Competition and the Provision of High Speed Rail Services

摘要

This paper reviews two alternative ways of introducing competition into high speed rail passenger markets - on track competition and franchising. Experience of on track competition is very limited, but there is evidence from modelling results. By contrast franchising has been used extensively in a number of countries but mainly for regional services. It is found that on track competition leads to lower fares and improved services, and encourages innovation and lower cost operators, but may lead to excessive service levels, reduced profitability and poor use of scarce capacity. By contrast, franchising has generally succeeded in raising rail demand and reducing costs, although in the one example where inter-city services were franchised -Britain - costs have actually risen. Our overall judgement is that franchising is likely to be the more successful approach, although it may need adaptation to the characteristics of high speed rail, and the best solution may vary with circumstances.