Abstract
The costs and benefits of integrating two major areas of urban transportation enhancement - high-occupancy toll (HOT) lanes and bus rapid transit (BRT) - are explored. The goal is to assess a synergistic strategy of providing premium public transit services in conjunction with roadway pricing strategies. The use of BRT is specifically addressed in the context of a congested urban travel corridor with roadway value pricing. A simple simulation is used to determine those circumstances in which BRT might be an effective element of a multimodal value-pricing corridor strategy. The model used is a variation of SMITE (Spreadsheet Model for Induced Travel Estimation) extended to include managed lanes developed previously by DeCorla-Souza at FHWA. The analysis simulated some alternatives differing from those included in the original DeCorla-Souza assessment of options for the Capital Beltway in Northern Virginia. This is currently a 14-mi-long, 8-lane freeway with no restricted lanes. Seven alternatives are examined. Six of the alternatives place an additional lane in each direction, for a total of 10 lanes. The seventh alternative takes a lane in each direction to provide a special-purpose lane in each direction. The findings suggest that both roadway pricing and BRT compare favorably with toll-free facilities and conventional transit. Taking a lane for a combined HOT facility with BRT might be particularly cost-effective in select locations.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 3-9 |
Number of pages | 7 |
Journal | Transportation Research Record |
Issue number | 1884 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - 2004 |
Externally published | Yes |
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Civil and Structural Engineering
- Mechanical Engineering