Study on the External Cost of Highway Congestion: Estimation Method and Application

The losses incurred by traffic congestion are an important part of the external costs of highway transportation. In this paper, traffic congestion index was proposed to estimate external costs of highway congestion. On basis of analyzing the composition and type of the external costs of traffic congestion, estimation methods about each type external costs were presented. By virtue of presented traffic congestion index and estimation methods, an application case was conducted on external time costs estimation about 2010 annual Beijing expressway congestion. Finally, some strategies to improve highway congestion were proposed according to the calculation results, which provided a reference for promoting the sustainable development of road transportation.