Reducing congestion on the nation’s increasingly crowded road network demands some type of toll or surcharge to inspire the use of transit, carpooling or off-peak commuting, the Government Accountability Office contends in a new report.
In the study, released Thursday, the GAO validates what every driver in the Washington area already knows: The demand for space on the highways, regionally or nationally, has not kept up with capacity, which has increased only 6 percent since 1980.
Single-occupancy drivers who use “free” roads at peak times are not taking into account the delays they cause, the pollution they emit and other costs “on the society at large,” according to the report. In addition to better operations, such as improved incident response and technology, governments should consider charging drivers to change their habits, the GAO said.
“A toll or surcharge … would create incentives for drivers to shift their travel to periods of lower demand, use other roads, or make other adjustments, when the costs of their decision to drive during congested periods exceed the benefits they receive,” the report states.
Without such “incentives,” the report concluded, “the transportation system will be headed for more frequent occurrences of congestion that last longer, resulting in more time spent traveling, greater fuel consumption, and higher emissions in the long run.”
The idea of pricing the daily commute is not new to the Washington region. D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty has broached the topic of congestion pricing — essentially charging a fee for entering downtown in a vehicle — while Ward 8 D.C. Council Member Marion Barry sought to study tolls at the District’s borders. High-occupancy vehicles lanes are being converted and expanded into high-occupancy toll lanes, while the tolls on the planned Intercounty Connector will vary depending on the time of day.
And the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments is examining where the region might be able to apply tolls to existing roadways, said Ron Kirby, COG’s transportation planning director.
“That concept has been around for like 50 years,” Kirby said, “and nobody has yet gotten the political support to implement it.”
