Road user charging research work for US

The Western Road Usage Charge Consortium (WRUCC) has awarded a contract to D’Artagnan Consulting to develop a roadmap for 11 US states to evaluate charging for road use. The move has come about as road user charging (RUC) is seen as having potential by US state government officials as a long-term solutions to addressing declining fuel tax revenues. However, there is insufficient knowledge of prior efforts at studying or implementing RUC or evaluation of their effectiveness. Nor have there been sufficient studies into how these experiences can be translated into lessons learned.

The D’Artagnan Team says it will draw on its extensive work supporting RUC efforts globally to provide a comprehensive analysis of past experiences, successes, failures, and lessons learned to assist efforts in formulating distance based charging strategies. Eleven WRUCC member states will participate in the study, whose outputs will include a synthesis report of policy development approaches and processes. In addition, D’Artagnan says it will develop a decision tool for agencies and policy makers to use in guiding the development of RUC policies in their own areas.