Agricultural & Resource Economics Theses and Dissertations
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2739
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Item THE INTERACTION BETWEEN DISTANCE TO WORK AND VEHICLE MILES TRAVELED(2008-01-31) Gonzalez, Hernan Mauricio; Horowitz, John K.; Agricultural and Resource Economics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Economists have long been concerned with the externalities generated by automobiles, such as traffic congestion and air pollution. Since many of these externalities are closely bound up with the number of miles being driven, economists have been much interested in the behavior of what is known as vehicle miles traveled (VMT). Planners believe that land use can be manipulated to serve congestion management, air quality or related transport planning goals. The underlying idea is that household location may have a big impact on its transportation demand, including car ownership. In this context, I focus on distance to work (DTW) as the measure of household location. I chose a continuous measure of household location instead of a discrete one because, besides being easily measured, it matches better the data available for this study and it has a very straightforward interpretation--it allows me to calculate the contribution of commuting miles to total miles driven. Despite the clear conceptual connection between DTW and VMT, and the constraining nature of household location, little is known about their joint behavior. City and household level attributes that may lead households to live close or far from their work may also lead them to drive few or many miles for non-commuting purposes. This effect must be accounted for when measuring the behavior of VMT conditional on DTW. I develop two models to analyze: (i) the role of city characteristics in explaining households' distance to work, (ii) the effect of distance to work on VMT and car ownership, (iii) the effect of city level attributes on VMT, conditional on DTW, (iv) the unobserved taste for driving, (v) differences between workers and non-workers. I find that: (i) City characteristics expected to affect commutes have a small effect on households' DTW, (ii) DTW provides an important effect on car ownership levels and VMT, (iii) City characteristics expected to influence non-commute miles have a small impact on VMT, (iv) taste for driving has a small but significant effect on VMT, and (v) non-workers are much less responsive to gas prices than workers.Item The Value of Mortality Risk Reductions in Delhi, India(2006-11-27) Bhattacharya, Soma; Alberini, Anna; Cropper, Maureen L; Agricultural and Resource Economics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Road accidents kill nearly 1.2 million people each year worldwide, two-thirds of whom live in developing countries. Traffic crashes may indeed become the third leading cause of death in developing countries by the year 2020 (Murray and Lopez, 1996). For governments in developing countries to make informed decisions about investments in traffic safety, it is imperative that the benefits of road traffic improvements be monetized and compared with costs. This, however, requires estimates of the value of reductions in risk of death. The goal of the dissertation is to provide estimates of the value of mortality risk reductions in a traffic safety context in Delhi, India. To estimate the value of road safety improvements in Delhi requires understanding the nature of developing country traffic risks. Methods of valuing traffic fatalities used in high-income countries based on seatbelt use or purchase of safer cars are not applicable here. In my survey I asked 1200 commuters what they would pay to reduce their own risk of dying as a (a) pedestrian, (b) driver of a two-wheeler, and (c) commuter, regardless of travel mode. These scenarios mirror the bulk of fatal accidents in Delhi. I find that mean WTP for mortality risk reduction increases with the size of risk reduction, as predicted by economic theory. WTP for a given risk change increases with income and education. The estimation results broadly confirm the Bayesian updating assumption, in that WTP increases with baseline exposure to risk, measured by commute time, whether the respondent travels as part of his job and whether he drives a two-wheeler. Mean WTP is three times larger for a respondent who drives a two-wheeler and travels on the job than for one who does not. The results of my survey indicate that the VSL is individuated, i.e., it varies across groups of potential beneficiaries of traffic safety programs (two-wheeler drivers, persons with bachelors degree, etc.). For the most highly exposed individuals--the VSL is about $150,000 (PPP, 2005). Transferred estimates adjusted for income from other developed and developing countries indicate a VSL that is much larger than my estimate. These findings underscore the importance of conducting original valuation studies.Item The Impact of the Washington Metro on Development Patterns(2005-12-05) Vinha, Katja Pauliina; Bockstael, Nancy; Cropper, Maureen; Agricultural and Resource Economics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)It is a tenet of urban planning that transportation networks help shape the spatial configuration of cities. In the case of heavy rail systems, a common belief is that building a subway system will promote employment and population density, thereby discouraging urban sprawl and its negative consequences. This dissertation examines the impact of the Washington Metro rail system in 1990 and 2000 on the distribution of employment and population in two counties in the Washington, DC metropolitan area--Montgomery County and Prince Georges County. It asks whether employment and residential construction increased more rapidly near Metro rail stations than in other parts of the metropolitan area. It also examines the impact of the Metro on the socio-demographic composition of population near Metro stations. Evaluating the impact of the Metro system on employment and population density is complicated by the fact that stations along the Metro line may be located in areas of high population and/or employment density to begin with, or in areas with significant amounts of developable land available. To deal with this issue I use a propensity score matching estimator. The technique is an improvement over the traditional methods of evaluation as it acknowledges the endogeneity of the location of Metro stations. Furthermore, matching estimators relax the functional form assumptions of OLS estimators. The research finds statistically significant impacts on employment and overall development density from proximity to a Metro station and does not find consistent impacts on population or dwelling unit densities. However, for Prince George's County a negative impact on the percentage of the population belonging to a minority is found. The results also suggest that impacts on development are greater closer to the station than farther away and that they are greater the longer the stations have been in operation.