- Fitch: Most US Managed Lane Facilities Outperform Expectations Following Pandemic
- CRRMA Director Discusses The Agency’s “Agnostic” Role In Developing Multi-Modal Mobility Projects
- TRB Conference On Extreme Weather And Climate Change Gets Underway Next Week
- China's Government Is Wary About New Wave Of Highway Tolling
- These are just some of the toll industry developments TRN is following.
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Fitch: Most US Managed Lane Facilities Outperform Expectations Following Pandemic
Based on the results of its latest peer review of US managed lane facilities (subscription required), Fitch Ratings finds that the facilities in its portfolio “have largely shaken off the effects of the pandemic” and “have recovered due to strong pricing power despite flat to low transaction growth on some facilities.” However, as Fitch director Anita Lin noted in a news release, “there are some lingering and permanent impacts from the pandemic that continue to affect a few facilities. ‘While traffic growth is higher on facilities that allow trucks due to the acceleration in e-commerce, managed lanes servicing a higher proportion of users who telecommute, typically located in affluent areas, have been slower to recover,’’’ Lin commented. That said, Lin added that managed lanes overall continue to outperform expectations after demonstrating resilient demand through the pandemic. “Managed lane users,” she observed, “have proven to be large and diverse across regions and income levels with strong performance showing that managed lanes’ value extends beyond time savings.”
Company and Agency Financial Issues And Reports Economic & Social Considerations Affecting Transportation Express Lanes Fitch RatingsCRRMA Director Discusses The Agency’s “Agnostic” Role In Developing Multi-Modal Mobility Projects
In a KDBC News interview, Camino Real Regional Mobility Authority (CRRMA) executive director Raymond Telles shares his take on how the agency fits into transportation infrastructure development in the Texas border region. “We’re not involved in the policy determination of whether [a project is] good, bad or otherwise. We are really agnostic to the projects. If the region determines that’s the project to be developed, we are a tool that will build it,” Telles says. As for transportation facility tolling, Telles explains that those decisions, too, are made elsewhere. Case in point: the toll road system approved by El Paso’s MPO in 2008, as to which tolling policy decisions were subsequently reversed. The article cites several projects CRRMA is now involved in, including improving and extending roads in collaboration with El Paso County and rehabilitating an aerial tramway in central El Paso.
Camino Real Regional Mobility Authority (CRRMA) ETC Systems Texas Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT)TRB Conference On Extreme Weather And Climate Change Gets Underway Next Week
The Transportation Research Board will hold its Transportation Resilience 2023 international conference in Washington, DC, next week, with a focus on extreme weather and climate change. The November 13-15 gathering is scheduled around panel discussions, presentations and other in-person activities, but may include some hybrid sessions. “Attendees will learn more about emerging best practices and state-of-the-art research results on how to adapt transportation networks to the potential impacts of climate change, extreme weather events, and disasters. The focus includes vulnerability and resilience to climate change and extreme weather events impacting all modes of domestic and international transportation. The benefits discussed are expected to extend beyond the transportation sector. Importantly, the range of practices to be explored and shared will be inclusive of resilience approaches that utilize change management, stakeholder communication and innovative financing, to complement traditional engineering/hardening solutions.” Additional information is available by emailing wbanderson@nas.edu.
Climate Change & Infrastructure Resilience Environmental Protection Policies Procedures And Initiatives Highway-Tunnel-Bridge Maintenance Highway-Tunnel-Bridge Safety (Includes COVID-19 Impacts) Transportation and Infrastructure Research & Development Transportation Research BoardChina's Government Is Wary About New Wave Of Highway Tolling
China Daily reports, eleven municipal tolling stations have come online in the past two years on national highways intended to be free for public use. Tolling, which is rare on national highways as distinct from expressways, requires provincial government approval. In the current sluggish economy, provincial officials, who derive most of their revenue from cities, are inclined to assent to the charges. The article underscores the central government’s imperative to keep transportation costs low for the sake of the national economy. Questioning the transparency with which the municipal tolls have been approved, the article concludes, “The financial difficulty of local governments is by no means an excuse for them to casually open new sources of revenues, seeking profits from basic public goods and services of the State. Relevant government watchdogs, lawmakers and political advisory bodies of the central authorities should fulfill their responsibilities to guarantee this wave of local government tolls are legal, fair and transparent.”
Editor’s Note: China Daily, a leading English-language source of Chinese news, is published by the Chinese Communist Party and subject to central government control.
China Company and Agency Financial Issues And Reports Economic & Social Considerations Affecting Transportation ETC SystemsThese are just some of the toll industry developments TRN is following.
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