This research evaluates the merits of road pricing scenarios affecting a single industry almost exclusively – grain movement on the rural road network in the west central region of the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. Policies in the Canadian grain handling and transportation industry have led to increased use of rural roads, accelerating road deterioration in the region. Using a simulated optimization framework to compare road pricing schemes, we find that a policy of differential road pricing based on known road maintenance costs generates the lowest total social costs. The differences between the simulated social costs in the pricing scenarios are surprisingly small.
