This chapter describes this guidebook’s context and scope, discusses the value of measuring
transport impacts, and discusses concepts of “transport” and “cost.”
Smart consumers investigate all costs and benefits before making major purchase
decisions. Prior to buying a car you want accurate information on its fuel, maintenance,
repair and insurance costs. Similarly, before buying a train or airline ticket you want to
know about all fees and taxes, and the ease of schedule changes. You also want
information on each option’s reliability, comfort and safety.
Just as consumers need accurate and comprehensive information when making personal
travel decisions, communities need accurate and comprehensive information on all
significant impacts when making transport policy and planning decisions.
Most people have limited knowledge of transport economics. They would say, “I just
want to be able to travel conveniently, safely and affordably, without higher taxes,
pollution or conflict with other road users.” Notice the just in this statement, reflecting
the assumption that these aspirations are modest and reasonable. Yet, they are actually
expensive, complex and contradictory. Accommodating ever-growing motor vehicle
travel requires significant resources to continually expand roadway and parking capacity,
and provide traffic services, in addition to accident risk, pollution emissions and other
undesirable impacts. A motorist thinks, “I pay vehicle taxes and fees so I should get
parking and traffic services,” little realizing that their user charges are insufficient to
cover the full costs imposed by their driving.
Transportation policy and planning decisions affect virtually every aspect of life. Such
decisions often involve tradeoffs between conflicting objectives. For example, strategies
to increase vehicle travel speeds can increase crash risk and degrade walking conditions.
Some emission reduction strategies increase vehicle costs or reduce total motor vehicle
travel. Expanding parking supply increases building costs and taxes. This report provides
a framework for evaluating and rationalizing such decisions. Some transport impacts,
such as vehicle operation costs and travel time values, have been widely studied and
estimates of their magnitude are easily available, making them relatively easy to evaluate.
Other impacts, such as changes in walking conditions and greenhouse gas emissions, are
more difficult to quantify, and so are often dismissed by decision-makers as intangibles,
with the implication that they are less important than tangible impacts. The result is
decision-making biased in favor of easy-to-measure impacts at the expense of moredifficult-to-measure
impacts.
This guidebook is intended to support more comprehensive transport policy and planning
analysis by providing benefit and cost information in a format that is convenient and
flexible for evaluating a wide range of options.