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Road pricing schemes are principally based on cordon-based pricing. Earlier studies have demonstrated that the performance of cordon schemes is critically dependent on cordon location. However, surveys of those designing such schemes indicate that they are opting for the simplest designs, in the interest of acceptability, and may well be overlooking designs which achieve greater economic benefit. A set of analytical procedures has been developed for identifying the locations for imposing charges and the charges at those points which are optimal in terms of economic efficiency. These are demonstrated on a simplified network of Cambridge. Tests on a larger network confirm that performance is very sensitive to cordon location. However, they also show that charging points selected by even a simple analytical procedure can achieve economic benefits around 50% higher than predefined cordons, and that relaxing the requirement to have uniform charges at all charging points can produce further substantial increases in economic benefits. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper describes a method for devising transport strategies that makes iterative use of transport models to find the optimal levels of pre-defined transport measures. It gives the results from using this method in nine European cities. At the heart of the procedure lies the definition of objective functions which encapsulate policy-makers'' objectives with respect to economic efficiency and sustainability. These objective functions include a number of significant parameters and the paper examines the sensitivity of the results to changes in the values of these parameters. The parameters concerned are: the level of shadow price used with regard to public sector financial surplus and deficit; the trade-off between the perspectives of the present generation and a future generation (of importance to issues of sustainability); the trade-off between internal benefits/costs and external (environmental) benefits/costs; and the level of user benefits that can be “value captured” in the sense of raising additional finance for transport policies. Full sets of results are given for these sensitivity tests, and a number of practical transport policy conclusions are made. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper reports on a study of current practice in policy transfer, and ways in which its effectiveness can be increased. A literature review identifies important factors in examining the transfer of policies. Results of interviews in eleven cities in Northern Europe and North America investigate these factors further. The principal motivations for policy transfer were strategic need and curiosity. Local officials and politicians dominated the process of initiating policy transfer, and local officials were also the leading players in transferring experience. A range of information sources are used in the search process but human interaction was the most important source of learning for two main reasons. First, there is too much information available through the Internet and the search techniques are not seen to be wholly effective in identifying the necessary information. Secondly, the information available on websites, portals and even good practice guides is not seen to be of mixed quality with risks of focussing only on successful implementation and therefore subject to some bias. Officials therefore rely on their trusted networks of peers for lessons as here they can access the ‘real implementation’ story and the unwritten lessons. Organisations which have a culture that is supportive of learning from elsewhere had strong and broad networks of external contacts and resourced their development whilst others are more insular or inward looking and reluctant to invest in policy lessons from elsewhere. Solutions to the problems identified in the evidence base are proposed. City to city policy transfer is a very active process in the field of transport. Not enough is yet understood about its benefits or the conditions under which it is most effective. Such understandings should help to promote and accelerate the uptake of effective and well matched policies. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The aim of the paper is to provide a number of recommendations for use of transport and land use planning models in the formulation of local transport plans. It is based on a study of Local Transport Plans (LTPs) in England. LTPs are required by central government (Department for Transport) as part of its process of allocating funds to local authorities. The first round of LTPs was carried out in 1999–2000 for the period 2001–2005. The next round, covering the period 2006–2011, has been developed in 2005–2006. The study reported here was designed to provide input to the guidance for this second round of LTPs. The research was carried out in two stages, the first being a review of current guidance, publicly available Local Transport Plans and other relevant material, the second being a series of case study interviews with five local authorities. From these two processes, a number of recommendations on modelling requirements and use of models were put forward classified by type of local authority, with respect to the geographical area for which it is responsible. The implications of these recommendations are discussed in the light of subsequent experience in the preparation of the second round of LTPs. The paper includes discussion on how these recommendations might be transferred to non-English contexts. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper presents a methodology for the design of optimal transport strategies and the case study results of the methodology for the City of Edinburgh, using the two multi-modal transport/land-use models MARS and TPM. First, a range of policy instruments are optimised in turn and their relative impacts explored. Second, optimisations with and without financial constraints are performed and compared. Although both models produce similar optimal policies, the relative contribution of the instruments differs between models as does the impact on outcome indicators. It is also shown that by careful design it is possible to identify a strategy which costs no more than the do-minimum but which can generate substantial additional benefits. The optimisation methodology is found to be robust, and is able to be used with different transport models, and with and without financial constraints. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The paper reports on the development of UK transport targets for CO2 emissions for 2050. Five key studies containing future carbon emissions scenarios for the UK were used to establish targets for overall reductions in emissions to achieve stabilisation at 550 and 450ppm of atmospheric CO2. Two approaches were used to consider the proportion of total emissions that would be attributable to transport in the future: 26% of total emissions as now and an increase to 41% of total emissions in line with forecasts. The overall targets and expected contributions from transport were used to derive target emissions for the transport sector to be achieved by 2050, which ranged from 8.2 to 25.8MtC. Even the weakest of these targets represents a considerable reduction from current emissions levels. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]