Transantiago: A tale of two cities

The Chilean government decided to modernize Santiago's entire public transport system, integrating the underground and the private bus networks based on a structure of trunk and feeder services, and a fare-payment by touchless smart card. The new, integrated transit system, known as Transantiago, very soon ran into serious problems that alienated much of its user base and significantly lowered the government's approval ratings. This paper recounts how Transantiago was planned and designed and then discusses its evolution after implementation. It concludes with suggestions for the Transantiago authorities and lessons to be learned from this traumatic process.     

Four decades of changing transport policy in Santiago,Chile

During the last forty years, Santiago has experienced a series of drastic changes in public transport policies. These changes have ranged widely, from total deregulation to processes that concentrated the management of public transport within the hands of the public sector.     

What is behind fare evasion in urban bus systems? An econometric approach

Fare evasion is a problem in many public transport systems around the world and policies to reduce it are generally aimed at improving control and increasing fines. We use an econometric approach to attempt explaining the high levels of evasion in Santiago, Chile, and guide public policy formulation to reduce this problem. In particular, a negative binomial count regression model allowed us to find that fare evasion rates on buses increase as: (i) more people board (or alight) at a given bus door, (ii) more passengers board by a rear door, (iii) buses have higher occupancy levels (and more doors) and (iv) passengers experience longer headways. By controlling these variables (ceteris paribus), results indicate that evasion is greater during the afternoon and evening, but it is not clear that it is higher during peak hours. Regarding socioeconomic variables, we found that fare evasion at bus stops located in higher income areas (municipalities) is significantly lower than in more deprived areas. Finally, based on our results we identified five main methods to address evasion as alternatives to more dedicated fine enforcement or increased inspection; (i) increasing the bus fleet, (ii) improving the bus headway regularity, (iii) implementing off-board payment stations, (iv) changing the payment system on board and (v) changing the bus design (number of doors or capacity). Our model provides a powerful tool to predict the reduction of fare evasion due to the implementation of some of these five operational strategies, and can be applied to other bus public transport systems.     

The impact of compliance measures on the operation of a bus system: The case of Transantiago

In a regulated bus system operated by private companies, pecuniary incentives can be of primary importance to ensure the quality of the operation and the level of service, especially when there are only a few companies and basically no competition among them. The case of Transantiago, in the capital city of Chile, provides a good example of this. The very ambitious Transantiago project, implemented in 2007 in Santiago, integrated the bus and the subway systems, changing the route structure of the bus services, introducing a common and integrated fare system and electronic payment device, and tendering the operation of approximately 4,600 buses (which by the launch of the system in February 2007 had increased to 5600) to 10 private companies replacing some 4000 small operators which owned 8000 buses. In the beginning, the system faced huge difficulties. Operators' revenue formula basically consisted of a fixed payment, which changed slightly with the actual patronage. This quickly turned out to be a problem, and as technological support became available (several months after the launch), compliance measures were implemented, directly affecting the operators' revenue. The first measure considered the seat/standing places per hour of the buses in operation, for each company, and compared it to the theoretical figure. As a result, buses operating during peak hours increased from 4600 to 5600 in just two months. Subsequent indexes included service frequency and regularity, as well as effective bus-km, aggregated by company first and later by service. This paper shows how the successive implementation of these performance indexes had an impact on the operation of Transantiago in the first years, discusses the difficulties faced to implement them and highlights the importance of technological support to make possible the application of adequate compliance measures.