Alternative approaches to the taxation of heavy vehicles.

This report contains recommendations that are applicable to federal and state governments for evaluating alternatives to the taxation of heavy vehicles. An evaluation procedure and general assessments and recommendations on future activities are presented. The report provides guidance and resource material for use by federal and state agencies. The results will be of interest to those who deal with the identification of revenue sources for highway purposes and to the motor carrier industry. The research report is supplemented by an `Applications Manual’, available on the Internet (see below). Motor-carrier user fees, typically applied as fuel taxes and registration charges, are an important component of surface transportation financing. Heavy vehicles used by motor carriers have characteristics that differ substantially from automobiles and other light vehicles. While their numbers on the highways are far fewer than light vehicles, heavy vehicles play an important role in determining the costs of constructing and maintaining durable, safe highways. Economic factors influencing motor-carrier operations also differ substantially from those affecting usage of lighter vehicles. For these reasons, appropriate alternatives to the motor-fuel tax for heavy vehicles may be very different from those considered best for other segments of the highway user market. In a previous NCHRP study, documented in NCHRP Report 377, "Alternatives to Motor Fuel Taxes for Financing Surface Transportation Improvements," a flexible and comprehensive method was developed for identifying and evaluating alternatives to the motor-vehicle fuel tax. Although some of the alternatives evaluated in that research were applicable to motor-carrier taxation, many of the issues surrounding heavy vehicles needed further amplification. Under NCHRP Project 20-24(7)A, "Alternative Approaches to the Taxation of Heavy Vehicles," Cambridge Systematics, Inc., with Sydec, Inc. and R. D. Mingo and Associates, developed a procedure for evaluating taxation systems for heavy vehicles and used the procedure to compare alternatives to the traditional motor-carrier taxation systems used by states to finance surface transportation system improvements. The results of this research will provide guidance and resource material to federal and state agencies for evaluating proposed schemes nationally and locally. To further the implementation of the research results, the agencies produced an `Applications Manual’, which is available on the Internet through the NCHRP World Wide Web site <www2.nas.edu/trbcrp> under the project write-up for NCHRP Project 20-24(7)A. Readers should direct their initial attention to the "Summary," which has been identified with shaded page edges. The full research report follows for those interested in the details of the research effort and all of the findings. (A)