The Privatization of Roads and Highways - Ludwig von Mises Institute

Congestion and Road Pricing 63
similar responses from businessmen involved in the street business.
One possible compromise might be one-way streets during
rush hours, when the outside users would likely predominate
over the locals, and two-way traffic at other times, when the
street is likely to be patronized mainly by local inhabitants. In
order for this plan to be viable, though, the owner must make the
judgment that the extra costs, both in terms of installation and of
possible increased danger due to confusion at changeover time,
are less weighty, in the eyes of the paying customers, than the
benefits.
If no such compromise is feasible, and only the profit-andloss
system, through trial and error, would be able to make this
determination, then the road owner could be counted upon to
choose that mode which he thinks will maximize his profits: i.e.,
the one that will accede to the wishes of the customers who have
shown themselves to be most concerned (by their willingness to
pay the most in order to have things arranged in a manner preferable
to them). There will be a “vote,” as it were, including only
those who are intimately connected to the road, and not, as under
democracy, all those over the age of eighteen or twenty-one. The
decision will be made in much the same way that it is decided to
plant oats and not wheat on a given plot of land (because there is
more money expected to be forthcoming for the former than for
the latter).
(c) Surveillance, monitoring. The magic of modern electrical
technology is oft-times put forward as a nonprice-rationing
panacea for highway congestion. Its proponents are not backward
in their claims on behalf of this attempted solution. Says
John F. Kain, for example:
A revolutionary improvement in the quality and quantity of
urban transportation services could be obtained in virtually
every U.S. metropolitan area in a relatively short period of time.
Moreover, this improvement can be obtained with expenditures
that are no larger than those presently programmed. These
gains can be achieved by converting existing urban expressways