Studying The Socioeconomic Impacts Of Urban Congestion : An empirical validation on revealed preferences survey data for the city of Sahline

Road congestion is one of the main obstacles to economic development, leading to serious social and economic consequences. The aim of this study is to better understand the social and economic impacts of road congestion on the city of Sahline. This study used a revealed preference survey approach to collect data from home-to-work users in Sahline City. Firstly, we analyzed the traffic performance across the service level for the four main axes of Sahline, and we found that the AHB line presents the most congested route then the AFH route. This ranking is due to the nature of the vital activities which result from it. Secondly, we calculated the different congestion costs through the survey data, and we noted that these costs vary according to socioeconomic categories. Indeed, the overall study revealed that there were several factors which influence this problem such as the attractiveness of the city center, which cause uncontrolled parking and which lead to poor traffic flow. This therefore affects the social life of regular road users with a drop in income and productivity, air and noise pollution, an increase in frustration, anger, wasted time and more particularly in stress levels. In this context, we showed that stress and socio-economic categories have a correspondence relationship by analyzing it with the CFA and the chi-square test. Finally, we suggested regulatory policies to minimize congestion and internalize its external costs in order to encourage transportation sustainability.