At the November meeting of SCAG’s newly-formed Steering Committee* on Regional Congestion Pricing, transportation firm HNTB outlined its preliminary research for a crowd of planners, businesspeople, and community advocates, mainly summarizing existing practices in other cities around the globe. Against the resistance of some local politicians and even its own Board members, SCAG recently committed $4 million to a feasibility study on congestion pricing in preparation for its 2012 update of the Regional Transportation Plan (RTP).

With Southern California slated to convert existing carpool lanes to HOT (High Occupancy Toll) lanes on stretches of the 210 10 and 110 as soon as next year, the committee gathered to debate whether the application of road pricing strategies should be broadened across the region to manage anticipated increases in VMT.

HNTB was mostly preaching to the choir as it outlined the positive benefits – economic and environmental – that have been reaped from the implementation of congestion pricing policies elsewhere. Representatives from the trucking/goods movement industries were a tad more skeptical, but most everyone agreed that the success of congestion pricing in Southern California will ride on the rollout of the concept to the public, particularly how the revenues from any user-based fees are subsequently allocated.

One of the most interesting findings from HNTB’s research was that, even in other cities less enamored of the automobile than Los Angeles, public support for congestion pricing increased after implementation, but still barely passed the 50% mark. The graph below tracks the opinion of Stockholm residents before and after the city started charging cars to enter its central district. The poll further distinguishes between residents in the inner-city (ie. within the congestion pricing zone) and the outer region/periphery.

% of Stockholm residents in favor of congestion pricing, before and after implementation, by location (Source: Stephen Glaister, Imperial College, UK, via HNTB)

Two caveats: 1) Public support may have increased further since Spring 2006, as residents have presumably adjusted to the policy and perhaps shifted their places of work/residence accordingly. 2) Southern California is not Stockholm. It is a famously polynucleated region without a dominant urban core. But the longstanding disparity between job-rich coastal counties and the more affordable but primarily housing-driven Inland Empire could pose similar challenges to Southern California policymakers in garnering broad majority support here. Indeed, there are still so many variables that it is hard to gauge who the probable winners and losers would be (more on that in a future post). But congestion pricing may be part of the long-term solution to our traffic woes.

*Of which I am a member, representing UC Irvine’s Center for Urban Infrastructure.