Joint impact of competition,ownership form and economic regulation on airport performance and pricing

The combined impact of ownership form, economic regulation and competition on airport performance is analyzed using data envelopment analysis to measure cost efficiency in the first stage and regression analysis to measure the impact of the environment in the second stage. The empirical results of an analysis of European and Australian airports over a 10 year timeframe reveal that under relatively non-competitive conditions, public airports operate less cost efficiently than fully private airports. Irrespective of ownership form, regulation is necessary to emulate competitive forces thus pushing airport management towards cost efficiency and reasonable pricing policies. Under potential regional or hub competition, economic regulation inhibits airports of any ownership form from operating and pricing efficiently. Although public and fully private airports operate equally efficiently in a competitive setting, private airports still set higher aeronautical charges. Furthermore, mixed ownership forms with a majority public holding are neither cost efficient nor low price, irrespective of the level of competition.     

Two-stage stochastic bilevel programming over a transportation network

We consider a two-stage stochastic extension of the bilevel pricing model introduced by Labbé et al. (1998). In the first stage, the leader sets tariffs on a subset of arcs of a transportation network, with the aim of maximizing profits while, at the lower level, flows are assigned to cheapest paths of a multicommodity transportation network. In the second stage, the situation repeats itself under the constraint that tariffs should not differ too widely from those set at the first stage, a condition that frequently arises in practice. We analyze properties of the model, provide numerical illustrations, and open avenues for further research into this area.     

深圳市轨道交通二期线网票价研究

为制定深圳市轨道交通线网票价方案,首先分析了现行票价所存在的问题。通过分析轨道交通票价制定的相关影响因素,提出了深圳市轨道交通票价制定原则。同时,借鉴国内外典型城市轨道交通票制票价经验,结合深圳市轨道交通发展现状,提出了轨道交通票制宜采用里程分段计价,确定了合理的票价方案。最后,对深圳市轨道交通线网票价提出了几点建议。     

Integrated operations planning and revenue management for rail freight transportation

In the rail industry, profit maximization relies heavily on the integration of logistics activities with an improved management of revenues. The operational policies chosen by the carrier have an important impact on the network yield and thus on global profitability. This paper bridges the gap between railroad operations planning and revenue management. We propose a new bilevel mathematical formulation which encompasses pricing decisions and network planning policies such as car blocking and routing as well as train make-up and scheduling. An exact solution approach based on a mixed integer formulation adapted to the problem structure is presented, and computational results are reported on randomly generated instances.     

Part I: Externalities and economic policies in road transport

Road transport imposes negative externalities on society. These externalities include environmental and road damage, accidents, congestion, and oil dependence. The cost of these externalities to society is in general not reflected in the current market prices in the road transport sector.An efficient mobility model for the future must take into account the true costs of transport and its regulatory framework will need to create incentives for people to make sustainable transport choices. This paper discusses the use of economic instruments to correct road transport externalities, but gives relatively more weight to the problem of carbon emissions from road transport, as this is particularly challenging, given its global and long-term nature.Economics offers two types of instruments for addressing the problem of transport externalities: command-and-control and incentive-based policies.Command-and-control policies are government regulations which force consumers and producers to change their behaviour. They are the most widely used policy instruments. Examples include vehicle emission and fuel standards in the US as well as driving or parking restrictions in Singapore. The implementation cost of these instruments to the government is small. Although from an economic perspective these policies often fail to achieve an efficient market outcome, the presence of political constraints often make them the preferred option, in terms of feasibility and effectiveness.Economic theory shows how policies, which affect consumption and production incentives, can be used to achieve the optimal outcome in the presence of externalities. Incentive-based policies function within a new or an altered market. We first examine incentive-based policies, which cap the aggregate amount of the externality, such as carbon emissions, by allocating permits or rights to the emitters. The emitters are then free to trade their permits amongst them. The permit allocation mechanism is important-although market efficiency would be satisfied by an auction, political influences usually favour a proportional allocation based on historic emissions. We discuss EU ETS as an example of a cap-and-trade system, however, no such policy for CO₂ emissions in road transport has been implemented anywhere in the world to date.Fiscal instruments are, like command-and-control, widely used in road transport, because they are relatively cheap and simple to implement. They include the use of taxes and charges in order to bridge the gap between private and the social costs and, in principle, can lead to an efficient market solution. Registration, ownership, fuel, emissions, usage taxes, and parking and congestion charges have been implemented in many countries around the world. On the other side of the spectrum, subsidies can be given to those scrapping old cars and buying fuel-efficient vehicles. Some cities, such as London, have implemented congestion charges and many states in the United States have introduced high occupancy lanes. Other interesting possibilities include pay-as-you-drive insurance and other usage charges. However, the size and scope of taxes and subsidies are determined by governments, and because of their imperfect knowledge of the market the outcome is still likely to be inefficient.Governments have many effective economic instruments to create a sustainable road transport model. These instruments can be used separately or together, but their implementation will be necessary in the nearest future.     

Violation or strengthening of the self-financing doctrine at international airports by SMCP funded PPP schemes?

International airports are among the few examples of transport infrastructures which can well achieve self-financing. The growing interest of private companies in airport construction and operation is the visible testimony to this fact. However, the financing structures of airports are complex, involving not only traffic, passenger and goods handling, but also non-aviation services, such as retail, car parking or intermodal facilities. The integration of social marginal cost pricing schemes into this organizational structure according to the strategic plans of the European Commission, however, is challenging. This paper investigates whether they comply with a second strategic policy objective at European and national level, which is to foster public-private partnerships (PPPs) in transport financing in terms of full cost coverage, risks and incentives.The cases analysed in this paper deal with two sites with very different characteristics: Munich Airport which has been publicly operated since 1991 and the Bulgarian airports Varna and Burgas, which have been managed since 2007 by one concessionaire and whose planning and future development is being accomplished with private capital. The results of both cases showed that self-financing is possible in case congestion costs are considered in the SMCP schemes, and given that air traffic growth rates return to the significant levels prior to the economic crisis. The chapter will discuss the legal implications of congestion pricing at European airports which are violating current EC legislation, as well as the impact of alternative pricing schemes on the environmental performance and technological innovation in aviation.     

上海地区铁路冷链物流发展对策研究

随着我国国民经济快速发展,冷链物流需求快速提升,公路冷链物流发展迅猛,但铁路冷链物流增速明显滞后于行业发展。为加快上海地区铁路冷链物流发展,阐述上海地区铁路冷链物流的发展现状,从运输时效、运输价格、能力供给、集配货模式、应急处置等方面分析铁路冷链物流发展存在的问题,提出大力组织班列开行、采用灵活价格政策、加大装备车辆供给、提供多样性物流服务、提升应急处置能力、推进行业标准出台等提升铁路冷链物流市场竞争能的对策,为实现上海地区铁路冷链货运量增长及铁路冷链物流持续健康发展提供支撑。     

拉姆塞定价模型在地铁定价中的应用

针对单一和计程票价制的缺点,介绍了拉姆塞定价的原理,并在此基础上对高峰定价法从经济学理论上进行了探讨。     

Workshop 5: Network and system planning

A renewed interest in public transport analysis and development has triggered a debate among policy makers, practitioners and stakeholders regarding technologies, design, pricing, subsidies and contract forms for optimal policy, including social well-being and the financing of public transport reform. Here we present contents and conclusions of workshop 5 of the Thredbo 12 Conference held in Durban, South Africa, where we analysed a series of recent theoretical developments on the links among demand, technology and the design of public transport systems, which we coupled with the examination of several case studies in order to feed the discussion regarding the relations among the strategic, tactical and operational elements that should be considered when designing a public transport policy.     

Optimal selection of build-operate-transfer projects on transportation networks

This paper considers the problem of how to select highway projects for the build-operate-transfer (BOT) development with the objective of improving the social benefit while ensuring the marketability of those selected. The problem can be viewed as a tri-level leader-follower game and is formulated as a mixed integer program with equilibrium constraints. Without solving the associated problem, we show that optimal tolls and travel times on selected BOT highways can be determined from their attributes under mild assumptions. This leads to an efficient heuristic algorithm for solving the project selection problem.