Suggested Citation:
Rowangould, Gregory (2010) A Spatially Detailed Locomotive Emission Model and Goods Movement Data Constraints on Public Policy and Planning. Institute of Transportation Studies, University of California, Davis, Research Report UCD-ITS-RR-10-50

The first part of this dissertation develops a new theoretically consistent GIS based locomotive emission model which improves the accuracy of current inventory methods while also increasing the spatial detail. Greater spatial resolution is important for considering local effects and environmental justice concerns. The model increases accuracy and spatial detail by considering the effect of track grade, train type and the local (route specific) locomotive fleet on fuel consumption. Further improvement is gained by developing emission factors that are specific to the local locomotive fleet. The modeling platform also allows the user to easily change model inputs and view results in a map or table at multiple geographic scales.

A growing national trend is to provide public financial support for private freight rail infrastructure projects with the goal of decreasing highway congestion and air pollutant emissions by allowing a greater share of goods to move by rail. But, do public planners and policy makers have the required data, tools and experience to make informed freight rail infrastructure decisions? The second part of this dissertation argues they may not.

California’s Trade Corridors Improvement Fund which allocates $3 billion for goods movement infrastructure improvements is considered as a case study. The study finds that the transportation and economic modeling, and assumptions underlying many project analyses depend on ad-hoc methods and unsupported assumptions. The most critical finding is the lack of a theoretically sound method which assesses the cost, benefits and risks of using public funds for private infrastructure projects. Few project applications consider or identify the cause of the problem they are trying to solve. For example, is a lack of rail capacity preventing truck traffic from shifting to rail? Under what conditions would private railroads provide less than the socially optimum level of rail capacity? And is public funding of freight rail the best solution to mitigate negative environmental and health impacts caused by goods movement? Focusing on correcting apparent market failures is likely to offer more certain benefits. This research also points to the need for a more standardized framework for evaluating goods movement projects.