Regional Impact of Public Transportation Infrastructure in the U.S. Northeast Megaregion: A Spatial Econometric Computable General Equilibrium Assessment

Transportation investment is a major public policy issue at the federal, state and local levels of government in the U.S. This dissertation develops, demonstrates and applies a new extension to computable general equilibrium analysis to assist policy makers in assessing the impact of public investments on economic output at different geographic scales (national, state and metropolitan) with an emphasis on the U.S. northeast megaregion.;The dissertation confirms that public transportation infrastructure plays a vital role in stimulating and facilitating regional economic growth even in a mature transportation systems region. The positive effects of public transportation infrastructure are found under both the partial equilibrium assessment and the general equilibrium assessment. In terms of the modal comparison, highway infrastructure is found to play a dominant role in economic growth at the national level, the state level and the metropolitan level.;Nationally, airports are the next most important public investment. The impact of public airport infrastructure was found much larger at the national level rather than at the northeast state level or the northeast metropolitan level. The regional impact of public passenger rail and transit varies among different geographic scales and locations. A higher impact from public passenger rail and transit investment was found at both the state and the metropolitan levels. After considering spatial spillover effects, the dissertation confirms that public passenger rail and transit infrastructure in the northeast megaregion make a substantial contribution to regional economic growth. Such impacts were much stronger than public airports' but significantly smaller than highways'.