This issue brief discusses traffic demand management and managed lanes.

Transportation Research Record 1682 contains the following papers: Analysis of transportation management strategies for 2020 regional transportation plan (Zavattero, DA, Ward, JA and Rice, DF); Capacitated demand changes as a project evaluation measure (Gur, YJ); Plan-HOV : case-based reasoning planning tool of high-occupancy vehicle lane analysis in a geographic information system environment (Khattak, AJ and Renski, H); Video enforcement of high-occupancy vehicle lanes : field test results for I-30 in Dallas (Turner, S); High-occupancy vehicle monitoring and evaluation framework (Bracewell, D, Sayed, T and Shalaby, A); Can high-occupancy/toll lanes encourage carpooling? Case study of carpooling behavior on the 91 express lanes (Parkany, E); MUSIC project : urban traffic control for traffic demand management (Clegg, RG and Clune, AJ); Predicting change in average vehicle ridership on the basis of employer trip reduction plans (Winters, PL, Cleland, FA, Pietrzyk, MC, Burris, MW and Perez, R); Evaluating effects of transportation demand management strategies on trip generation by using poisson and negative binomial regression (Wallace, B, Mannering, F and Rutherford, GS).

Traffic congestion on the nation's highways and streets continues to increase and affect mobility, energy conservation, and air quality. GAO evaluated federal efforts to encourage better management of the nation's highways through the use of low-cost transportation systems management techniques. Overall, GAO found that the federal government plays an important role in facilitating the local implementation of such techniques to reduce congestion and improve air quality. This role includes funding assistance, planning requirements, and technical support. These current efforts have not, however, been fully successful in achieving widespread transportation systems management--and particularly transportation demand management--usage. GAO found that: (1) TSM encompasses low-cost techniques for improving the efficiency of surface transportation, including supply management techniques, which include traffic signal coordination and ramp metering, and transportation demand management techniques, which include carpooling and vanpooling; (2) federal efforts to achieve widespread TSM usage have not been fully successful; (3) over the last decade, the actual total expenditures for TSM with federal aid has remained small relative to total allocations; (4) although the federal government has sought to promote better supply and demand management by including certain TSM projects under an incentive provision that included other operational improvements, the provision has not significantly influenced the amount of TSM implemented; (5) transportation planning requirements alone appear to be insufficient to guarantee that TSM and transportation demand management are implemented, due to local reluctance to fully embrace transportation demand management and an uncertain connection between transportation planning and any consequent project funding; (6) federal policy could further support innovative strategies to better manage traffic demand through ongoing technical assistance; and (7) due to 1990 Clean Air Act requirements, the need for technical assistance could increase greatly.

"This issue contains 19 papers on the subjects of transportation economics, demand management, and parking policy. Specific topics discussed include the following: tax increment financing; revenue performance and bonding costs of toll roads; pass-through tolling agreements; flexible-term highway concessions; a vehicle mileage-based user fee; impact fees emphasizing vehicle miles traveled; equity in road pricing; equitable congestion pricing; congestion pricing and managed lanes in metropolitan transportation planning; drivers opinions of congestion pricing; economic incentives to influence drivers' route choices for safety enhancement; value of travel time estimation using hierarchical Bayesian mixed logit approach; hybrid econometric-network models for freight and passenger modeling; the Olympics as a potential catalyst for enhancing urban transport; encouraging transit and bicycle use by restricting parking provision; the influence of parking policy on the built environment and travel behavior; dynamic ridesharing markets; comparison of parking requirements in zoning and form-based codes; and carsharing parking policy."--pub. desc.

Congestion and traffic-related pollution are increasingly becoming major issues in towns and cities world-wide. This book deals with carefully selected market and non-market based measures to reduce congestion, and their implementation and effectiveness in tackling the problem. The book features a multi-authored research-based text comprising 12 individual chapters that draw upon relevant case studies. The authors were specifically chosen for their global expertise in terms of the respective Demand Management Tools. Drawing on international case studies, the book details the role played internationally by selected Transport Demand Management (TDM) measures in dealing with both congestion and traffic-related pollution in urban areas, focusing on their relative merits and in particular their effectiveness and the issues surrounding implementation.