David King | Arizona State University (original) (raw)

Papers by David King

Urban Science

The advent of ridehailing services such as Uber and Lyft has expanded for-hire vehicle travel. We... more The advent of ridehailing services such as Uber and Lyft has expanded for-hire vehicle travel. We use data from the 2017 National Household Travel Survey (NHTS) to investigate the extent of this expansion in the United States. We report changes in the for-hire vehicle market since ridehailing services became available and statistically estimate the determinants of ridehailing use. From 2009–2017, the for-hire vehicle market share doubled. While for-hire vehicles still only account for 0.5% of all trips, the percent of all Americans who use ridehailing in any given month is nearly 10%. Within the for-hire vehicle market, this trend of growth has not been uniformly distributed across demographic groups or geographies; it has been greater in mid-sized and large cities, and among younger individuals and wealthier households. This suggests that understanding the equity implications of ridehailing is an important avenue for research. Multivariate analysis provides evidence that both trans...

Journal of Transport and Land Use

Taxicabs are ubiquitous in cities throughout the world, and the industry is going through regulat... more Taxicabs are ubiquitous in cities throughout the world, and the industry is going through regulatory change with the growth of app-based services. In the United States, where taxicabs are typically regulated locally, licenses determine where taxis can pick up passengers. This means that for trips that end outside of licensed boundaries taxicabs are prohibited from picking up passengers and are forced to make “deadhead” return trips. This research estimates empty taxi travel associated with spatial restrictions on passenger trip origins in New York City. In 2012, New York introduced a special taxi category intended to improve taxi access in areas of the city considered underserved by taxicabs. The new green taxicabs, as they are called, can drop off passengers anywhere in the city but are restricted from picking up passengers in the central business districts and at any of the region’s airports. Using detailed trip data for each taxi ride, we estimate that up to 500,000 kilometers pe...

Journal of Transport and Land Use

Taxicabs are ubiquitous in cities throughout the world, and the industry is going through regulat... more Taxicabs are ubiquitous in cities throughout the world, and the industry is going through regulatory change with the growth of app-based services. In the United States, where taxicabs are typically regulated locally, licenses determine where taxis can pick up passengers. This means that for trips that end outside of licensed boundaries taxicabs are prohibited from picking up passengers and are forced to make “deadhead” return trips. This research estimates empty taxi travel associated with spatial restrictions on passenger trip origins in New York City. In 2012, New York introduced a special taxi category intended to improve taxi access in areas of the city considered underserved by taxicabs. The new green taxicabs, as they are called, can drop off passengers anywhere in the city but are restricted from picking up passengers in the central business districts and at any of the region’s airports. Using detailed trip data for each taxi ride, we estimate that up to 500,000 kilometers pe...

Taxicabs are critical complements to public transit systems. In New York City, ubiquitous yellow ... more Taxicabs are critical complements to public transit systems. In New York City, ubiquitous yellow cabs are as iconic as the city's subway system, and the city recently added green taxicabs to improve taxi service in areas outside of the Central Business Districts and airports. In this paper, we used multiple datasets to explore taxicab fare payments by neighborhood and examine how paid taxicab fares are associated with use of conventional banking services. There are clear spatial dimensions of the propensity of riders to pay cash, and we found that both immigrant status and being " unbanked " are strong predictors of cash transactions. These results have implications for local regulations of the for-hire vehicle industry, particularly in the context of the rapid growth of services that require credit cards to use. At the very least, existing and new providers of transit services must consider access to mainstream financial products as part of their equity analyses.

User fees have long been seen as an efficient financing mechanism because beneficiaries of servic... more User fees have long been seen as an efficient financing mechanism because beneficiaries of services pay for the benefits received. This point of view is especially applicable to public services with commercial aspects and in situations for which links between consumption and price are relatively easy to make. However, road pricing, such as tolls, can be very high and important to local price levels. This paper examines the way in which expenditures on tolls are tracked and measured in the United States through the consumer expenditure survey (CES) run by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The paper describes the CES and its methods, both generally and for tolls and road charges specifically, and compares those with estimates of U.S. tolls from other sources and from some micro-data the authors have compiled for the New York metropolitan area. The results suggest that the current CES underestimates consumer toll expenditures. Because the CES is a key background input into the consumer price index, the paper argues that flow-on effects continue through to measurement of U.S. inflation and gross domestic product as well. User fees have long been seen as an efficient financing mechanism because beneficiaries of services pay for the benefits received. This belief is especially applicable to public services with commercial aspects and in situations for which links between consumption and price are relatively easy to make. Road pricing, such as tolls, can be very high and locally important in consumer cost of living and firm costs. This paper examines the way in which expenditures on tolls are tracked and measured in the United States through the consumer expenditure survey (CES), which is run by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) of the U.S. Department of Labor. This paper describes the CES and its methods, both generally and for tolls and road charges specifically, and compares those with estimates of U.S. tolls from other sources and from some microdata the authors have compiled for the New York metropolitan area as an indicative, detailed case study. The results suggest that the current CES underestimates consumer toll expenditures. Because the CES is a key background input into the consumer price index (CPI), the paper argues that flow-on effects continue through to measurement of U.S. inflation and gross domestic product (GDP) as well. Rise of Road PRicing in ameRica During the 20th century in the United States, the primary national source of funding for highways and, later on, transit was the fuel excise, or gas tax. Beginning with Oregon, all U.S. states and the District of Columbia implemented a fuel tax between 1919 and 1929. President Hoover initially instituted the federal tax with the Revenue Act of 1932. These taxes are a specific excise that is a fixed price per unit sold (as opposed to an ad valorem, or percentage of sales price) tax. This tax is collected at the national and state levels and has the advantage of being easy to collect, typically at the rack or distributor level, hard to evade, and administratively low cost (1, 2). The gas tax was increased at regular intervals for most of its history, though those increases always had political challenges from various quarters. For most states and at the federal level, the gas tax was never indexed for inflation, and opposition to raising it grew near the end of the last century and into this one so that its revenue yield has not kept pace with spending needs (1, 3). The federal tax is currently 0.183/galofgasoline,and840.183/gal of gasoline, and 84% of the revenue collected goes into the highway account of the federal Highway Trust Fund, with the remaining 16% going to the mass transit account (3). Nonetheless, the tax remains a significant revenue raiser at the federal level, with it alone contributing more than 0.183/galofgasoline,and8425 billion to the highway trust fund in 2012; taxes on other fuels, such as gasohol, also exist, but the gasoline excise is the single biggest revenue source (4). U.S. states also raise significant amounts of money with their own fuel excises, which range from 0.08/galinAlaskato0.08/gal in Alaska to 0.08/galinAlaskato0.506/gal in New York. Like the federal government, most states have left their gas tax rates unchanged for years, so, while important, the gas tax's relative real revenue yield is falling (5). challenge of measuRing extent of Road PRicing The political undesirability of higher fuel taxes is combining with other factors to cause a significant shift away from fuel taxation as a revenue source for transportation investment. In the United States, federal and state governments have turned more and more to road pricing of various sorts, and these range from traditional tolls to experiments with taxes on vehicle miles traveled (VMT) (5). The FHWA reports the following major sources of highway-user revenues in 2012: federal fuel taxes ($33.8 billion, which includes other fuel excises beyond gasoline, such as diesel taxes), state and local fuel and other fees ($55.0 billion), and tolls (i.e., road pricing, 11.8billion).Ofatotalreportedrevenueyieldof11.8 billion). Of a total reported revenue yield of 11.8billion).Ofatotalreportedrevenueyieldof100.6 billion for 2012, around 12% was raised from road pricing (tolls), a significant increase from past years and a trend set to continue in the future (4). Toll revenues have doubled over the past 15 years and are likely to continue a rapid climb.

In this paper, we examine the movement of container freight in, out and around the third largest ... more In this paper, we examine the movement of container freight in, out and around the third largest maritime port in the United States and the use of toll facilities by these freight movements. Understanding how road pricing affects freight activity is of significant interest to transport planners, port operators and commercial interests with regards to regional competitiveness and economic development. Using a unique survey of truck activity at two maritime terminals in the Port of New York and New Jersey, we examine the frequency of truck trips, toll costs and trip distance, and how these characteristics may affect port freight costs and operations by location. Key findings indicate that while the New York ports serve 19 states and Canada, the vast bulk of cargo moves are short haul trips of less than 50 miles one way from the port facility. We also find that toll charges in the New York City metropolitan region may represent over 50% of the total costs for a short haul truck trip into or out of a maritime port depending on the location of the port facility. The results presented suggest that road toll programs can place non-trivial costs on truck trips to/from major regional freight centers.

Books by David King

by Moira Zellner, Daniel Felsenstein, Richard Sinnott, Yingling Fan, David King, Francisco Pereira, Tae Hong Park, Joseph Y J Chow, Seth Spielman, Piyushimita (Vonu) Thakuriah, Frank Douma, Timothy Johnson, Nader Afzalan, Jonathan Peters, Li Yin, Mubassira Khan, Sungsoon Hwang, Steven French, Kristin Tufte, Yao-Li Wang, Lise Dirks, Camille Barchers, Gregory Erhardt, Phil Delaney, Yu-Luen Ma, Laiyun Wu, Luca Morandini, and Josep Maria Salanova Grau

Urban Science

The advent of ridehailing services such as Uber and Lyft has expanded for-hire vehicle travel. We... more The advent of ridehailing services such as Uber and Lyft has expanded for-hire vehicle travel. We use data from the 2017 National Household Travel Survey (NHTS) to investigate the extent of this expansion in the United States. We report changes in the for-hire vehicle market since ridehailing services became available and statistically estimate the determinants of ridehailing use. From 2009–2017, the for-hire vehicle market share doubled. While for-hire vehicles still only account for 0.5% of all trips, the percent of all Americans who use ridehailing in any given month is nearly 10%. Within the for-hire vehicle market, this trend of growth has not been uniformly distributed across demographic groups or geographies; it has been greater in mid-sized and large cities, and among younger individuals and wealthier households. This suggests that understanding the equity implications of ridehailing is an important avenue for research. Multivariate analysis provides evidence that both trans...

Journal of Transport and Land Use

Taxicabs are ubiquitous in cities throughout the world, and the industry is going through regulat... more Taxicabs are ubiquitous in cities throughout the world, and the industry is going through regulatory change with the growth of app-based services. In the United States, where taxicabs are typically regulated locally, licenses determine where taxis can pick up passengers. This means that for trips that end outside of licensed boundaries taxicabs are prohibited from picking up passengers and are forced to make “deadhead” return trips. This research estimates empty taxi travel associated with spatial restrictions on passenger trip origins in New York City. In 2012, New York introduced a special taxi category intended to improve taxi access in areas of the city considered underserved by taxicabs. The new green taxicabs, as they are called, can drop off passengers anywhere in the city but are restricted from picking up passengers in the central business districts and at any of the region’s airports. Using detailed trip data for each taxi ride, we estimate that up to 500,000 kilometers pe...

Journal of Transport and Land Use

Taxicabs are ubiquitous in cities throughout the world, and the industry is going through regulat... more Taxicabs are ubiquitous in cities throughout the world, and the industry is going through regulatory change with the growth of app-based services. In the United States, where taxicabs are typically regulated locally, licenses determine where taxis can pick up passengers. This means that for trips that end outside of licensed boundaries taxicabs are prohibited from picking up passengers and are forced to make “deadhead” return trips. This research estimates empty taxi travel associated with spatial restrictions on passenger trip origins in New York City. In 2012, New York introduced a special taxi category intended to improve taxi access in areas of the city considered underserved by taxicabs. The new green taxicabs, as they are called, can drop off passengers anywhere in the city but are restricted from picking up passengers in the central business districts and at any of the region’s airports. Using detailed trip data for each taxi ride, we estimate that up to 500,000 kilometers pe...

Taxicabs are critical complements to public transit systems. In New York City, ubiquitous yellow ... more Taxicabs are critical complements to public transit systems. In New York City, ubiquitous yellow cabs are as iconic as the city's subway system, and the city recently added green taxicabs to improve taxi service in areas outside of the Central Business Districts and airports. In this paper, we used multiple datasets to explore taxicab fare payments by neighborhood and examine how paid taxicab fares are associated with use of conventional banking services. There are clear spatial dimensions of the propensity of riders to pay cash, and we found that both immigrant status and being " unbanked " are strong predictors of cash transactions. These results have implications for local regulations of the for-hire vehicle industry, particularly in the context of the rapid growth of services that require credit cards to use. At the very least, existing and new providers of transit services must consider access to mainstream financial products as part of their equity analyses.

User fees have long been seen as an efficient financing mechanism because beneficiaries of servic... more User fees have long been seen as an efficient financing mechanism because beneficiaries of services pay for the benefits received. This point of view is especially applicable to public services with commercial aspects and in situations for which links between consumption and price are relatively easy to make. However, road pricing, such as tolls, can be very high and important to local price levels. This paper examines the way in which expenditures on tolls are tracked and measured in the United States through the consumer expenditure survey (CES) run by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The paper describes the CES and its methods, both generally and for tolls and road charges specifically, and compares those with estimates of U.S. tolls from other sources and from some micro-data the authors have compiled for the New York metropolitan area. The results suggest that the current CES underestimates consumer toll expenditures. Because the CES is a key background input into the consumer price index, the paper argues that flow-on effects continue through to measurement of U.S. inflation and gross domestic product as well. User fees have long been seen as an efficient financing mechanism because beneficiaries of services pay for the benefits received. This belief is especially applicable to public services with commercial aspects and in situations for which links between consumption and price are relatively easy to make. Road pricing, such as tolls, can be very high and locally important in consumer cost of living and firm costs. This paper examines the way in which expenditures on tolls are tracked and measured in the United States through the consumer expenditure survey (CES), which is run by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) of the U.S. Department of Labor. This paper describes the CES and its methods, both generally and for tolls and road charges specifically, and compares those with estimates of U.S. tolls from other sources and from some microdata the authors have compiled for the New York metropolitan area as an indicative, detailed case study. The results suggest that the current CES underestimates consumer toll expenditures. Because the CES is a key background input into the consumer price index (CPI), the paper argues that flow-on effects continue through to measurement of U.S. inflation and gross domestic product (GDP) as well. Rise of Road PRicing in ameRica During the 20th century in the United States, the primary national source of funding for highways and, later on, transit was the fuel excise, or gas tax. Beginning with Oregon, all U.S. states and the District of Columbia implemented a fuel tax between 1919 and 1929. President Hoover initially instituted the federal tax with the Revenue Act of 1932. These taxes are a specific excise that is a fixed price per unit sold (as opposed to an ad valorem, or percentage of sales price) tax. This tax is collected at the national and state levels and has the advantage of being easy to collect, typically at the rack or distributor level, hard to evade, and administratively low cost (1, 2). The gas tax was increased at regular intervals for most of its history, though those increases always had political challenges from various quarters. For most states and at the federal level, the gas tax was never indexed for inflation, and opposition to raising it grew near the end of the last century and into this one so that its revenue yield has not kept pace with spending needs (1, 3). The federal tax is currently 0.183/galofgasoline,and840.183/gal of gasoline, and 84% of the revenue collected goes into the highway account of the federal Highway Trust Fund, with the remaining 16% going to the mass transit account (3). Nonetheless, the tax remains a significant revenue raiser at the federal level, with it alone contributing more than 0.183/galofgasoline,and8425 billion to the highway trust fund in 2012; taxes on other fuels, such as gasohol, also exist, but the gasoline excise is the single biggest revenue source (4). U.S. states also raise significant amounts of money with their own fuel excises, which range from 0.08/galinAlaskato0.08/gal in Alaska to 0.08/galinAlaskato0.506/gal in New York. Like the federal government, most states have left their gas tax rates unchanged for years, so, while important, the gas tax's relative real revenue yield is falling (5). challenge of measuRing extent of Road PRicing The political undesirability of higher fuel taxes is combining with other factors to cause a significant shift away from fuel taxation as a revenue source for transportation investment. In the United States, federal and state governments have turned more and more to road pricing of various sorts, and these range from traditional tolls to experiments with taxes on vehicle miles traveled (VMT) (5). The FHWA reports the following major sources of highway-user revenues in 2012: federal fuel taxes ($33.8 billion, which includes other fuel excises beyond gasoline, such as diesel taxes), state and local fuel and other fees ($55.0 billion), and tolls (i.e., road pricing, 11.8billion).Ofatotalreportedrevenueyieldof11.8 billion). Of a total reported revenue yield of 11.8billion).Ofatotalreportedrevenueyieldof100.6 billion for 2012, around 12% was raised from road pricing (tolls), a significant increase from past years and a trend set to continue in the future (4). Toll revenues have doubled over the past 15 years and are likely to continue a rapid climb.

In this paper, we examine the movement of container freight in, out and around the third largest ... more In this paper, we examine the movement of container freight in, out and around the third largest maritime port in the United States and the use of toll facilities by these freight movements. Understanding how road pricing affects freight activity is of significant interest to transport planners, port operators and commercial interests with regards to regional competitiveness and economic development. Using a unique survey of truck activity at two maritime terminals in the Port of New York and New Jersey, we examine the frequency of truck trips, toll costs and trip distance, and how these characteristics may affect port freight costs and operations by location. Key findings indicate that while the New York ports serve 19 states and Canada, the vast bulk of cargo moves are short haul trips of less than 50 miles one way from the port facility. We also find that toll charges in the New York City metropolitan region may represent over 50% of the total costs for a short haul truck trip into or out of a maritime port depending on the location of the port facility. The results presented suggest that road toll programs can place non-trivial costs on truck trips to/from major regional freight centers.

by Moira Zellner, Daniel Felsenstein, Richard Sinnott, Yingling Fan, David King, Francisco Pereira, Tae Hong Park, Joseph Y J Chow, Seth Spielman, Piyushimita (Vonu) Thakuriah, Frank Douma, Timothy Johnson, Nader Afzalan, Jonathan Peters, Li Yin, Mubassira Khan, Sungsoon Hwang, Steven French, Kristin Tufte, Yao-Li Wang, Lise Dirks, Camille Barchers, Gregory Erhardt, Phil Delaney, Yu-Luen Ma, Laiyun Wu, Luca Morandini, and Josep Maria Salanova Grau