Category Archives: Transportation

From 1982 to 2014 the annual direct cost of traffic congestion in America’s metro areas increased from $42 billion to $160 billion (both measured in 2014 dollars). A major reason for this was that states and metro areas cut way … Continue reading →

In discussions about the ultimate effects of fully autonomous vehicles (robo-taxis), the least attention is being paid to their likely impact on traditional mass transit. To be sure, some suggest that robo-taxis could serve the last-mile function, taking people from … Continue reading →

Now that Congress has added use-it-or-lose-it provisions to the federal pilot program that allows three states to each replace a worn-out Interstate highway using toll finance, interest in the subject is increasing. Last fall Missouri DOT held a workshop (at … Continue reading →

A recent news article in The Wall Street Journal included this provocative sentence: “Some of the features being added to trucks are similar to those in cars, but generally the move to autonomy in commercial and industrial vehicles is far … Continue reading →

Much of today’s urban transportation planning focuses on transit and “smart growth.” According to this set of ideas, suburbanization (aka “sprawl”) is bad and should be discouraged, while higher density is good and should be increased, so that “we can … Continue reading →