Perspectives on efficiency in transportation

This paper considers the engineer’s, economist’s, manager’s, and planner’s perspectives on transportation efficiency respectively. This paper examines the measures used in each perspective and weighs their advantages and disadvantages for various purposes. It illustrates each measure with an example drawn from the case of the Twin Cities ramp metering shut off. The first section summarizes various measures of mobility that are used to assess transportation. This is followed by an exposition of transportation consumer surplus and its limitations. Similar treatment of accessibility and productivity are provided. The conclusions call for consideration of equity in addition to efficiency when evaluating broader effectiveness and for taking the subjective point of view of the traveler rather than the ‘‘objective’’ point of view of the omniscient planner/engineer/economist/manager. 2003 Published by Elsevier Ltd.