TUM Study: Cars Cause 80 Percent of External Costs

A new study from the MCube Future Cluster at the Technical University of Munich has calculated the external costs of transportation using the example of the state capital Munich and concludes that car traffic is responsible for 80 percent of these costs in total. The title is both a program and a message to policymakers: “Ending the myth of mobility at zero costs: An external cost analysis.” The aim is to dispel the myth that current levels and styles of mobility come without significant costs.

"Every kilometer driven by car costs society more than twice as much as a kilometer traveled by public transport. This means that expanding active mobility as well as public transport in Germany not only benefits the climate but also relieves everyone's wallet," appealed TU mobility expert and author Daniel Schröder.

Although it is known that the external costs of transportation are considerable, their estimates are uncertain, especially when comparing different modes of transport. This paper presents a comprehensive approach to evaluating the external costs of various modes of transport, including public transport, motorized private transport, shared services, and active mobility. The methodology also covers several external cost categories, namely air pollution, climate, noise, land use, congestion, accidents, and barrier costs, as well as the health benefits of active mobility, the authors sketch. The city of Munich, Germany, serves as a case study for calculating the total external costs of transportation per year. In addition, the developed approach allows the evaluation of transport policy scenarios to investigate the impacts of changes in the mobility system, such as modal shifts or electrification.

"In Munich, diesel and gasoline vehicles cause almost 80 percent of all external costs. Increasing the share of active mobility is more advantageous in terms of reducing external costs than increasing the share of public transport or the electrification rate," urges Schröder.

The debate on the future of mobility is always a question of costs, says Schröder in a contribution for the Tagesspiegel regarding the debates on the nine-euro or 49-euro ticket, fuel price brakes, or now the coalition dispute over highway and rail expansion. The actual total costs of mobility – not just the individual purchase prices for citizens or the investment amount for infrastructure for the state – are hardly known so far. All modes of transport were compared in urban Munich in terms of their so-called internal and external costs.

External costs: Someone has to pay. We all do!

Internal costs are paid directly or indirectly by the user, such as for public transport or shared services, or costs for using a private car or bicycle. The principle here is: “Caused by user, paid by user.” External costs arise from the consumption of a product, in this case, mobility, which causes costs for other people not covered by the price. Principle: “Caused by user, paid by others.” These include, for example, the provision. The comprehensive methodology is, in principle, applicable to any urban area in the world. Initial results were presented based on extensive data from the cluster for the urban area of Munich. The external costs consist of various components that cause costs in society:

• Air pollutants from local emissions such as NOx or carbon particles cause not only health damage costs in the population but also non-health damage such as crop losses, property damage, or biodiversity loss.
• Climate costs, caused by greenhouse gases like CO2, arise from damage caused by climate change. Noise costs consider both health impairments due to mental stress for residents and losses due to reduced productivity in adjacent office buildings.
• Land use costs include the costs of infrastructure for moving (rail and road) and stationary traffic (parking lots) as well as opportunity costs of the consumed land.
• Congestion costs arise from the value of lost time in traffic jams or on public transport due to delays.
• Accident costs consist of various components. These include the direct costs such as medical treatment of the injured and emergency transport, as well as the indirect costs for the general provision of emergency services. These are particularly high for bicycles and e-scooters due to the many severe injuries.

Cars account for 80 percent of the costs

Cars contribute to 80 percent of all external costs, according to a clear analysis. The components vary in intensity for different modes of transport. For cars, climate costs, congestion costs, and space usage costs dominate, whereas for active modes of transport (bicycles, pedestrians), high accident costs are the main cost drivers, and for public transport (unsurprisingly) delays and infrastructure costs are significant. Based on this insight, researchers pose key questions: Where are the greatest savings potentials for society? Is public transport truly chronically deficient, and is individual transport an expression of the free market? In Munich, gasoline and diesel cars caused nearly 80 percent of all external mobility costs, which are borne not by the owners but by society as a whole. The remaining 20 percent of the costs are generated collectively by bicycles, buses, pedestrians, electric scooters, and others. Clear conclusion:

"Simply switching to electric cars saves society only eleven percent of external costs per passenger-kilometer with the current energy mix. In contrast, switching to bicycles saves 58 percent, and switching to the subway saves even 75 percent," according to the analysis.