[sustran] What is the “economic value” of the city transport system?

[eric.britton at ecoplan.org]

Dear Colleagues,

Do any of you have access to a source which has tried to put credible
numbers to the following?

What is the “economic value” of the city transport system, i.e., the money
price that one might put on it measured in terms of what people actually
pay, one way or another, for this part of their daily lives? Per day? Year?
Single city? A nation as a whole?

Clearly that number would vary wildly depending on what one decides to try
to include and the values chosen for each input (e.g., what externalities
does on try to capture? what about the value of time in transit?). I can
think of a number of different ways of cutting it to make the calculation,
but no sense in my trotting all that out here since most of you know far
more about it than I do. Moreover, I have seen such numbers here and the in
the past, but none which has stuck in my mind.

My interest in doing this?  Well, suppose one took a team to Boston, Prague
or Lagos, sat down with the mayor or dictator of the moment, and showed her
how she could reengineer the regional system to get a lot more throughput
per economic unit, whether in terms of the city’s contribution or from a
more global perspective (which, incidentally, should be her platform for
reelection).

And if these numbers already exist, how come no one is making proper use of
them?

Regards,

eric britton
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