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Explaining light vehicle demand evolution in interurban toll roads: a dynamic panel data analysis in Spain

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Abstract

Tolls have increasingly become a common mechanism to fund road projects in recent decades. Therefore, improving knowledge of demand behavior constitutes a key aspect for stakeholders dealing with the management of toll roads. However, the literature concerning demand elasticity estimates for interurban toll roads is still limited due to their relatively scarce number in the international context. Furthermore, existing research has left some aspects to be investigated, among others, the choice of GDP as the most common socioeconomic variable to explain traffic growth over time. This paper intends to determine the variables that better explain the evolution of light vehicle demand in toll roads throughout the years. To that end, we establish a dynamic panel data methodology aimed at identifying the key socioeconomic variables explaining changes in light vehicle demand over time. The results show that, despite some usefulness, GDP does not constitute the most appropriate explanatory variable, while other parameters such as employment or GDP per capita lead to more stable and consistent results. The methodology is applied to Spanish toll roads for the 1990–2011 period, which constitutes a very interesting case on variations in toll road use, as road demand has experienced a significant decrease since the beginning of the economic crisis in 2008.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO), which has funded the project “EU Support Mechanisms to promote Public Private Partnerships for financing TransEuropean Transport Infrastructure” [TRA 2012-36590].

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centro de Investigación del Transporte (TRANSyT), Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Calle Profesor Aranguren s/n, 28040, Madrid, Spain

    Juan Gomez & José Manuel Vassallo

  2. Departamento de Matemática e Informática Aplicadas a la Ingeniería Civil, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Calle Profesor Aranguren s/n, 28040, Madrid, Spain

    Israel Herraiz

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  1. Juan Gomez
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  3. Israel Herraiz
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Correspondence to Juan Gomez.

Appendix: description of explanatory variables included in the model

Appendix: description of explanatory variables included in the model

AADT (light veh./day): annual average daily traffic volume for light vehicles in each toll road, as recorded in the statistics of the Spanish Ministry of Transportation.

AADT (−1)(light veh./day): lag of the annual daily traffic volume for light vehicles in each toll road.

GDP, national (M€): Gross domestic product at the national level, as recorded in the Spanish National Statistics Institute (INE) database. In constant euros.

GDP, provincial (M€): sum of the GDPs from the K provinces crossed by each toll road:

$$GDP,\;provincial = \varSigma_{i = 1}^{K} GDP_{i}$$

Employment, national (103 people): number of people employed in the country, as recorded in the Spanish National Statistics Institute (INE) database.

Employment, provincial (103 people): sum of people employed in the K provinces crossed by each toll road:

$$Employment,\;provincial = \varSigma_{i = 1}^{K} Employment_{i}$$

GDP per capita, national (103 euro/person): Gross domestic product per person at the national level, as recorded in the Spanish National Statistics Institute (INE). In constant euros.

GDP per capita, provincial (103 euro/person): average GDP per capita from the K provinces crossed by each toll road:

$$GDP\;per\;capita,\;provincial:\;\frac{{\varSigma_{i = 1}^{K} GDP_{i} }}{{\varSigma_{i = 1}^{K} population_{i} }}$$

Toll rate (euro/km): toll rate applied in each toll road, as recorded in the statistics of the Spanish Ministry of Transportation. In constant euros.

Fuel price (euro/liter): gasoline and diesel prices in constant euros, weighed by the proportion of gasoline and diesel light vehicle fleet in each year:

Fuel cost (euro/km): product of Fuel price and Fuel consumption:

Fuel cost = Fuel price (euro/liter) × Fuel consumption (liter/km)

Fuel consumption is assumed as a linear progression from average 1990 levels according to the Spanish Ministry of Transportation to 2011 values by the Spanish Ministry of Industry.

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Gomez, J., Vassallo, J.M. & Herraiz, I. Explaining light vehicle demand evolution in interurban toll roads: a dynamic panel data analysis in Spain. Transportation 43, 677–703 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11116-015-9612-3

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