The synthetic control method (SCM) is widely used to evaluate causal effects under quasi-experimental designs. However, SCM suffers from weaknesses that compromise its accuracy, stability and meaningfulness, due to the nested optimization problem of covariate relevance and counterfactual...

European governments are increasingly committed to road safety, due to the impact of road accidents in terms of economic loss and as a public health threat. In addition to regulation, providing better road infrastructure is an essential strategy to promote road safety. This paper investigates...

The road safety literature is typified by a high degree of compartmentalization between studies that focus on infrastructure and traffic conditions and those devoted to the evaluation of public policies and regulations. As a result, few studies adopt a unified empirical framework in their...

This paper evaluates how changes in the provision of HSR services do affect Tourism outcomes in Spain, a touristic country that has the longest and newest HSR network in Europe. The empirical strategy is based on Differences in Differences panel data methods with double fixed effects. Main data...

The use of tolls is being widespread around the world. Its ability to fund infrastructure projects and to solve budget constraints have been the main rationale behind its renewed interest. However, less attention has been payed to the safety effects derived from this policy in a moment of...

Congestion costs are emerging as one of the most important challenges faced by metropolitan planners and transport authorities in first world economies. In US these costs were as high as 78 million dollars in 2005 and are growing due to fast increases in travel delays. In order to solve the...

Road safety has become an increasing concern in developed countries due to the significant amount of mortal victims and the economic losses derived. Only in 2005 these losses rose to 200.000 million euros, a significant amount – approximately the 2% of its GDP- that easily justifies any public...

Recent theoretical developments on concession contracts for long term infrastructure projects under uncertain demand show the benefits of allowing for flexible term contracts rather than fixing a rigid term. This study presents a simulation to compare both alternatives by using real data from...