Societal and economic implications in implementing electronic road pricing (ERP) in Shanghai, China

The booming local economy has been bringing continuous and increasing pressure on the transport system in Shanghai. Local planners are investigating the use of pricing instruments to restrain traffic growth and spread it temporally and spatially, especially in the congested central city area. This paper evaluates the equity implications of the Shanghai electronic road pricing (ERP) proposal. We find the proposed ERP system to be generally equitable. If the toll revenue is channeled into improving public transit and subsidizing the taxi industry, the system would be more progressive even than its counterparts in developed countries.