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Erik Verhoef

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Nanyang Technological University

Atle Mikkola Kjøsen

Western University Canada

Kansas State University

Armando Marques-Guedes

UNL - New University of Lisbon

Stephane Tonnelat

Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique / French National Centre for Scientific Research

Mustafa Kemal Bayırbağ

Middle East Technical University

George Mason University

Technion - Israel Institute of Technology

UFMG - The Federal University of Minas Gerais

Giulio Mattioli

Dortmund University of Technology - Technische Universität Dortmund

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Papers by Erik Verhoef

Car Ownership and Status

European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research

Research on ‘happiness’ suggests that once an average per capita income of around US$ 10,000 is a... more Research on ‘happiness’ suggests that once an average per capita income of around US$ 10,000 is achieved in a country, further increases in income will not lead to a significant increase in happiness. Additional income will probably often be spent on the satisfaction of mainly ‘relative’ needs, of which ‘status goods’ would be one example. From that perspective, an overall shift to more fuel-efficient cars (i.e. smaller cars with less power) would not necessarily, or only to a limited extent, result in less happiness. From a welfare economic perspective, the satisfaction of the relative needs pertaining to consumption can be considered as a form of consumption externalities. This creates a welfare economic basis for government intervention. A model in which these consumption externalities are studied is presented here. Government intervention would include stimulating consumption of lowerstatus goods and discouraging consumption of higher-status ones. We speculate, however, that to ...

Welfare Effects of Road Pricing and Traffic Information Under Alternative Ownership Regimes

Social Science Research Network, 2010

This paper models strategic interactions between a product supplier, a provider of information ab... more This paper models strategic interactions between a product supplier, a provider of information about product quality, and end users, in the context of road transportation. Using a game-theoretical analysis of suppliers' pricing strategies, we assess the social welfare effects of traffic information under various road markets with different ownership regimes. The results show that in this context, the distortive welfare effect of monopolistic information pricing appears small to negligible. Collusion of the road operator and information provider yields higher social welfare than independent pricing by two firms. The intuition behind this result resembles that behind the welfare effects of double marginalization, but it is not exactly the same, as traffic information is not strictly complementary to road use.

Dynamic Congestion and Urban Equilibrium

Social Science Research Network, 2012

We consider a monocentric city where a traffic bottleneck is located at the entrance of the centr... more We consider a monocentric city where a traffic bottleneck is located at the entrance of the central business district. The commuters' choices of the departure times from home, residential location, and lot size, are all endogenous. We show that elimination of queuing time under optimal road pricing induces individuals to spend more time at home and to have larger houses, causing urban sprawl. This is opposite to the typical results of urban models with static congestion, which predict cities to become denser with road pricing.

Dynamic bottleneck congestion and residential land use in the monocentric city

Journal of Urban Economics, Mar 1, 2014

We consider a monocentric city where a traffic bottleneck is located at the entrance of the centr... more We consider a monocentric city where a traffic bottleneck is located at the entrance of the central business district. The commuters' departure times from home, residential locations, and lot sizes, are all endogenous. We show that elimination of queuing time under optimal road pricing induces individuals to spend more time at home and to have larger houses, causing urban sprawl. This is opposite to the typical results of urban models with static congestion, which predict cities to become denser with road pricing.

The WTP for Facilities at the Amsterdam Zuidas

Social Science Research Network, 2005

This paper reports the results of a stated preference study investigating the Willingness-topay (... more This paper reports the results of a stated preference study investigating the Willingness-topay (WTP) of employees at the Amsterdam Zuidas for the presence of non-shopping and shopping facilities. The Amsterdam Zuidas area, surrounding the current train-metro-tram station Amsterdam Zuid World-Trade-Centre, is the largest multifunctional land use project currently under development in The Netherlands. For non-shopping facilities, the results show that employees have the highest WTP for the presence of day-care centres and public transport facilities, and the lowest for public and recreation facilities. The average WTP for the presence of non-shopping facilities amounts to approximately ¤29 per month per employee. The WTP for the presence of shopping facilities is estimated at ¤16 per month per employee on average, and is in absolute value highest for supermarkets and lowest for hairdressers and dry cleaners.

Regulation of Road Accident Externalities when Insurance Companies have Market Power

RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, Jan 18, 2013

Accident externalities are among the most important external costs of road transport. We study th... more Accident externalities are among the most important external costs of road transport. We study the regulation of these when insurance companies have market power. Using analytical models, we compare a public-welfare maximizing monopoly with a private profit-maximizing monopoly, and markets where two or more firms compete. A central mechanism in the analysis is the accident externality that individual drivers impose on one another via their presence on the road. Insurance companies will internalize some of these externalities, depending on their degree of market power. We derive optimal insurance premiums, and "manipulable" taxes that take into account the response of the firm to the tax rule applied by the government. Furthermore, we study the taxation of road users under different assumptions on the market structure. We illustrate our analytical results with numerical examples, in order to better understand the determinants of the relative performance of different market structures.

Teleworking and Congestion: A Dynamic Bottleneck Analysis

RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, Jul 18, 2011

We analyze the welfare effects of part-day teleworking on road traffic congestion in the context ... more We analyze the welfare effects of part-day teleworking on road traffic congestion in the context of Vickrey's dynamic bottleneck model. Endogenous decisions to become equipped with a teleworkingenabling technology change the commuting pattern of equipped drivers and, due to congestion externalities, affect travel costs of all drivers. We show that even costless teleworking might be marginally welfare reducing, after reaching the optimal penetration level, as an equipped driver imposes a higher travel externality on other equipped drivers than unequipped drivers do. We find that private monopolistic supply of the technology might yield a higher social welfare than perfectly competitive supply.

Miles, speed, and technology: Traffic safety under oligopolistic insurance

Transportation Research Part B-methodological, Apr 1, 2016

We study road safety when insurance companies have market power, and can influence drivers' behav... more We study road safety when insurance companies have market power, and can influence drivers' behavior via insurance premiums. We obtain first-and second-best premiums for different insurance market structures. The insurance program consists of an insurance premium, and marginal dependencies of that premium on speed and own safety technology choice of drivers. A private monopolist internalizes collision externalities up to the point where compensations to users' benefit matches the full (intangible) costs; in oligopolistic markets, insurers do not fully internalize collision externalities. Analytical results demonstrate how insurance firms' incentives to influence traffic safety coincide with or deviate from socially optimal incentives. Our results may be useful for design of pay-as-you-speed and alike insurances as well as policies related to driving safety.

Self-Financing Roads

International Journal of Sustainable Transportation, Aug 31, 2009

and-conditions-of-access.pdf This article may be used for research, teaching and private study pu... more and-conditions-of-access.pdf This article may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution , reselling , loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contents will be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug doses should be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings, demand or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material.

Will all autonomous cars cooperate? Brands' strategic interactions under dynamic congestion

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2022

Autonomous cars allow safe driving with a smaller headway than that required for normal human-dri... more Autonomous cars allow safe driving with a smaller headway than that required for normal human-driven cars, thereby potentially improving road capacity. To attain this capacity benefit, cooperation among autonomous cars is vital. However, the future market may have multiple car brands and the incentive for them to cooperate is unknown. This paper investigates the competition and cooperation between multiple car brands that, may provide both autonomous and normal vehicles. We develop a two-stage game-theoretic model to investigate brands' strategic interactions and evaluate, from both policy and organizational perspectives, the implications of their cooperation incentives and pricing competition. We compare four market structures: duopoly competition, perfect competition, a public welfare-maximizing monopoly, and a private profit-maximizing monopoly. Various parameters are evaluated, including factors such as the capacity benefits from cooperation, cooperation cost and price elasticity. This evaluation provides policy insights into actions that could be considered by regulators and organizations for the operation of autonomous cars.

Traveller response and information service technology: Analysis and modelling of economic effects

Spatial Economics, Interaction and Information

Leaving the Tub: The Nature and Dynamics of Hypercongestion in a Bathtub Model with a Restricted Downstream Exit

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2020

Hypercongestion is the situation where a certain traffic flow occurs at a combination of low spee... more Hypercongestion is the situation where a certain traffic flow occurs at a combination of low speed and high density, and a more favorable combination of these could produce the same flow. The macroscopic fundamental diagram (MFD) allows for such hypercongestion, but does not explicitly describe the dynamic process leading up to hypercongestion. Earlier studies of hypercongestion on single links have, however, confirms that such dynamic processes are important to consider. The bathtub model is one class of model that can be used to investigate how hypercongestion can arise in urban areas, when drivers can choose their departure times. This paper investigates equilibrium outcomes and user costs under the realistic assumption that there is finite capacity to exit the bathtub, without which it would be hard to explain why hypercongestion would not dissolve through shockwaves originating from the bathtub exit. We find that when the exit capacity of the bathtub is lower than the equilibrium exit flow from the bathtub, no additional inefficiencies arise due to hypercongestion. However, when the exit capacity is higher than the equilibrium exit flows from the bathtub inefficiencies do occur. The implication of this result is that a restricted downstream capacity regulating hypercongestion may not be necessary because time gains in the bathtub are lost in the queue at the exit.

Tradable Permits to Manage Urban Mobility: Market Design and Experimental Implementation

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2019

Congestion levels have grown substantially in recent years, while the traditional economic respon... more Congestion levels have grown substantially in recent years, while the traditional economic response to congestion-road pricing-remains politically infeasible in most locations. Tradable permits are likely to be a more viable alternative, because they do not require a net financial flow from road users to the government. It is therefore the right moment to design and empirically test tradable permit schemes for managing urban mobility. This paper presents and empirically tests a complete design of a market for tradable permits, both in terms of the conceptual setup of the market as well as its technical implementation. The design is evaluated against a number of criteria, including: transparency and containment of transaction costs, stability of permit prices in relation to the dynamic equilibrium on the mobility market and the prevention of undesirable speculation and fraud. We present evidence of the empirical functioning of this market, using the results of a conducted lab-in-the-field experiment with virtual mobility behaviour and real financial incentives. * We thank the audiences of the 2018 ITEA conference in Hong Kong and of the spatial economics seminar at the VU Amsterdam for useful comments.

Sustainable mobi;ity

and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requi... more and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. • Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. • You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal ? Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.

Train Commuters' Scheduling Preferences: Evidence from a Large-Scale Peak Avoidance Experiment

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2015

We study the trip scheduling preferences of train commuters in a real-life setting. The underlyin... more We study the trip scheduling preferences of train commuters in a real-life setting. The underlying data have been collected during large-scale peak avoidance experiment conducted in the Netherlands, in which participants could earn monetary rewards for traveling outside peak hours. The experiment included ca. 1000 participants and lasted for about 6 months. Holders of an annual train pass were invited to join the experiment, and a customized smartphone app was used to measure the travel behavior of the participants. We find that compared to the pre-measurement, the relative share of peak trips decreased by 22% during the reward period, and by 10% during the post-measurement. By combining multiple complementary data sources, we are able to specify and estimate (MNL and panel latent class) departure time choice models. These yield plausible estimates for the monetary values that participants attach to reducing travel time, schedule delays, the number of transfers, crowdedness, and unreliability.

Hotelling Models with Price-Sensitive Demand and Asymmetric Transport Costs: An Application to Public Transport Scheduling

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2012

We formulate a horizontal differentiation model with price-sensitive demand and asymmetric transp... more We formulate a horizontal differentiation model with price-sensitive demand and asymmetric transport costs, in the context of transport scheduling. Two competitors choose fares and departure times in a fixed time interval. Consumers are distributed uniformly along the interval; their location indicates their desired departure time. In a standard Hotelling model, locations are chosen before prices. In our context, the opposite order is also conceivable, but we show that it does not result in a Nash equilibrium; the same is true for a game in both variables are chosen simultaneously. We also discuss Stackelberg game structures and second-best regulation. We conclude that the addition of price-sensitive demand results in equilibria in the traditional Hotelling model with price setting; there, services are scheduled closer together than optimal. We also show that it is possible to include asymmetric schedule delay functions. Our results show that departure times can be strategic instruments. Optimal regulatory strategies depend on the value of schedule delay, and on whether the regulator can commit.

A Rank Dependent Scheduling Model

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2010

We like to thank Peter Wakker, participants of ETC 2009, and an anonymous reviewer for valuable c... more We like to thank Peter Wakker, participants of ETC 2009, and an anonymous reviewer for valuable comments on earlier versions of this paper. Furthermore, we like to thank Jasper Knockaert for provision of the data. The usual disclaimer applies. The data were gathered in the context of the Dutch peak avoidance project 'Spitsmijden'. Paul Koster was partly funded by TRANSUMO. The project "Reliable accessibility of airports" was made possible with support of TRANSUMO (TRANsition SUstainable MObility). TRANSUMO is a Dutch platform for companies, governments and knowledge institutes that cooperate in the development of knowledge with regard to sustainable mobility.

Overreporting vs. Overreacting: Commuters' Perceptions of Travel Times

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2013

We asked participants of a large-scale, real-life peak avoidance experiment to provide estimates ... more We asked participants of a large-scale, real-life peak avoidance experiment to provide estimates of their average in-vehicle travel time for their morning commute. Comparing these reported travel times to the corresponding actual travel times, we find that travel times are overstated by a factor of 1.5 on average. We show that driver-and link-specific characteristics partially explain the overstating. Using stated and revealed preference data, we investigate whether the driverspecific reporting errors are consistent with the drivers' scheduling behavior in reality as well as in hypothetical choice experiments. For neither case, we find robust evidence that drivers behave as if they misperceived travel times to a similar extent as they misreported them, implying that reported travel times do neither represent actual nor perceived travel times truthfully. The results presented in this paper are thus a strong caveat against the uncritical use of reported travel time data in transport research and policy.

Door-to-door travel times in RP departure time choice models: An approximation method using GPS data

Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, 2013

A common way to determine values of travel time and schedule delay is to estimate departure time ... more A common way to determine values of travel time and schedule delay is to estimate departure time choice models, using stated preference (SP) or revealed preference (RP) data. The latter are used less frequently, mainly because of the difficulties to collect the data required for the model estimation. One main requirement is knowledge of the (expected) travel times for both chosen and unchosen departure time alternatives. As the availability of such data is limited, most RP-based scheduling models only take into account travel times on trip segments rather than door-to-door travel times, or use very rough measures of door-to-door travel times. We show that ignoring the temporal and spatial variation of travel times, and, in particular, the correlation of travel times across links may lead to biased estimates of the value of time (VOT). To approximate doorto-door travel times for which no complete measurement is possible, we develop a method that relates travel times on links with continuous speed measurements to travel times on links where relatively infrequent GPS-based speed measurements are available. We use geographically weighted regression to estimate the location-specific relation between the speeds on these two types of links, which is then used for travel time prediction at different locations, days, and times of the day. This method is not only useful for the approximation of door-to-door travel times in departure time choice models, but is generally relevant for predicting travel times in situations where continuous speed measurements can be enriched with GPS data.

Car Ownership and Status

European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research

Research on ‘happiness’ suggests that once an average per capita income of around US$ 10,000 is a... more Research on ‘happiness’ suggests that once an average per capita income of around US$ 10,000 is achieved in a country, further increases in income will not lead to a significant increase in happiness. Additional income will probably often be spent on the satisfaction of mainly ‘relative’ needs, of which ‘status goods’ would be one example. From that perspective, an overall shift to more fuel-efficient cars (i.e. smaller cars with less power) would not necessarily, or only to a limited extent, result in less happiness. From a welfare economic perspective, the satisfaction of the relative needs pertaining to consumption can be considered as a form of consumption externalities. This creates a welfare economic basis for government intervention. A model in which these consumption externalities are studied is presented here. Government intervention would include stimulating consumption of lowerstatus goods and discouraging consumption of higher-status ones. We speculate, however, that to ...

Welfare Effects of Road Pricing and Traffic Information Under Alternative Ownership Regimes

Social Science Research Network, 2010

This paper models strategic interactions between a product supplier, a provider of information ab... more This paper models strategic interactions between a product supplier, a provider of information about product quality, and end users, in the context of road transportation. Using a game-theoretical analysis of suppliers' pricing strategies, we assess the social welfare effects of traffic information under various road markets with different ownership regimes. The results show that in this context, the distortive welfare effect of monopolistic information pricing appears small to negligible. Collusion of the road operator and information provider yields higher social welfare than independent pricing by two firms. The intuition behind this result resembles that behind the welfare effects of double marginalization, but it is not exactly the same, as traffic information is not strictly complementary to road use.

Dynamic Congestion and Urban Equilibrium

Social Science Research Network, 2012

We consider a monocentric city where a traffic bottleneck is located at the entrance of the centr... more We consider a monocentric city where a traffic bottleneck is located at the entrance of the central business district. The commuters' choices of the departure times from home, residential location, and lot size, are all endogenous. We show that elimination of queuing time under optimal road pricing induces individuals to spend more time at home and to have larger houses, causing urban sprawl. This is opposite to the typical results of urban models with static congestion, which predict cities to become denser with road pricing.

Dynamic bottleneck congestion and residential land use in the monocentric city

Journal of Urban Economics, Mar 1, 2014

We consider a monocentric city where a traffic bottleneck is located at the entrance of the centr... more We consider a monocentric city where a traffic bottleneck is located at the entrance of the central business district. The commuters' departure times from home, residential locations, and lot sizes, are all endogenous. We show that elimination of queuing time under optimal road pricing induces individuals to spend more time at home and to have larger houses, causing urban sprawl. This is opposite to the typical results of urban models with static congestion, which predict cities to become denser with road pricing.

The WTP for Facilities at the Amsterdam Zuidas

Social Science Research Network, 2005

This paper reports the results of a stated preference study investigating the Willingness-topay (... more This paper reports the results of a stated preference study investigating the Willingness-topay (WTP) of employees at the Amsterdam Zuidas for the presence of non-shopping and shopping facilities. The Amsterdam Zuidas area, surrounding the current train-metro-tram station Amsterdam Zuid World-Trade-Centre, is the largest multifunctional land use project currently under development in The Netherlands. For non-shopping facilities, the results show that employees have the highest WTP for the presence of day-care centres and public transport facilities, and the lowest for public and recreation facilities. The average WTP for the presence of non-shopping facilities amounts to approximately ¤29 per month per employee. The WTP for the presence of shopping facilities is estimated at ¤16 per month per employee on average, and is in absolute value highest for supermarkets and lowest for hairdressers and dry cleaners.

Regulation of Road Accident Externalities when Insurance Companies have Market Power

RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, Jan 18, 2013

Accident externalities are among the most important external costs of road transport. We study th... more Accident externalities are among the most important external costs of road transport. We study the regulation of these when insurance companies have market power. Using analytical models, we compare a public-welfare maximizing monopoly with a private profit-maximizing monopoly, and markets where two or more firms compete. A central mechanism in the analysis is the accident externality that individual drivers impose on one another via their presence on the road. Insurance companies will internalize some of these externalities, depending on their degree of market power. We derive optimal insurance premiums, and "manipulable" taxes that take into account the response of the firm to the tax rule applied by the government. Furthermore, we study the taxation of road users under different assumptions on the market structure. We illustrate our analytical results with numerical examples, in order to better understand the determinants of the relative performance of different market structures.

Teleworking and Congestion: A Dynamic Bottleneck Analysis

RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, Jul 18, 2011

We analyze the welfare effects of part-day teleworking on road traffic congestion in the context ... more We analyze the welfare effects of part-day teleworking on road traffic congestion in the context of Vickrey's dynamic bottleneck model. Endogenous decisions to become equipped with a teleworkingenabling technology change the commuting pattern of equipped drivers and, due to congestion externalities, affect travel costs of all drivers. We show that even costless teleworking might be marginally welfare reducing, after reaching the optimal penetration level, as an equipped driver imposes a higher travel externality on other equipped drivers than unequipped drivers do. We find that private monopolistic supply of the technology might yield a higher social welfare than perfectly competitive supply.

Miles, speed, and technology: Traffic safety under oligopolistic insurance

Transportation Research Part B-methodological, Apr 1, 2016

We study road safety when insurance companies have market power, and can influence drivers' behav... more We study road safety when insurance companies have market power, and can influence drivers' behavior via insurance premiums. We obtain first-and second-best premiums for different insurance market structures. The insurance program consists of an insurance premium, and marginal dependencies of that premium on speed and own safety technology choice of drivers. A private monopolist internalizes collision externalities up to the point where compensations to users' benefit matches the full (intangible) costs; in oligopolistic markets, insurers do not fully internalize collision externalities. Analytical results demonstrate how insurance firms' incentives to influence traffic safety coincide with or deviate from socially optimal incentives. Our results may be useful for design of pay-as-you-speed and alike insurances as well as policies related to driving safety.

Self-Financing Roads

International Journal of Sustainable Transportation, Aug 31, 2009

and-conditions-of-access.pdf This article may be used for research, teaching and private study pu... more and-conditions-of-access.pdf This article may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution , reselling , loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contents will be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug doses should be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings, demand or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material.

Will all autonomous cars cooperate? Brands' strategic interactions under dynamic congestion

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2022

Autonomous cars allow safe driving with a smaller headway than that required for normal human-dri... more Autonomous cars allow safe driving with a smaller headway than that required for normal human-driven cars, thereby potentially improving road capacity. To attain this capacity benefit, cooperation among autonomous cars is vital. However, the future market may have multiple car brands and the incentive for them to cooperate is unknown. This paper investigates the competition and cooperation between multiple car brands that, may provide both autonomous and normal vehicles. We develop a two-stage game-theoretic model to investigate brands' strategic interactions and evaluate, from both policy and organizational perspectives, the implications of their cooperation incentives and pricing competition. We compare four market structures: duopoly competition, perfect competition, a public welfare-maximizing monopoly, and a private profit-maximizing monopoly. Various parameters are evaluated, including factors such as the capacity benefits from cooperation, cooperation cost and price elasticity. This evaluation provides policy insights into actions that could be considered by regulators and organizations for the operation of autonomous cars.

Traveller response and information service technology: Analysis and modelling of economic effects

Spatial Economics, Interaction and Information

Leaving the Tub: The Nature and Dynamics of Hypercongestion in a Bathtub Model with a Restricted Downstream Exit

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2020

Hypercongestion is the situation where a certain traffic flow occurs at a combination of low spee... more Hypercongestion is the situation where a certain traffic flow occurs at a combination of low speed and high density, and a more favorable combination of these could produce the same flow. The macroscopic fundamental diagram (MFD) allows for such hypercongestion, but does not explicitly describe the dynamic process leading up to hypercongestion. Earlier studies of hypercongestion on single links have, however, confirms that such dynamic processes are important to consider. The bathtub model is one class of model that can be used to investigate how hypercongestion can arise in urban areas, when drivers can choose their departure times. This paper investigates equilibrium outcomes and user costs under the realistic assumption that there is finite capacity to exit the bathtub, without which it would be hard to explain why hypercongestion would not dissolve through shockwaves originating from the bathtub exit. We find that when the exit capacity of the bathtub is lower than the equilibrium exit flow from the bathtub, no additional inefficiencies arise due to hypercongestion. However, when the exit capacity is higher than the equilibrium exit flows from the bathtub inefficiencies do occur. The implication of this result is that a restricted downstream capacity regulating hypercongestion may not be necessary because time gains in the bathtub are lost in the queue at the exit.

Tradable Permits to Manage Urban Mobility: Market Design and Experimental Implementation

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2019

Congestion levels have grown substantially in recent years, while the traditional economic respon... more Congestion levels have grown substantially in recent years, while the traditional economic response to congestion-road pricing-remains politically infeasible in most locations. Tradable permits are likely to be a more viable alternative, because they do not require a net financial flow from road users to the government. It is therefore the right moment to design and empirically test tradable permit schemes for managing urban mobility. This paper presents and empirically tests a complete design of a market for tradable permits, both in terms of the conceptual setup of the market as well as its technical implementation. The design is evaluated against a number of criteria, including: transparency and containment of transaction costs, stability of permit prices in relation to the dynamic equilibrium on the mobility market and the prevention of undesirable speculation and fraud. We present evidence of the empirical functioning of this market, using the results of a conducted lab-in-the-field experiment with virtual mobility behaviour and real financial incentives. * We thank the audiences of the 2018 ITEA conference in Hong Kong and of the spatial economics seminar at the VU Amsterdam for useful comments.

Sustainable mobi;ity

and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requi... more and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. • Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. • You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal ? Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim.

Train Commuters' Scheduling Preferences: Evidence from a Large-Scale Peak Avoidance Experiment

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2015

We study the trip scheduling preferences of train commuters in a real-life setting. The underlyin... more We study the trip scheduling preferences of train commuters in a real-life setting. The underlying data have been collected during large-scale peak avoidance experiment conducted in the Netherlands, in which participants could earn monetary rewards for traveling outside peak hours. The experiment included ca. 1000 participants and lasted for about 6 months. Holders of an annual train pass were invited to join the experiment, and a customized smartphone app was used to measure the travel behavior of the participants. We find that compared to the pre-measurement, the relative share of peak trips decreased by 22% during the reward period, and by 10% during the post-measurement. By combining multiple complementary data sources, we are able to specify and estimate (MNL and panel latent class) departure time choice models. These yield plausible estimates for the monetary values that participants attach to reducing travel time, schedule delays, the number of transfers, crowdedness, and unreliability.

Hotelling Models with Price-Sensitive Demand and Asymmetric Transport Costs: An Application to Public Transport Scheduling

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2012

We formulate a horizontal differentiation model with price-sensitive demand and asymmetric transp... more We formulate a horizontal differentiation model with price-sensitive demand and asymmetric transport costs, in the context of transport scheduling. Two competitors choose fares and departure times in a fixed time interval. Consumers are distributed uniformly along the interval; their location indicates their desired departure time. In a standard Hotelling model, locations are chosen before prices. In our context, the opposite order is also conceivable, but we show that it does not result in a Nash equilibrium; the same is true for a game in both variables are chosen simultaneously. We also discuss Stackelberg game structures and second-best regulation. We conclude that the addition of price-sensitive demand results in equilibria in the traditional Hotelling model with price setting; there, services are scheduled closer together than optimal. We also show that it is possible to include asymmetric schedule delay functions. Our results show that departure times can be strategic instruments. Optimal regulatory strategies depend on the value of schedule delay, and on whether the regulator can commit.

A Rank Dependent Scheduling Model

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2010

We like to thank Peter Wakker, participants of ETC 2009, and an anonymous reviewer for valuable c... more We like to thank Peter Wakker, participants of ETC 2009, and an anonymous reviewer for valuable comments on earlier versions of this paper. Furthermore, we like to thank Jasper Knockaert for provision of the data. The usual disclaimer applies. The data were gathered in the context of the Dutch peak avoidance project 'Spitsmijden'. Paul Koster was partly funded by TRANSUMO. The project "Reliable accessibility of airports" was made possible with support of TRANSUMO (TRANsition SUstainable MObility). TRANSUMO is a Dutch platform for companies, governments and knowledge institutes that cooperate in the development of knowledge with regard to sustainable mobility.

Overreporting vs. Overreacting: Commuters' Perceptions of Travel Times

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2013

We asked participants of a large-scale, real-life peak avoidance experiment to provide estimates ... more We asked participants of a large-scale, real-life peak avoidance experiment to provide estimates of their average in-vehicle travel time for their morning commute. Comparing these reported travel times to the corresponding actual travel times, we find that travel times are overstated by a factor of 1.5 on average. We show that driver-and link-specific characteristics partially explain the overstating. Using stated and revealed preference data, we investigate whether the driverspecific reporting errors are consistent with the drivers' scheduling behavior in reality as well as in hypothetical choice experiments. For neither case, we find robust evidence that drivers behave as if they misperceived travel times to a similar extent as they misreported them, implying that reported travel times do neither represent actual nor perceived travel times truthfully. The results presented in this paper are thus a strong caveat against the uncritical use of reported travel time data in transport research and policy.

Door-to-door travel times in RP departure time choice models: An approximation method using GPS data

Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, 2013

A common way to determine values of travel time and schedule delay is to estimate departure time ... more A common way to determine values of travel time and schedule delay is to estimate departure time choice models, using stated preference (SP) or revealed preference (RP) data. The latter are used less frequently, mainly because of the difficulties to collect the data required for the model estimation. One main requirement is knowledge of the (expected) travel times for both chosen and unchosen departure time alternatives. As the availability of such data is limited, most RP-based scheduling models only take into account travel times on trip segments rather than door-to-door travel times, or use very rough measures of door-to-door travel times. We show that ignoring the temporal and spatial variation of travel times, and, in particular, the correlation of travel times across links may lead to biased estimates of the value of time (VOT). To approximate doorto-door travel times for which no complete measurement is possible, we develop a method that relates travel times on links with continuous speed measurements to travel times on links where relatively infrequent GPS-based speed measurements are available. We use geographically weighted regression to estimate the location-specific relation between the speeds on these two types of links, which is then used for travel time prediction at different locations, days, and times of the day. This method is not only useful for the approximation of door-to-door travel times in departure time choice models, but is generally relevant for predicting travel times in situations where continuous speed measurements can be enriched with GPS data.