A comparison of rail liberalisation levels across four European countries

Beria, Paolo and Quinet, Emile and de Rus, Gines and Schulz, Carola (2010): A comparison of rail liberalisation levels across four European countries. Published in: Selected Proceedings of the 12th World Conference on Transport Research Society, ISBN 978-989-96986-1-1

Abstract

The paper presents the results of a research on railway regulation and liberalisation in Italy, France, Germany and Spain. The analysed fields of regulation are the relationship between the State and the rail companies, network access conditions by operators, slot allocating and pricing schemes and how public service obligations are defined, paid and regulated. The aim of the paper is to give a comparative overview of the rail regulation from a critical point of view, rather than descriptive. The regulatory frameworks are outlined and then assessed according to their implications on the liberalisation level and on the effective market opening. The conclusions are that the actual level of liberalisation is still scarce and only in some cases the opening level is increasing. Market penetration of newcomers is significant only in niche markets. An issue emerging from the work is the opposing attitude of incumbent railways against liberalisation and the role of decision makers in backing this behaviour. The strategies followed to limit the outcomes of the liberalisation process are different across the country sample. However, all the incumbents argue with the self-referential declaration of efficiency, public service obligations and they claim to be under an excessive and unfair foreign competition. These arguments are yet embedded in legislative, organisational and economic settings supporting these positions like the common ownership of network and services, the permanence of dominant positions and favourable financial conditions.

• Item Type: MPRA Paper
• Language: English
• Keywords: railways; liberalisation; regulation; Europe; Italy; France, Germany; Spain
• Subjects: L - Industrial Organization > L5 - Regulation and Industrial Policy > L51 - Economics of Regulation; L - Industrial Organization > L9 - Industry Studies: Transportation and Utilities > L92 - Railroads and Other Surface Transportation; R - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics > R4 - Transportation Economics > R48 - Government Pricing and Policy; P - Economic Systems > P1 - Capitalist Systems > P16 - Political Economy

References

Cambini, C., Buzzo Margari, B. (2005). Le gare nelle ferrovie locali. Rapporto III – Ottobre 2005, HERMES.

Campos, J. (2006). Spain: The end of an era. In Gómez-Ibañez, J.A. and de Rus, G. (editors): Competition in the railway industry: An international comparative analysis. Edward Elgar.

CESIT (2008). Emergenza trasporto regionale: il punto di vista dei pendolari. CESIT.

DB (2007), Balance sheet 2007.

European Commission (2006). Policy effectiveness of rail. EU policy and its impact on the rail system. DG TREN, European Commission.

European Commission (2009a). Evaluation of the Common Transport Policy (CTP) of the EU from 2000 to 2008 and analysis of the evolution and structure of the European transport sector in the context of the long-term development of the CTP. DG TREN, European Commission.

European Commission (2009b). Report from the Commission to the Council and the European Parliament. Second report on monitoring development of the rail market. SEC(2009)1687. European Commission.

European Rail Infrastructure Managers (EIM) and Community of European Railway and Infrastructure Companies (CER) (2008). Rail Charging and Accounting Schemes in Europe. Case studies from six countries. May 2008.

Ferrovie dello Stato (2007). Bilancio Consolidato e Bilancio di Esercizio 2007. Ferrovie dello Stato, Roma (Italy).

Friebel, G., Ivaldi, M. and Vibes, C. (2003). Railway (de) regulation: A European efficiency comparison. IDEI report no 3 on passenger rail transport, University of Toulouse.

Gomez-Ibanez, J.A. and Pittman, R. (2004). Chinese Railway Reform and Competition. Journal of Transport Economics and Policy 38 (2004b): 309-332.

Gathon, H. J. and Pestieau, P. (1995). Decomposing efficiency into its managerial and its regulatory components: The case of European railways. European Journal of Operational Research, 80: 500-507.

Glaister, S. (2006). Competition undermined by politics. In: Gómez-Ibañez, J.A. and de Rus, G. (editors): Competition in the railway industry: An international comparative analysis. Edward Elgar.

Kirchner, C. (2004). Rail liberalisation index 2004. Comparison of the market opening in the rail markets of the member states of the European Union, Switzerland and Norway. IBM Business Consulting Services.

Link, H. (2004). Rail infrastructure charging and on-track competition in Germany. In: International Journal of Transport Management. 2.: 17-24.

MEEDDAT/SESP (2008), Les comptes des transports en 2007 (tome 1). Les transferts de l’État et des collectivités locales: Ministère de l'écologie, de l'énergie, du développement durable et de l'aménagement du territoire, Paris (France).

Monami, Eric (2000). European Passenger Rail Reforms: A Comparative Assessment of the Emerging Models. Transport Reviews, vol. 20: 91-112.

Nash, C.A. (2006). Europe: alternative models of restructuring. In Gómez-Ibañez, J.A. and de Rus, G. (editors): Competition in the railway industry: An international comparative analysis. Edward Elgar.

Nash, C.A. (2008). Passenger railway reform in the last 20 years – European experience reconsidered. Research in Transport Economics, 22(2008): 61–70.

Oum T. H., Waters, W.G. II, and Yu, C. (1999). A survey of productivity and efficiency measurement in rail transport. Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, 33 (January): 9-42.

Oum T. H. and Yu, C. (1994). Economic efficiency of railways and implications for public policy: A comparative study of the OECD countries' railways. Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, 28, 2: 121-138.

Pittman, R. (2007). Options for restructuring the state-owned monopoly railway. In Dennis, S.M. and Talley, W.K. (editors): Railroad economics. Research in transportation economics. Elsevier.

Ponti M. (forthcoming). Competition, Regulation and Public Service Obligations. In Quinet (forthcoming). Elsevier.

Quinet, E. (2006). France: Avoiding competition. In Gómez-Ibañez, J.A. and de Rus, G. (editors): Competition in the railway industry: An international comparative analysis. Edward Elgar.

Quinet, E. (forthcoming). Le système ferroviaire français: la revolution lente. In Commentaire, Paris.

RENFE (2007), Resultados y principales magnitudes de las Áreas de Actividad, RENFE, Madrid (Spain).

Sanchez-Borràs, M., Nash, C., Abrantes, P., Lopez-Pita, A. (2010). Rail access charges and the competitiveness of high speed trains. Transport Policy, 17: 102-109.

SNCF (2009). Concurrence dans le ferroviaire : quelle régulation. Proceedings of the seminar 8th of July 2009. http://medias.sncf.com/resources/fr_FR/medias/MD0005_20090910/template/Journee_SNCF_IDEI_080709_Les_actes.pdf

Thompson, L. (2001). Directions of Railway Reform. International Railway Congress Association. Vienna.

Winston, C. (2006). United States: Private and deregulated. In Gómez-Ibañez, J.A. and de Rus, G. (editors): Competition in the railway industry: An international comparative analysis. Edward Elgar.

Waters II, W.G. (2007). Evolution of railroad economics. In Dennis, S.M. and Talley, W.K. (editors): Railroad economics. Research in transportation economics. Elsevier.