Exploring the relationship between perceived acceptability and referendum voting support for alternative road pricing schemes

Abstract

A dominant theme in the debate on road pricing reform is securing buy in from all key stakeholders as a pre-condition for gaining support from politicians. This paper explores the key influences and the extent to which particular road pricing schemes are acceptable to the community at large, and how this translates into support if a scheme were subject to a vote in a referendum. Using data collected in Sydney in 2012 from a sample of car users, we estimate a recursive simultaneous bivariate probit model that recognises the endogeneity effect of scheme acceptability on voting plans. We find that there is a very strong link between voting intentions and scheme acceptability, and provide a series of direct elasticity estimates of the influence that the cost elements of road pricing reform schemes have on the joint probability of accepting and voting for a scheme.

Increasing the acceptability of a congestion charging scheme

“…Referendum voting, when implemented, shows a general ex-ante rejection to CC, with just a few exceptions (Hensher and Li, 2013). Studies analysing the relations between voting intentions and scheme acceptability (Hensher, 2013;Eliasson and Jonsson, 2011) have underlined the importance of providing the public with information about the potential impacts of the scheme and "marketing" appropriately the benefits of the changes (Cools et al, 2011). Regarding information, Ardiç et al (2013) emphasise the important role played by the news media as a nonobjective policy actor.…”

Planning for Congestion Pricing Policies in the Middle East: Public Acceptability and Revenue Distribution

“…(2) Revenue generation: The lack of public acceptance of congestion pricing is attributed by many researchers to the lack of confidence in the government's use of the revenue generated (Eliasson and Jonsson 2011;Kim et al 2013;Hensher and Li 2013;Hensher 2013). Acceptability increases when people have clear information about the final use of the revenue generated as it indicates the potential benefits that can be derived from congestion pricing (Abulibdeh 2013;Albalate and Bel 2009;Steg, 2003).…”

“…(4) Particular features of the pricing scheme: These include the area covered, period of charging, and the amount of the toll paid (Kockelman and Kalmanje 2005). The complexity of a scheme may also decrease public acceptability since people may have difficulty in understanding the scheme (De Palma, Lindsey, and Proost 2007;Hensher 2013).…”

Predicting the results of a referendum on urban road pricing in France: “the cry of Cassandra”?

“…This literature seeks to analyze what determines the votes of electors [3,6,9,17,[24][25][26][27][28][29]39], but without an ex-ante analysis and without really putting the data to the test, with the exception of Jaensirisak et al [28,29], Gaunt et al [17] and Harsman and Quigley [24] focusing only on the UK case study. A better understanding of intention change is a way of increasing transport policy effectiveness, as the cost of rejection can be important and sustained financially by society.…”