Business Cases for Road User Charging and Tolling: Cost of Technical Requirements in Tenders

As a result of a huge number of projects in Urban and Inter Urban Road User Charging, comprising both electronic fee / toll collection (EFC = ETC = tolling) and enforcement the main lesson learnt is how to minimize risk in the various implementations. The most important and effective strategy is to reduce the number of interfaces and to put responsibility into one hand, i.e. use an experienced supplier capable of providing the most appropriate realization of a Toll Regulation in a tolling system. This paper will touch all important factors to be considered when setting up a business case for a tolling system. Crucial points are highlighted to show current best practice in road user charging. We mention situations to be avoided as they incorporate significantly increasing cost. Total cost and toll income of some existing installations are compared and in addition the transaction cost is used to compare tolling methods and technologies.