestion for a large number of roads in Rome, Italy. We show that the marginal external cost is substantial, equaling about two thirds of the private time cost of travel. About one third of this cost is borne by public transport users. Our results imply that policies designed to reduce congestion can result in important welfare gains.",

keywords = "Deadweight loss, Marginal external congestion costs, Public transport",

author = "Antonio Russo and Martin Adler and Federica Liberini and {van Ommeren}, Jos",

year = "2021",

month = jul,

day = "31",

doi = "10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2021.103692",

language = "English",

volume = "89",

journal = "Regional Science and Urban Economics",

issn = "0166-0462",

publisher = "Elsevier B.V.",

}

TY - JOUR

T1 - Welfare losses of road congestion

T2 - evidence from Rome

AU - Russo, Antonio

AU - Adler, Martin

AU - Liberini, Federica

AU - van Ommeren, Jos

PY - 2021/7/31

Y1 - 2021/7/31

N2 - We estimate the marginal external cost and welfare losses due to congestion for a large number of roads in Rome, Italy. We show that the marginal external cost is substantial, equaling about two thirds of the private time cost of travel. About one third of this cost is borne by public transport users. Our results imply that policies designed to reduce congestion can result in important welfare gains.

AB - We estimate the marginal external cost and welfare losses due to congestion for a large number of roads in Rome, Italy. We show that the marginal external cost is substantial, equaling about two thirds of the private time cost of travel. About one third of this cost is borne by public transport users. Our results imply that policies designed to reduce congestion can result in important welfare gains.

KW - Deadweight loss

KW - Marginal external congestion costs

KW - Public transport

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85108703844&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2021.103692

DO - 10.1016/j.regsciurbeco.2021.103692

M3 - Article

SN - 0166-0462

VL - 89

JO - Regional Science and Urban Economics

JF - Regional Science and Urban Economics

M1 - 103692

ER -

Welfare losses of road congestion: evidence from Rome

Abstract

Funding

Keywords

ASJC Scopus subject areas

UN SDGs

Access to Document

Other files and links

Fingerprint

Cite this