CPD Course: Fiscal Measures for Combatting Traffic Congestion in Hong Kong (Jan 10, 2026)

CPD Course: Fiscal Measures for Combatting Traffic Congestion in Hong Kong

Organized by

The Institute of Transport Studies

The University of Hong Kong

Date:   January 10, 2026

Time:   2 p.m. – 6 p.m. 

Format:  In-person Lecture

SYNOPSIS 

Traffic congestion adversely affects the development and productivity of cities and the livelihood of their residents and visitors. This course explores the rudimentary and sophisticated fiscal measures for addressing traffic congestion in Hong Kong and overseas.  The effectiveness of the first registration tax (FRT), vehicle license fee (VLF), fuel levy and passage tax is examined with regards to local transport policy. The merits of introducing time-varying tolling at the three road harbour crossings as of December 17, 2023 are explored. New measures, such as quota premium for controlling vehicle ownership and electronic road pricing for reducing traffic movement in an area, shall also be advanced. In addition to the planning and engineering analyses, a transportation economics approach is delved into. Starting from first economic principles, the efficacy of the pricing approach is investigated. Congestion pricing curtails excess traffic and results in travel time saved which otherwise would have been lost. A congestion charge aims to internalize the congestion externality. Since a congestion charge is calculated on the incremental congestion cost that a motorist causes other vehicles behind him to slow down, all vehicles should be charged rather than merely singling out the automobile. Emergency vehicles are the only ones to be exempted. As a proxy measure for congestion, a congestion charge should be based on the road space taken up by a vehicle when moving in a traffic stream. Congestion charging based on the road space taken up by a vehicle by time of day and location is both efficient and fair. A brief economic assessment of several overseas practices to date includes Singapore’s Area Licensing Scheme (1975) followed by its Electronic Road Pricing System (1998), London (2003), Stockholm (2007), Milan (2007), Gothenberg (2013) and New York City (as of January 5, 2025).

Language:  English

CPD Credit: This short course is recommended for four CPD-hour credits.

e-Certificate of Attendance will be issued to attendees.

Rundown:                  2:00 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. Lecture by Alfred C.Y. Lam

                                    3:30 p.m. – 3:45 p.m. Break                                      

                                    3:45 p.m. – 5:45 p.m. Lecture by Timothy D. Hau

                                    5:45 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. Q&A session                        

(This program is subject to minor modifications without further notice.)

Registration fee:        HK$880 per person

All payments are non-refundable.

Registration:              Please visit our website:

https://hkuems1.hku.hk/hkuems/ec_hdetail.aspx?guest=Y&ueid=104111 for online registration. The deadline for the registration will be on 8 January 2026 (Thursday).

Enquiries:                  For general enquiries, please contact Dr. Mingxuan CHEN (email: hkits@hku.hk).

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Ir Alfred C.Y. Lam is Adjunct Associate Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering and the Department of Geography at the University of Hong Kong. He was Chief Engineer (Transport Planning) in the Transport Department and has been working as a transport planner and engineer in government departments and consultancy firms for over four decades. He worked on a wide range of transport planning and traffic engineering projects in Hong Kong and overseas and garnered extensive experience in planning for new highways and formulating transport policies. He is conversant in developing and applying transport and traffic models to produce traffic and transport demand forecasts for assessing alignment, configuration and tolling. He conducted and managed numerous traffic impact studies and transport projects involving traffic and transport surveys, travel demand analyses, traffic engineering designs and assessments. He continues to teach transport planning and supervises dissertation work at the master’s degree level at the University of Hong Kong.

Dr Timothy D. Hau is Honorary Associate Professor of Economics, HKU Business School. He obtained his B.A. from Stanford, and M.A. and Ph.D. in economics from U.C. Berkeley. He taught at U.C. Davis before joining HKU. The World Bank invited him to work as an economist in its Transport Division, Infrastructure and Urban Development Department in the nineties. He also worked in its Public Economics Division, Policy Research Department. His World Bank papers on the theory and mechanisms of road use charging have been widely circulated and cited in the academic and professional literature. He was once awarded the Faculty Outstanding Teacher Award. His single-authored papers have appeared in journals such as Economica, Economics Letters, Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, Built Environment, Transportation Research B, and Transportmetrica. The International Encyclopedia of Transportation 2021 carries his four entries on congestion pricing, public transportation pricing, road investment, and an Electronic Road Pricing proposal for Hong Kong. Besides the WB, he provided policy advice to the ADB, IADB, UN, and the National Research Council (US).

Non-financial sponsor:

The Chartered Institution of Highways & Transportation (Hong Kong Branch)

The Chartered Institution of Logistics and Transport