TRAVELER RESPONSE TO ELECTRONIC TOLLS BY DISTANCE TRAVELED AND TIME-OF-DAY

This paper examines potential travel behavioral changes of in response to the implementation of electronic tolls by distance traveled and time-of-day. An interactive computerized questionnaire with a stated preference experiment was designed to interview auto travelers using freeways for their daily commuting. The joint multinomial logit and nested logit models are employed to identify important factors influencing route and departure time choices. The preferred nested logit model implies a high correlation between unobserved utilities of two route alternatives (freeways and non-toll roads) in the earlier departure time nest and rejects the choice structure in which the choices of route and departure time are jointly determined. Elasticity analyses indicate that freeway travelers are more sensitive to total travel time than toll; existing short-distance toll-free travelers are more sensitive to the toll levels than other travelers and likely to alter their travel choices when implementing electronic tolls.