Urban Transportation Financing

This is an economic analysis of pricing and subsidy policies for urban roads and urban public transit in Ontario. Professor Frankena demonstrates the benefits of evaluating the economic merits of policy alternatives, and attempts to determine whether existing policies waste resources or lead to undesirable income transfers among different groups in the population. He concludes that resources are being wasted because the use of urban roads is substantially underpriced during periods of peak demand. He also finds that while there are sound economic justifications for substantial public transit subsidies, the allocation of subsidies by the Ontario government on the basis of capital expenditures can be expected to waste resources, as can the maximization of ridership which is likely to lead to detrimental fare and service policies. In conclusion, Frankena suggests improvements in the systems for charging people for the use of roads and public transit and in the ways that governments provide subsidies.

Mark W. Frankena (1943 - 2017) was a senior adviser for the economic consulting firm Cornerstone Research. He was a former deputy director for antitrust in the U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s Bureau of Economics and associate professor of economics at the University of Western Ontario. He was also the co-author of Economic Analysis of Provincial Land Use Policies in Ontario.