Competitive, cooperative and Stackelberg congestion pricing for multiple regions in transportation networks

In the previous studies of congestion pricing, it is assumed that the network is managed by a central authority with the objective to enhance the performance of the whole network. In practice, however, a transportation network often covers multiple administrative regions, and the subnetwork in each local region is managed separately by the local transportation authority with perhaps competing objectives. In this article, we propose practical pricing schemes that can take into account competition and/or collaboration between different administrative regions of the network. Both Nash and Stackelberg games are employed to capture the behaviour of local regions. Numerical examples show that local regional pricing may be beneficial or detrimental to the whole network, depending on the structure and O–D pattern of the network. And cooperation among regions in congestion pricing can improve overall system performance in terms of total social welfare.