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Value Pricing Pilot Program: Lessons Learned – Appendix B

Appendix B
Executive Summary

Lessons Learned Report

The “Lessons Learned Report” provides a summary of projects sponsored by FHWA’s Congestion and Value Pricing Pilot Programs from 1991 through 2006 and draws lessons from a sample of projects with the richest and most relevant experience across selected project categories.

Since inception of Pricing Pilot Program in 1991, over 75 pricing projects have been funded by FHWA. More than a dozen operational projects are providing important findings regarding traffic and congestion impacts, transportation funding issues, public acceptability, administrative matters and future prospects for addressing congestion using various pricing strategies. In addition, useful information and valuable lessons have been provided by project feasibility studies and by pricing projects that did not progress to implementation or exhibited unexpected outcomes.

This report aims to synthesize the experience from the projects in the federal pricing programs regarding effectiveness at meeting their objectives and the political and technical aspects related to implementation.

Vppp Case Study Project Summaries

The following set of Case Studies summarizes key findings from past congestion and value pricing pilot projects.  Twenty-four summaries are presented covering the primary project categories and encompassing the range of project types categorized in the FHWA Value Pricing Pilot Project Quarterly Reports.  Some of the projects are feasibility or pre-implementation studies; others entail fully implemented and evaluated programs; others are experimental pricing trials.  The 24 summaries presented are a selection from all the pricing projects that have been funded or granted authority to toll through the program.  These case studies were selected for a variety of reasons, including:  variety of project type; depth and breadth of available evaluation material; range of relevant project experiences and outcomes; range of success or failure along key implementation and outcome variables, and; variation in location across the United States.  The 24 case studies presented here are organized under the appropriate FHWA project categories and do not appear in any particular order.

Each case study is summarized according to the matrix described below in Table ES.1:

Table ES.1 Name and Location of Project

Pricing Project Category

Name and Location of Project

Operations

Details of program or study, including:
Description of participating agencies, pricing mechanisms, enforcement, operational details, project management, advisory committee presence.
Phasing of project or operational changes, e.g., development into managed lane, revised fees, variable introductions, technology.

Cost, Finance,
and Revenue

Reports any financial details included in projects, including:
VPPP grant monies awarded to project.
Cost and revenue information, and when available, breakdown by operations, equipment, enforcement, etc.
Relevant legislation pertaining to surplus revenue distribution, designated support of alternative modes, earmarks, etc.

Policy and Institutional

Indicates key institutional and legislative aspects of projects, including:
Enabling policies and legislation with key provisions, e.g., free flow in HOT lane.
Operational requirements for public involvement, transparency, profit distribution, environmental justice, reporting, sunset, etc.

Outreach and Acceptance

Outlines the extent of public engagement efforts and reports results, including:
Formation of public processes, e.g., key actor or champion roles, workshops, surveys, hearings, focus groups, etc.
Ongoing efforts, e.g., newsletters, hot line media or customer relations.
Public opinion or media reactions, e.g., hearings, customer service tracking, and any program changes resulting.

Technology

Introduces types of, and experiences with, technology in projects, including:
Pricing system, e.g., transponders, readers, driver signs, dynamic versus other.
Operational performance, accuracy, failures, functioning MOEs.

Equity and
Environmental

Examines impacts, costs, and benefits of study or project, including:
Emissions impacts from traffic or user surveys.
Low-income group impacts from surveys, benefit/cost or economic studies.
Business, land use, or other interest group impacts, per evaluation.

Impacts

Reports quantitative and qualitative findings of study or project, including:
Traffic (volumes, VMT, delay, LOS, speed, general purpose lanes, surface streets, diversion, etc.).
Mode share (HOV, transit, P&R impacts).
Violations (SOV, HOV citations, observation results).
Users perceptions (travel time, on time arrival, safety) and affected party perceptions (e.g., business, low-income).

Evaluation

Methodology, limitations and strengths of evaluation completed:
Evaluation framework, e.g., traffic studies, user panels, business, land use, air quality, equity assessments, acceptance, or phases over time.
Evaluation manager, i.e., agency, independent contractor, or other.
Evaluation particulars of interest, e.g., use of controls, survey sample sizes, response rates, means of evaluating difficult impacts, e.g., businesses.