FERROVIE

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SITI, PORTALI, ENTI

ANSF, Agenzia Nazionale per la Sicurezza delle Ferrovie (Italia)

UIC International Union of Railways

European Railway Agency Agenzia dell'Unione Europea. "The European Railway Agency in Valenciennes/Lille, France, has the mission of reinforcing safety and interoperability of railways throughout Europe, and thus adding a strong new momentum towards the shared vision of a truly integrated, competitive European railway area."

ERRAC The European Rail Research Advisory Council

The European Railway Server (Laboratoire d’Economie des Transports)

Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), U.S. Department of Transportation (Washington, DC).

FerCargo è l'Associazione di Imprese ferroviarie private italiane che operano nel settore del trasporto merci.

NewRail, the Centre for Railway Research at Newcastle University.

The Office of Rail Regulation is the independent safety and economic regulator for Britain's railways.

[[ www.RailPages.com portale dedicato a fornire informazioni sulle ferrovie europee [in inglese] a cura di RailNetEurope (RNE), “an association of railway infrastructure managers in Europe”]] sito attualmente non attivo!

Sustainable Freight Transport sito a cura di T&E

Der Eisenbahn Webkatalog "Der umfangreichste deutschsprachige Webkatalog zum Thema Eisenbahn und Modelleisenbahn". Portale in lingua tedesca, contiene informazioni aggiornate, news, links sulle ferrovie.

bahnONLINE.ch Das Portal über die Schweizer Bahnen (il portale sulle ferrovie svizzere).

Rail.co. The site focuses on rail news around the world and in the UK.

RailServe.com Directory of Railroad Travel, Hobby & Industry Sites

Répertoire des sites ferroviaires. Portale con accesso a siti di associazioni, imprese, storia, musei, reti, turismo, tram. metro e funicolari in Europa e nel mondo.

SoloTreni.net. Comunità OnLine per la promozione della Cultura Ferroviaria e del Trasporto Pubblico.

Stagniweb. Questo è un sito amatoriale, realizzato da Giorgio Stagni, di Milano. Si occupa principalmente di ferrovie e in particolare di programmazione dei servizi ferroviari, oltre che di molti aspetti storici legati alla ferrovia. Ampie parti del sito trattano però anche altri argomenti: fotografia, macchine fotografiche e cineprese, informatica e relative guide su vari software, urbanistica e scempi ambientali, modellismo ferroviario ed altro ancora. Sezione dedicata al Servizio ferroviario regionale della Lombardia.

zeljeznice.net Portale sulle ferrovie in lingua croata.

Airport Railways of the World (database). "This site helps you to find which airports have rail connections - and what sort of connections they are. It tells you the name, web-site, e-mail address and help-line number of the airport operator and the railway operator - or operators - where this is available."

International Association of Railway Operations Research (IAROR).

The Association of Community Rail Partnerships (ACoRP) is a federation of over 50 community rail partnerships and rail promotion groups (UK). "We are an organisation of ‘do-ers’, focused on practical initiatives which add up to a better more sustainable local railway. Improved station facilities, better train services and improved integration with other forms of transport are central to the work of ACoRP and its members".

Associazione Ferrovie Piemontesi. Intende promuovere una mobilità collettiva sostenibile nell’ambito della regione Piemonte e promuovere lo sviluppo e la gestione del sistema ferroviario.



TRENI A BATTERIA / IDROGENO / CELLE A COMBUSTIBILE - FUEL CELL / HYDROGEN / BATTERY ELECTRIC TRAINS

Christian Schindler (RWTH Aachen University), The Aachen Rail Shuttle ARS - Autonomous and energy self-sufficient feeder transport. Journal of Rail Transport Planning & Management 21 (2022) 100299 (11 p.) [formato PDF, 4,1 MB]. Open Access. "This article is about a research and development project that deals with the rail bus of the 3rd generation. The vehicle concept is aimed to be energyself-sufficient and locally emission free. It has the dimensions of a standard city road bus and is designed to operate autonomously on sight in rural areas. The Aachen Rail Bus (ARS) is intended to provide a significantly better service by shorter headways in order to attract more passengers from the countryside to the rail. The research challenges are to prove that the ARS can operate at line of sight, that the energy storage system is suitable for the proposed operation concept and that the passive safety system protects the light and relatively weak passenger compartment, which shall be easily exchangeable by an adequate interface to the chassis that includes all technical equipment.!

Emanuele Fedele, Diego Iannuzzi, Andrea Del Pizzo (Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II, Naples), Onboard energy storage in rail transport: Review of real applications and techno-economic assessments. IET Electr. Syst. Transp. 2021;1-31 (31 p.) [formato PDF, 2,1 MB]. Open Access. "Despite low energy and fuel consumption levels in the rail sector, further improvements are being pursued by manufacturers and operators. Their primary efforts aim to reduce traction energy demand, replace diesel, and limit the impact of electrified overhead infrastructures. From a system-level perspective, the integration of alternative energy sources on board rail vehicles has become a popular solution among rolling stock manufacturers. Surveys are made of many recent realizations of multimodal rail vehicles with onboard electrochemical batteries, supercapacitors, and hydrogen fuel cell systems. The ratings, technical features, and operating data of onboard sources are gathered for each application, and a comparison among different technologies is presented. Traction system architectures and energy-control strategies of actual multimodal units are explored and compared with literature research. Moreover, the maturity and potential of recent technologies and alternative topologies of power converters for multimodal traction systems are discussed. Ultimately, onboard storage systems are compared with other solutions for energy-saving and catenary-free operation, with particular focus on their current techno-economic attractiveness as an alternative to diesel propulsion."

Rebecca Thorne, Astrid H. Amundsen, Ingrid Sundvor, Battery electric and fuel cell trains: Maturity of technology and market status. TØI Report 1737/2019. Institute of Transport Economics (TOI), Oslo, November 2019, 42 p. [formato PDF, 1,8 MB]. "Athough most trains in Europe are powered by electricity from a third rail or overhead line, it is not always cost effective to electrify rail lines. In these cases, alternatives to diesel train population are batteries and fuel cells. Battery electric and hydrogen fuel cell technologies have developed significantly in recent years and multiple manufacturers are now investing in the development of battery electric and hydrogen fuel cell trains. Resultingly there have been an increasing number of these trains in operation, both for trials and commercial service. Changes in rail transport are not possible without the support of an adequate network, which must be highly planned. This is particularly important for hydrail, since no mass production of hydrogen for transport applications is yet in place. Nonetheless, with current focus on further implementation both in Norway and across Europe, the future is bright for these zero emission propulsion technologies."


TRASPORTO DI PERSONE

Commission "TET d'avenir", TET: agir pour l'avenir [Rapport Duron sur les trains d'équilibre du territoire (TET)]. Paris, 25 mai 2015, 117 p. [formato PDF, 2,45 MB].

Perspectives du système ferroviaire de transport de voyageurs. Faut-il mettre fin au développement de la grande vitesse à la française ?. (Les Carnets de TDIE). TDIE (transport développement intermodalité environnement), Paris, 2012, 10 p. [formato PDF, 1,62 MB]. "Entre les gains de vitesse, l'amélioration des capacités et les facilités de correspondance aux noeuds du réseau, il existe une gamme de réponses possibles en fonction des spécificités de chaque territoire, comme le démontre la diversité des solutions mises en oeuvre chez nos voisins européens. Pour spectaculaire qu'il soit, ce changement d'approche s'inscrit dans une évolution encore plus large et plus profonde : la proposition de mettre en chantier une planification intégrée et cohérente du système de transport."

Le transport ferroviaire de voyageurs sur le réseau ferré national français. Exploration d'un système complexe. Synthèse des connaissances. Bagneux, Service d'études sur les transports, les routes et leurs aménagements (Sétra), Septembre 2009, 93 p. [formato PDF, 3,48 MB]. "Le présent document rassemble ainsi, à l'intention des néophytes ou de ceux qui souhaiteraient approfondir leur connaissance du sujet, des éléments de base et plus détaillés permettant d'appréhender les composantes du système ferroviaire français de transport de voyageurs : un système technique, tout d'abord, dans lequel l'infrastructure, le matériel roulant et les modes d'exploitation ont été considérés jusqu'à maintenant comme étroitement interdépendants; un système d'acteurs, ensuite, privés et surtout publics, au coeur d'enjeux d'aménagement du territoire, sociaux, environnementaux et économiques, dont les interrelations permanentes s'inscrivent dans un cadre législatif et réglementaire particulier. Un système en permanente évolution et dont la photographie, ici détaillée pour l'année 2008, devrait connaître d'importantes évolutions dans les années à venir." Un ampio panorama sul trasporto ferroviario di persone in Francia: dati di base, regionalizzazione, infrastrutture e materiale rotabile, problemi di gestione.


SERVIZIO FERROVIARIO REGIONALE, PENDOLARI

Legambiente, Rapporto Pendolaria 2016. La situazione e gli scenari del trasporto ferroviario pendolare in Italia. Roma, gennaio 2017, 110 p. [formato PDF, 4,5 MB]. "Ogni giorno in Italia quasi 5,5 milioni di persone prendono il treno per spostarsi per ragioni di lavoro o di studio, un numero solo leggermente superiore al 2015 (+0,2%), quando i pendolari del treno erano 5,43 milioni (e 5,1 nel 2014). A crescere in maniera evidente sono, invece, le diseguaglianze tra le Regioni rispetto al numero di viaggiatori e alle condizioni del servizio offerto. È questo il dato saliente del rapporto Pendolaria 2016 di Legambiente: la sistuazione e gli scenari del trasporto pendolare ferroviario in Italia."

Massimo Procopio (Isfort S.p.A.), Servizi di trasporto ferroviario regionale – Il quadro nazionale. Relazione al Workshop "IV Pacchetto ferroviario e gare regionali", Roma, 18 giugno 2015, 5 p. [formato PDF, 157 kB].

Legambiente, Nuovi treni per città più vivibili. Come una cura del ferro può rendere più moderne e sostenibili le città italiane. Studio realizzato da Legambiente con il contributo di Ansaldo Breda. Roma, 2015, 38 p. [formato PDF, 3,05 MB]. Studio sulla situazione di treni regionali, metropolitane e tram nelle città italiane.

Legambiente, Rapporto Pendolaria 2014. La situazione e gli scenari del trasporto ferroviario pendolare in Italia. Roma, dicembre 2014, 110 p. [formato PDF, 4,10 MB].

Ennio Cascetta (Univ. Napoli Federico II), Il Trasporto Ferroviario Regionale: confronti internazionali e ruolo nel Sistema di Trasporto Pubblico. Presentazione al convegno FerroVie, Roma, 14.1.2014, 10 slides [formato PDF, 909 kB].

Legambiente, Rapporto Pendolaria 2013. La situazione e gli scenari del trasporto ferroviario pendolare in Italia. Roma, dicembre 2013, 93 p. [formato PDF, 5,52 MB].

Legambiente, Rapporto Pendolaria 2012. La situazione e gli scenari del trasporto ferroviario pendolare in Italia. Roma, dicembre 2012, 76 p. [formato PDF, 4,09 MB]. "Sono 2 milioni 903 mila le persone che, nel nostro paese, ogni mattina prendono il treno per andare a lavorare o a studiare. Ogni sera lo riprendono per tornare a casa. In 90.000 sulla Roma San Paolo-Ostia, in 75.000 sulla Roma Nord-Viterbo, 60.000 sulla Napoli-Torregaveta, 58.000 sulla Milano-Saronno-Lodi, 45.000 sulla Milano-Como-Chiasso, 30.000 sulla Padova-Venezia Mestre, per fare qualche esempio di linee frequentate da più passeggeri dell’Alta Velocità Roma-Milano. Passeggeri inesistenti, però, nel dibattito pubblico, come mette in evidenza Legambiente nel suo rapporto Pendolaria 2012. Cittadini di serie B per la politica nazionale dei trasporti, che da oltre dieci anni premia la strada a danno della ferrovia come ben dimostra la suddivisione dei finanziamenti della Legge Obiettivo 2002-2012: 71% delle risorse per strade e autostrade, 15% per le ferrovie e 14% per le reti metropolitane. Anche quest’anno, alla crescita costante del numero di pendolari in Italia governo e amministrazioni regionali hanno risposto con tagli ai servizi, aumenti del costo dei biglietti in tutte le regioni e incertezze sugli investimenti, con effetti rilevanti sulla qualità del servizio."

Jean-Marie Geveaux, Thierry Lepaon, L'ouverture à la concurrence des services ferroviaires régionaux de voyageurs. Conseil économique, social et environnemental (CESE), Paris, Juillet 2012, 138 p. [formato PDF, 3,92 MB]. "Le Transport Express Régional de voyageurs (TER) a connu grâce à la régionalisation un essor remarquable. Mais son coût tend à s’accroître et son développement paraît sous contrainte, alors que l’Union européenne a engagé une libéralisation progressive des transports ferroviaires. Dans ce contexte, le Premier ministre a demandé l’avis du CESE sur l’ouverture à la concurrence des transports régionaux de voyageurs, en particulier quant au périmètre géographique, à la propriété du matériel roulant, aux relations contractuelles entre région et exploitant, ainsi qu’à sa dimension sociale.Pour le CESE, la décision d’ouvrir, même à titre expérimental, les TER à la concurrence est politique et relève du gouvernement. Dans cet esprit, l’avis esquisse un chemin de réforme qui permette, via une expérimentation maîtrisée, d’avancer prudemment sur ce dossier sensible, en associant l’ensemble des parties prenantes. L’enjeu est en effet de maintenir, voire d’amplifier le succès de la régionalisation des TER, afin de favoriser la compétitivité et l’accessibilité des territoires, la mobilité des personnes, la préservation de l’environnement et le développement de la filière ferroviaire."

Legambiente, Rapporto Pendolaria 2011. La situazione e gli scenari del trasporto ferroviario pendolare in Italia. Roma, dicembre 2011, 71 p. [formato PDF, 4,20 MB]. "Meno 20% in Veneto, meno 13% nelle Marche, meno 12% in Liguria, meno 10% in Abruzzo e Campania: ecco solo alcuni numeri relativi ai tagli dei treni per i pendolari attuati nel 2011 nelle Regioni italiane che pure, negli ultimi due anni hanno visto aumentare le schiere degli utenti (+ 7,8%) raggiungendo quota 2 milioni e 830 mila. Numeri enormi che illustrano senza equivoci la misura in cui il disagio e le difficoltà per chi ogni giorno ha necessità di muoversi per raggiungere il proprio posto di lavoro o studio aumenteranno. Per fare esempi, vuol dire che i treni che ogni giorno attraversano Genova da Voltri a Nervi, dal 2007 ad oggi, sono passati da 51 a 37 mentre i 65 mila pendolari della linea romana da Fiumicino Aeroporto a Fara Sabina, già progettata per contenere il flusso di solo 50 mila viaggiatori giornalieri, vedono tagliati altri 4 treni; chi si muove tra Prato e Bologna ha dovuto rinunciare ad un quarto dei treni e chi viaggia tra Piacenza e Milano ha visto tagliare un terzo dei treni. E la situazione non migliorerà nel 2012, anzi: sono in programma ulteriori tagli. La manovra economica del Governo Monti ha infatti recuperato una parte del buco ereditato dal Governo Berlusconi nelle risorse per i treni pendolari, ma mancano ancora 400 milioni di euro per chiudere i bilanci 2011 e oltre 200 milioni per il 2012 se si vogliono garantire almeno i treni in circolazione. Per il 2013 si prevede di intervenire con un contributo sull’accisa, che però è ancora tutta da chiarire. Intanto aumentano i prezzi dei biglietti: +23,4% in Lombardia, + 25% in Abruzzo, + 20% in Liguria, tanto per citare i più eclatanti." Ampio dossier sul trasporto ferroviario locale in Italia, con tabelle sui costi, la spesa regionale per la gestione e l'acquisto di materiale rotabile, i problemi segnalati dai pendolari e le proposte di interventi sui nodi urbani, le realizzazioni più interessanti di nuove linee e nuovi servizi, l'integrazione tariffaria, il confronto con il resto d'Europa.

Yves Crozet, Christian Desmaris, Le transport ferroviaire régional de voyageurs: un processus collectif d’apprentissage. Recherche Transports Sécurité (RTS), 27, 3 (2011) 143-162 [formato PDF, 311 kB]. "Le transport ferroviaire régional de voyageurs se présente depuis la fin des années 90 comme une sorte d’exception française. C’est en effet un secteur où une réforme a été conduite sereinement et a connu un réel succès, sans doute car elle a été progressive et a pris le temps de l’expérimentation. Ainsi, après les 6, puis 7 régions expérimentatrices, qui se sont lancées en 1997 dans ce qui est encore un processus collectif d’apprentissage, ce sont l’ensemble des régions métropolitaines (Corse et Ile-de-France exceptées) qui sont entrées en janvier 2002 dans l’ère de la gestion décentralisée du transport régional de voyageurs. Aujourd’hui, nous avons le recul nécessaire pour évaluer ce processus d’apprentissage, son cheminement, ses résultats et ses perspectives. Une évaluation qui est, dans un premier temps, rétrospective, pour éclairer le jeu des acteurs et la nouvelle dynamique qui en a découlé, tant pour l’offre que pour la demande. Nous proposons ensuite une évaluation prospective car le succès même de la régionalisation invite à poursuivre le processus d’apprentissage, fut-ce en s’approchant de transformations qui relèvent sans doute plus de la discontinuité que de la continuité." "Regional rail passenger services are prevalent in France, as opposed to the more marginal role they play elsewhere in the world. It is indeed at the regional level that reforms have been successfully implemented, probably because the process was gradual and cautious. Initially in 1997, seven regions began experimenting with a decentralized system of regional passenger transportation services. By 2002, all metropolitan regions, with the exception of Corsica and Ilede- France, were involved. Today we have reached a point where this process can be retrospectively and prospectively assessed. This article is first an assessment of the role of actors and the emerging dynamic between regional passenger rail transport supply and demand. Then, a prospective is offered since regionalization is best understood as an ongoing learning process that can be discontinuous or continuous."

Legambiente, Rapporto Pendolaria 2010. La situazione e gli scenari del trasporto ferroviario pendolare in Italia. Roma, dicembre 2010, 54 p. [formato PDF, 1,36 MB]. Quinta edizione della campagna che difende i diritti dei pendolari e promuove la mobilità sostenibile.

Legambiente, Rapporto Pendolaria 2009. La situazione e gli scenari del trasporto ferroviario pendolare in Italia. Roma, dicembre 2009, 49 p. [formato PDF, 3,67 MB]. Il rapporto fa parte della campagna Pendolaria 2009, quarta edizione della campagna che difende il diritto alla mobilità dei cittadini pendolari.

Comitato Pendolari Gemona - Udine. Blog dedicato alle problematiche dei pendolari e dei viaggiatori della tratta ferroviaria Gemona - Udine.

Strade ferrate del FVG (ex "Pendolari ferroviari del Friuli Venezia Giulia"): un blog per conoscerci e per far conoscere le nostre esigenze.

Heike Link, Regional Rail Companies in Germany. Japan Railway and Transport Review n.52 (2009) 38-45 [formato PDF, 390 kB]. "Germany has a large number of railway companies in addition to the state-owned Deutsche Bahn AG (DB AG). This article describes the market and its latest developments after rail restructuring, focussing on the performance and problems of these smaller regional railway companies."

Pendolaria: rapporto di Legambiente sulla situazione del trasporto ferroviario pendolare in Italia. Le politiche, la spesa delle Regioni italiane per il servizio, gli investimenti per le infrastrutture. Roma, novembre 2008, 26 p. [formato PDF, 377 kB]. Il rapporto fa parte della campagna Pendolaria 2008, terza edizione della campagna che difende il diritto alla mobilità dei cittadini pendolari.

Ministero dei Trasporti, CENSIS, Pendolari d'Italia: scenari e strategie. Sintesi della ricerca. CENSIS, Roma, 14 marzo 2008, 20 p. [formato PDF, 153 KB]. "Negli ultimi anni la mobilità pendolare ha avuto un forte ciclo espansivo, legato soprattutto ai processi di diffusione abitativa che hanno cambiato profondamente le concentrazioni urbane in molte aree del Paese. Si tratta di un fenomeno complesso, in cui interagiscono fattori sociali, economici, ma anche aspetti urbanistici, infrastrutturali e relativi alla regolamentazione del trasporto pubblico e privato. L’analisi ha consentito di approfondire le motivazioni individuali, i modelli di mobilità, le opinioni e le propensioni, i disagi e le aspettative dei viaggiatori pendolari, combinando gli aspetti quantitativi del fenomeno con i profili qualitativi e comportamentali. Attraverso l’ascolto dei pendolari e con un quadro conoscitivo più puntuale e accurato si possono ricavare informazioni preziose per orientare le decisioni politiche." (necessaria registrazione gratuita sul sito del CENSIS)

Giuseppe Roma (CENSIS), Pendolari d'Italia: scenari e strategie. Intervento alla presentazione della ricerca. CENSIS, Roma, 14 marzo 2008, 23 slides [formato PDF, 218 KB]. (necessaria registrazione gratuita sul sito del CENSIS)

Ministero dei Trasporti, CENSIS, Indagine sul fenomeno del pendolarismo: gli scenari e le strategie. Sintesi della ricerca. CENSIS, Roma, 2007, 21 p. [formato PDF, 301 KB].

Giuseppe Roma (CENSIS), Indagine sul fenomeno del pendolarismo: gli scenari e le strategie. Presentazione, Roma, 27 novembre 2007, 14 slides [formato PDF, 55 KB].

Servizio ferroviario regionale Emilia-Romagna. Informazioni, orari, tariffe e altro.

Pendolari ER (Emilia-Romagna). Sito della Regione Emilia-Romagna con informazioni, orari, tariffe; con un forum e uno spazio per comunicati e notizie dai Comitati e Associazioni dei pendolari.

Andrés López Pita y Adrina Bachiller, La regionalización de los servicios ferroviarios: experiencia internacional. Ingeniería y territorio, n. 76, 2006 (Transporte ferroviario metropolitano y regional), p.70-75 [formato PDF, 362 KB]. Analisi dell'esperienza della regionalizzazione ferroviaria in Francia e in Germania, che hanno comportato un miglioramento dell'offerta e un aumento degli investimenti.

Six régions à l'épreuve des politiques de transport : décentralisation, régionalisation ferroviaire et différenciation territoriale. (Synthèse INRETS N°55), INRETS, Mars 2007, 233 p. [formato PDF, 1,44 MB]. Ampia e approfondita analisi dell'esperienza della regionalizzazione ferroviaria in Francia. La ricerca ha approfondito i casi concreti di 6 regioni, col loro nuovo ruolo di pianificazione, gestione e finanziamento dei trasporti ferroviari a livello regionale.

Legambiente, Pendolaria: Primo rapporto sul trasporto pendolare ferroviario nelle città italiane, Roma, novembre 2006, 19 p. [formato PDF, 336 kB].

Regione Lombardia, Il Piano di Sviluppo del Servizio Ferroviario Regionale. Milano, 2001, 95 p. [formato PDF, 4 files, totale 4,62 MB].


ALTA VELOCITA'

Andrea Giuricin, Roberto Tosatti, The history of Italo and the benefits of competition in the Italian HSR sector. CESISP Working Paper N. 6. CESISP (Centro di Ricerca in Economia e Regolazione dei Servizi, dell'Industria e del Settore Pubblico), Università di Milano-Bicocca, 2018, 28 p. [formato PDF, 1,8 MB]. "The purpose of this study, divided in three different parts, is to represent the evolution of the Italian high-speed railway (HSR) sector from the origin to the competition phase, focusing attention on the non-public competitor, Italo, recently became an American company. In the first part of the study will be provided a presentation about the liberalization of the Italian rail market under EU regulation. This theme will be address within a legal point of view. In the second part of the paper will be represent the evolution of the HSR sector in the country, from an infrastructural and economics point of view. In particular we will discuss about the development of the service until the competition phase. In the last part we will talk about the history of NTV and its service (Italo). We will talk about the origins and the current commercial situation. Lately we will analyse the results of its first 6 years of life, comparing the HSR sector before and after its entry and the benefits it produced."

David Banister (University of Oxford), Policy on Sustainable Transport in England: The case of High Speed 2. European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research (EJTIR), 18(3), 2018, pp.262-275 (14 p.) [formato PDF, 218 kB]. "T he achievement of sustainable transport is often a clearly stated objective of government policy, but in England there is no National Sustainable Transport Strategy (NSTS). This paper outlines the nature of sustainable transport arguing for a strategic approach that takes account of the means to reduce travel through substitution and shorter trips, as well as making best use of all modes and reducing reliance on carbon-based energy sources. It reviews the recent austerity phase of UK transport policy (2010-2015) where revenue support has been cut, but capital expenditure has increased, and it comments on the difficulties of making decisions on large scale transport infrastructure projects in the absence of a NSTS. The recent policy statements and initiatives on transport and sustainability are covered, looking backwards and forwards. It then takes the case of High Speed 2 (HS2) and identifies five main narratives in the debates over the arguments in support of this huge investment. It seems that sustainable transport has not been a central part of that debate, and there is a need to reframe the discussion on HS2, as part of a NSTS."

European Court of Auditors (Corte dei Conti Europea), A European high-speed rail network: not a reality but an ineffective patchwork. Special Report N. 19/2018. European Court of Auditors, Luxembourg, 2018, 103 p. [formato PDF, 9,1 MB]. "Since 2000, the EU has been investing €23.7 billion into high speed rail infrastructure. There is no realistic long term EU plan for high speed rail, but an ineffective patchwork of national lines not well linked since the European Commission has no legal tools and no powers to force Member States to build lines as agreed. Cost-efficiency is at stake, because not everywhere very high speed lines are needed, as the cost per minute of saved travel time is very high, going up to €369 million, and as the average speeds only amount to 45 % of the maximum capacity, while cost overruns and construction delays are the norm rather than the exception. Sustainability is low, effectiveness of the investments is lacking and EU added value is at risk with three out of seven completed lines having low passenger numbers leading to a high risk of ineffective spending of €2.7 billion EU co-funding. Moreover, nine out of 14 lines and stretches have insufficient high numbers of passengers, and 11 000 national rules still exist, although the Court already asked in 2010 to lift these technical and administrative barriers."

Mario Cavargna, Massimo Zucchetti, The High-Speed Rail Handbook: a Technical Guide. International Journal of Ecosystems and Ecology Science (IJEES), Vol. 8 (3): 515-530 (2018) (16 p.) [formato PDF, 644 kB]. "The project of the new railway line Turin Lyon is an exemplary case of unnecessary work. It should overlap a railway tunnel and an international railway line with modern features; traffic data show since 2000 a collapse of road and rail movements along the corridor Italian French interested; after 14 years of experimentation its modal transfer capacity has always given negative results; the new line would not be interoperable with the rest of the Italian and French network because it has its own, even different, links between the Italian and the French of the same line. The studies carried out on the energy consumption and CO2 production of the Turin Lyon in the construction phase, which requires the excavation of 42 million cubic meters of rock, and the management of energy consumption of the ventilation and refrigeration of the base tunnel, give a negative energy balance for the new work. Finally, because the size of the necessary works and their enormous cost would have very heavy effects on the environment and on the resources to be dedicated to the critical issues of the remaining national network and to the real needs of citizens."

Paolo Beria1, Daniel Albalate, Raffaele Grimaldi, Germà Bel, Delusions of success: costs and demand of high speed rail in Italy and Spain. Open Access. Conference paper, World Conference on Transport Research - WCTR 2016 Shanghai. 10-15 July 2016. Transportation Research Procedia(2017), 20 p. [formato PDF, 655 kB]. "Mismatches between forecasted and actual costs and traffic figures are common in transport investments, especially in large scale ones, and so are delusions on future demand. High-speed rail project are often among the worst practices for cost overruns and demand overestimation, even where traffic figures may tell a history of apparent success. In the paper, we analyse two significant cases of delusion of success, namely Italian and Spanish HSR programmes. The Italian one shows excellent demand performances, but is among the continental worst cases for construction costs. The Spanish one, recognised worldwide as one of the most successful cases, is the one where potential demand estimations was systematically neglected and the planned network appears largely out-of-scale compared to actual traffic. The two cases show that the core of the problem does not lay in the wrong estimations of costs and demand, but on deliberate choices of overinvestment, overdesign and overquality."

Paolo Beria, Raffaele Grimaldi (Politecnico di Milano), An ex-post cost benefit analysis of Italian High Speed train, five years after. (Working papers SIET 2016), SIET, 2016, 19 p. [formato PDF, 735 kB]. "The core of Italian HS rail plan is the Turin-Salerno line, in operation since 2009. The central segment Milan - Rome has been working well since the opening, with good demand figures quite in line with the later forecasts. The extremes of the line, namely the extensions to Turin and to Naples/Salerno has remained for long far less used. In 2012, unique case in Europe, a newcomer entered in the market and pushed a radical change in Trenitalia marketing, quality and pricing. This positive fact has fostered the market, with supply and demand dramatically increased, reduced fares and distributed benefits to the users, also in terms of new mobility practices. The paper aims at revising a former Cost Benefit Analysis exercise, produced just two years after line opening, in the light of the changed conditions. In particular, applying a similar methodology and estimating on the basis of third-party sources the current Origin-Destination demand matrix, we will recalculate the economic feasibility indicators. The cost-benefit analysis gives a marginally positive result in the most-likely case. To the contrary, extrapolating pre-competition trends without competition, gives a very negative result. In fact, we show that travel time benefits are a fraction of the cost. The largest benefits comes from the new demand, which in turn comes from increased frequency, from the introduction of mixed traditional/high-speed services and from the fall in prices due to the entrance of NTV."

Fausto Galli, Giuseppe Lubrano Lavadera, Marianna Marra, Does high speed railway impact airport efficiency? The Italian case. 57th Annual Conference of the Italian Economic Association, Milan, 20-22 October 2016, 32 p. [formato PDF, 532 kB]. "This paper investigates the impact of the development during the period 2003-2014 of High-Speed Railway (HSR) infrastru0cture on the efficiency of the overall airport system in Italy. The Italian case was selected for the peculiar characteristics of its travel infrastructure system. We employ a two stage estimation. Following Simar and Wilson (2007), in the first stage we implement data envelopment analysis (DEA) to obtain airport efficiency scores, which, in the second stage, are regressed with the variables of interest. We find evidence of a positive impact of HSR on airport efficiency, with airports located in the North of Italy and close to HSR performing better, while airports with no HSR are find to be inefficient. To support our argument, we provide robustness checks for the presence of international flights and low cost companies. The results of this study should help policy decisions about future investments to improve the efficiency of regional travel systems."

Alessandro Fantechi (a cura di), L'Alta Velocità e il "nodo" di Firenze: domande e risposte sulle nuove ipotesi. Associazione per gli studi sulla Mobilità ed i Trasporti in Toscana, Firenze, 22 agosto 2016, 13 p. [formato PDF, 1,9 MB]. " All'inizio di quest'estate importanti figure istituzionali hanno stimolato un vivace dibattito sui media riportando la notizia di un possibile ripensamento di Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane rispetto al progetto già in via di realizzazione di sotto attraversamento ferroviario della città di Firenze. La ristrutturazione del traffico ferroviario con la realizzazione del passante sotterraneo dei treni ad alta velocità e la stazione progettata da Foster & Arup aveva costituito la stella polare dell'idea di riorganizzazione della mobilità metropolitana per oltre un ventennio. La riunione del 21 luglio a cui hanno partecipato il Comune di Firenze, la Regione Toscana, Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane ed altri importanti enti ha avuto un esito interlocutorio e si attende da Ferrovie per settembre la presentazione di un nuovo piano guida. Per far chiarezza in un momento in cui sembra che i fraintendimenti e le interpretazioni errate possano prender piede AMT offre un contributo tecnico."

Ofelia Betancor, Gerard Llobet, Contabilidad Financiera y Social de la Alta Velocidad en España. (Estudios sobre la economía española 2015-08). Fedea (Fundación de Estudios de Economía Aplicada), Madrid, 20 de Marzo 2015, 61 p. [formato PDF, 2,03 MB]. "Este trabajo estudia la rentabilidad financiera y social de la alta velocidad ferroviaria en España. El análisis se realiza para los cuatro corredores en funcionamiento a finales de 2013. Ambos análisis son contrafactuales, es decir, toman como punto de referencia lo que habría sucedido en caso de no acometer estas inversiones. Asimismo ambos se realizan para un horizonte temporal de 50 años que nos lleva a utilizar como criterios de decisión el VAN financiero y social en términos de valor esperado y distribuciones de probabilidad. Asimismo para facilitar la interpretación de las cifras éstas se expresan en unidades monetarias del año 2013. La evaluación desde el punto de vista financiero se concentra en el concepto de beneficio empresarial, y por tanto estudia qué parte de los costes, incluyendo la inversión, se cubre con los ingresos de las empresas que gestionan los servicios y la infraestructura (RENFE y ADIF). Por otro lado el análisis de la rentabilidad social contrapone los beneficios derivados de las ganancias de tiempo, disposiciones a pagar de la demanda generada y costes evitados, con los costes de oportunidad de la inversión y la operación. Con la excepción del análisis financiero del corredor Madrid-Norte, los resultados muestran que se cubren los costes variables tanto en términos financieros como sociales. Sin embargo en ningún caso se cubre la inversión, lo que implica que, teniendo en cuenta los niveles de demanda, estas inversiones no son rentables ni para las empresas ni para la sociedad."

Daniel Albalate, Germà Bel (Universitat de Barcelona), La experiencia internacional en alta velocidad ferroviaria. (Documento de Trabajo 2015-02). Fedea (Fundación de Estudios de Economía Aplicada), Madrid, March 2015, 82 p. [formato PDF, 1,40 MB]. "El presente informe muestra que la alta velocidad es una tecnología de transporte con presencia internacional pero está enormemente concentrada en Europa occidental y Asia oriental, aunque existen importantes diferencias en cuanto a dotación. España destaca por su liderazgo en dotación de infraestructura una vez corregida por población, lo que contrasta con el escaso uso de la misma, muy por debajo del resto de redes de Alta velocidad (AV). La mayoría de experiencias contemplan, sobre todo en las primeras rutas desplegadas, una motivación de eficiencia con la eliminación de cuellos de botella y las ampliaciones de capacidad como elemento central para lograr ahorros en corredores densos. Otras redes, la minoría, se han justificado por motivaciones de integración política y vertebración, equidad o cohesión territorial. Las motivaciones de las distintas redes afectan al diseño de la red, la elección de rutas y a su funcionalidad. Los costes de la AV ferroviaria son enormes, tanto para su construcción, como en mantenimiento y operación. Los determinantes de los costes son la velocidad de diseño, la integración con las líneas convencionales, el uso mixto pasajeros-mercancías o exclusivo para pasajeros, la orografía del territorio y el valor de las expropiaciones en áreas urbanas. Esto comporta gran heterogeneidad en los costes unitarios de construcción entre los diferentes países. España se caracteriza por presentar unos costes por km comparativamente bajos, aunque sus cifras acostumbran a no incluir la inversión en estaciones y en expropiaciones. Sólo dos líneas de AV han conseguido lograr rentabilidad financiera clara: la Tokio-Osaka y la París-Lyon. Más recientemente, la Jian-Quingdao (China), presenta unos resultados positivos, aunque muy moderados. Estas rutas son enormemente densas y conectan grandes núcleos de población que se encuentran en distancias eficientes para la AV frente al transporte aéreo y al transporte por carretera. Los resultados en términos financieros acostumbran a ser pobres en el resto de las líneas, y empeoran a medida que la red se extiende a corredores con menor demanda."

Piers Connor (University of Birmingham), High Speed Railway Capacity. Understanding the factors affecting capacity limits for a high speed railway. International Conference on High Speed Rail, Birmingham, 8th December 2014, 9 p. [formato PDF, 1,38 MB]. "High Speed Rail is the new railway. Around the world, proposals for new high speed lines are booming. Many existing railway systems are experiencing ever increasing passenger and freight traffic and some routes are showing signs of stress, such as poor punctuality and overcrowding, often due to the capacity constraints of their systems. This is leading to calls in various countries for new high speed routes to be built to provide more railway capacity, with the added benefits of reduction in the pollution and congestion caused by cars on the roads and planes in the skies. These are laudable objectives but a big question is just how much capacity can a high speed rail route provide? Lots of numbers have been cast about in the hope of making a case for various high speed rail projects but not many of them are accurate and some are simply unrealistic. In this paper I look at the question of high speed railway capacity, with the case of the British HS2 project as an example and analyse the factors affecting capacity, including terminals, junctions, stations and rolling stock performance."

Min Chen, Hailong Tang, Kun Zhang (BeiHang University, Beijing, China), Some Critical Issues in the Development of Chinese High-Speed Rail: Challenges and Coping Strategies, Journal of Transportation Technologies, April 2014, 4, 164-174 (11 p.) [formato PDF, 838 kB]. Open Access. "In this paper, several critical issues related to Chinese high-speed rails (CHSR) are analyzed, investigated and discussed, including development background, reasons for high ticket fare, some typical factors that influence the environmental life-cycle assessment, time and cost comparison of typical door-to-door travel routes between different transport modes and complementary strategies among different transport modes. First, the results show that the expanding high-speed rail network increased the pressure on the country's roads in the 2010 spring festival rush period due to the high ticket fare of CHSR. Second, due to lower than expected ridership because of the high ticket price and limited demand in less developed areas, some Chinese CHSR projects have become economically unsustainable. Third, without sufficient ridership and service life, the utilization of HSR was unable to show any advantages in the environmental impact compared with the other transport modes. In addition, the impact of shock from CHSR on Chinese domestic civil airlines is evident when the travel distance is below 1050 km. The key objective of the investigation is to enhance our understanding of the development and operation of Chinese high-speed rail. One of the key contributions of the current paper is the presented suggestions for complementary strategies between different transport modes to make full use of Chinese transportation resources to promote low carbon economy."

M. Clerico, L.Giunti, L.Mercalli, M. Ponti, A. Tartaglia, S.Ulgiati, M. Zucchetti, Railway Related Impacts: the Turin-Lyon High-Speed Rail Case Fresenius Environmental Bulletin, (in print, 2014), 8 p. [formato PDF, 392 kB]. "One of the best known cases of struggle for the commons in Italy, characterized by bitter controversies over the last 20 years, is the popular opposition to the construction of the High Speed Railway line (HSR, “TAV” in Italian) between Turin and Lyon, designed to cross the Susa Valley (at the Italian-French border) and the Alps. This HSR project still carries, in spite of twenty years of continuous updating and reworking, a great deal of unsolved environmental and economic issues. An issue of insufficient cost-benefit balance has recently come to clear evidence, especially in view of the non-negligible passenger and freight traffic decrease along the Turin-Lyon direction. The most important aspects dealing with economic costs and claimed benefits, energetic considerations, legal constraints, environmental impact, health impact potential, and the negative experience of other projects, are discussed." Traduzione in italiano: Impatto ambientale della Nuova Linea Ferroviaria Torino-Lione.

Christopher Nash (Univ. of Leeds), When to Invest in High-Speed Rail. (Discussion Paper No. 2013-25). International Transport Forum, Paris, December 2013, 34 p. [formato PDF, 1,84 MB]. "High speed rail (HSR) is usually regarded as services operating at 250 kmph or more, and these invariably require construction of new purpose-built lines. According to the International Union of Railways (UIC), by 2012, a total of 13 000km of such lines had been built worldwide, half in Europe and half in Asia. China had the largest network at 3 426km, whilst Japan, France and Spain all had over 2 000km. There are plans for a further major expansion, with the European Commission calling for a trebling of the kilometrage in Europe by 2030.Yet high speed rail is an enormous investment, with a typical 500km line costing 6-12Bn euros in 2004 prices (Euros 12-24 Bn per km) (de Rus and Nash, 2009). It is necessary to consider very carefully in what circumstances such an outlay is justified. The first such line, the new Tokaido line in Japan, was clearly built with the twin aims of giving large time savings (and thus competing effectively with air transport) and relieving capacity constraints on the existing railway line. These were also clearly the motives behind the construction of the first TGV line from Paris to Lyons in France. But since then, wider motives have appeared, including reducing carbon emissions by diverting traffic from air and road, and promoting economic regeneration and growth. The first part of this paper will consider at a general level the costs and benefits of high speed rail, and evidence to date on what determines their magnitude. We will then consider specifically evidence from the current debate in Britain. The first High Speed Rail line to be built in Britain, from London to the Channel Tunnel, opened in 2004-7. Possible benefits of regeneration in East London played a significant role in the choice of route and in the appraisal of this line (later dubbed HS1). It was not until 2001 that the Strategic Rail Authority commissioned a study of the case for high speed rail linking London with cities to the North. This formed the basis of the current proposals for a line from London to Birmingham, branching near Birmingham to form lines going on to Manchester and Leeds (HS2). The government is committed to going ahead with this line, and is just starting parliamentary processes to obtain the powers to build it. However, the project is very controversial, and consequently an enormous effort has been put into studying its effects by both proponents and opponents. The evidence from these studies will be reviewed, before we draw our conclusions."

Yves Crozet (Univ. of Lyon), Performance in France: From Appraisal Methodologies to Ex-post Evaluation. (Discussion Paper No. 2013-26). International Transport Forum, Paris, December 2013, 37 p. [formato PDF, 1,71 MB]. "In the first part of the paper, we will present the main phases and the principal performance characteristics of the high-speed rail system in France. We will also explain the need to distinguish between high-speed train (TGV) and high-speed line (LGV). In the second part of the paper, we shall see that it is more accurate to talk about high-speed rail systems in the plural because there are other "models" in Europe which differ from the one developed by France. High-speed rail is not just a matter of technology; it also depends on the geography of the country, on the country's institutions and on its ability to master the art of project assessments."

Fumio Kurosaki (Institute of Transportation Economics, Tokyo), Shinkansen Investment Before and After JNR Reform. (Discussion Paper No. 2013-27). International Transport Forum, Paris, December 2013, 27 p. [formato PDF, 2,05 MB]. "As Shinkansen lines have been built in various markets in Japan over a half century, traffic volume varies greatly depending on the line. Based on published data, this paper examines the changes to high-speed rail transport and appraises its outcomes including the financial aspects of the operating companies."

Ginés De Rus (University of Las Palmas de G.C., University Carlos III de Madrid), Economic evaluation of the High Speed Rail. Revised (May, 2012), 93 p. [formato PDF, 1,10 MB]. This report is undertaken for The Expert Group on Environmental Studies (Ministry of Finance, Sweden). "Investment in high speed rail (HSR) infrastructure produces social benefits and costs. The potential benefits are basically time savings, higher reliability, comfort, safety and the release of capacity in the conventional rail network, roads and airport infrastructure. The costs are high, and sunk in a significant proportion; therefore, the social profitability of the project requires that HSR users’ and other beneficiaries’ willingness to pay is high enough to compensate the sunk and variable costs of maintaining and operating the line plus any other external cost during construction and project life. In Sweden there are now plans to build a high speed rail between the country´s two largest cities, Stockholm and Gothenburg. The distance between the cities is around 500 km. This is a standard medium-length line where the HSR develops its full potential. In this paper we conduct a cost-benefit analysis of the HSR lines for Madrid-Barcelona, Madrid-Seville and Stockholm-Gothenburg. The first one has been running for a couple of years and the second one since 1992, so we can evaluate their performance and increase our understanding of the potential social profitability of similar lines, like the Stockholm-Gothenburg where the investment decision has not been taken so far."

Håvard Bergsdal, Johan Pettersen, Christian Solli, Christine Hung, Carine Grossrieder and Johanne Hammervold (MiSA – Miljøsystemanalyse), Environmental analysis : Climate. Norwegian High Speed Railway Project, Phase 3. Final report. Version 2 (03.02.2012) including all alignments. Miljøsystemanalyse AS, Sandvika/Trondheim, February 2012, 116 p. [formato PDF, 3,92 MB]. "The Norwegian Ministry for Transport and Communications has mandated a national assessment for high-speed rail (HSR) in Norway. This study presents the greenhouse gas (GHG) projections for the Norwegian HSR assessment. A total of 12 HSR alignments are assessed. They are all quite different in terms of landscape, distances and type of market. High-speed rail is proposed as a GHG-reducing measure, as it may be operated on clean electric energy with low energy use per seat-km. However, the operation of HSR requires an initial investment in the construction of a HSR line. The benefit from HSR concepts therefore is a function of market shift by introduction of HSR and emission intensity in the competing transport alternatives, as well as the utilization rate of the built HSR line. This study aims to assess the net benefit for GHG emissions in kg CO2e. Results present the effect on GHG emissions over a 60 year assessment period, and time required to pay back the initial GHG investment in HSR infrastructure."

Paolo Beria, Raffaele Grimaldi (Politecnico di Milano), An Early Evaluation of Italian High Speed Projects (Una prima valutazione dell’Alta Velocità in Italia). TeMA Vol 4, No 3, settembre 2011, p. 15-28 (15 p.) [formato PDF, 794 kB]. "L’Italia ha affrontato, negli ultimi 15 anni, un eccezionale sforzo finanziario per costruire circa 1 000 km di linee ferroviarie ad alta velocità. Ulteriori estensioni sono attualmente in costruzione o sono state pianificate, in particolare sulle principali relazioni internazionali. Questa rete è comunemente considerata fondamentale nella visione europea di un sistema di trasporto continentale. Questo articolo analizza il passato ed il futuro di questa rete, laddove possibile da un punto di vista quantitativo. La prima parte dell’articolo ripercorre la storia del progetto Alta Velocità, soffermandosi in particolare sulle questioni relative alla regolazione degli investimenti ed alle vicende finanziarie nelle prime fasi ed alle questioni attuali relative alla regolazione dei servizi ferroviari. Nella seconda parte l’analisi dell’offerta, dei guadagni di tempo permessi, della domanda e dei costi permette di sviluppare una valutazione ex post – semplificata ma indipendente - dei progetti realizzati, sottolineandone i successi e le potenzialità ancora inespresse, ma anche le significative criticità. L’ultima parte dell’articolo analizza i piani di espansione futura, confrontando i costi, la domanda esistente e quella attesa. Tale analisi permette di derivare alcune indicazioni di politica dei trasporti e strategie di riduzione dei costi, al fine di controllare la spesa pubblica in un periodo di crisi, senza abbandonare l’idea di una rete ferroviaria moderna ed efficace." "Italy has undergone, in the last 15 years, an exceptional public financial effort to build approximately 1,000 km of high speed rail lines. Further extensions are under construction or planned, especially in the most important international relations. This network is widely considered as fundamental to comply the European vision of a continental-wide transport system. The paper analyses the past and the future of such network, where possible from a quantitative point of view. The first part of the article reviews the history of the Alta Velocità scheme, particularly focusing on the issues related to the economic regulation of the investments and the financial troubles at first and then on the present issues related to the regulation of rail services. The analysis of the supply, the time gains, the demand and the costs allows to build a simple but independent evaluation of the past projects from an ex-post perspective, pointing out the successes, but also important critical issues. The second part of the paper analyses the future expansion plans looking at the costs, the existing and expected demand and derives some policy indications and cost reduction strategies capable both to control public expenditure in a period of crisis and not to abandon the idea of a modern and effective rail network."

Mikhail Chester and Arpad Horvath (Univ. of California), Life-cycle assessment of high-speed rail: the case of California. Environ. Res. Lett. 5 (2010) 014003, 9 p. [formato PDF, 801 kB]. "The state of California is expected to have significant population growth in the next half-century resulting in additional passenger transportation demand. Planning for a high-speed rail system connecting San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Sacramento as well as many population centers between is now underway. The considerable investment in California high-speed rail has been debated for some time and now includes the energy and environmental tradeoffs. The per-trip energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, and other emissions are often compared against the alternatives (automobiles, heavy rail, and aircraft), but typically only considering vehicle operation. An environmental life-cycle assessment of the four modes was created to compare both direct effects of vehicle operation and indirect effects from vehicle, infrastructure, and fuel components. Energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, and SO2, CO, NOX, VOC, and PM10 emissions were evaluated. The energy and emission intensities of each mode were normalized per passenger kilometer traveled by using high and low occupancies to illustrate the range in modal environmental performance at potential ridership levels. While high-speed rail has the potential to be the lowest energy consumer and greenhouse gas emitter, appropriate planning and continued investment would be needed to ensure sustained high occupancy. The time to environmental payback is discussed highlighting the ridership conditions where high-speed rail will or will not produce fewer environmental burdens than existing modes. Furthermore, environmental tradeoffs may occur. High-speed rail may lower energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions per trip but can create more SO2 emissions (given the current electricity mix) leading to environmental acidification and human health issues. The significance of life-cycle inventorying is discussed as well as the potential of increasing occupancy on mass transit modes."

Sergio Ulgiati, Riccardo Basosi, High-Speed rail: misleading assessments and false solutions. Life Cycle Assessment and Energy Analysis / Alta Velocità ferroviaria: le valutazioni fuorvianti e false soluzioni. Valutazione del ciclo di vita e analisi energetica. September 2010, 6 p. [formato PDF, 68 kB].

Daniel Albalate, Germà Bel (Universitat de Barcelona), Cuando la economía no importa: auge y esplendor de la alta velocidad en España. Revista de Economía Aplicada, n.55, vol. 19, 2011, p. 171-190 [formato PDF, 750 kB]. "The great protagonist of the Spanish transport policy, High Speed Rail (HSR), has reached its greatest splendour to become, in late 2010, the largest HSR network of EU and OECD countries. However, the investment policy decisions have been taken in a context devoid of an open and rigorous debate and where economic analysis, which has obtained clear and robust results, has played a marginal role. The marginality of the effect of economic analysis on the investment policy is due to its almost exclusive emphasis on the financial aspects and the reluctance to address multidisciplinary elements that, in practice, have been commonly used as persuasive arguments for government’s network design. This paper provides an analysis in terms of objectives and actual effects of high speed projects, taking into account the multiple dimensions in order to complement the economic analysis by favouring its impact in the public policy debate. Among these multiple dimensions, we review the issues concerning the design and structure of the network, the economic costs and social return on investments, as well as the environmental and mobility impacts."

Lo sviluppo dell'alta velocità in Europa e nel mondo. (I quaderni dell'Ufficio Studi n.1). Nuovo Trasporto Viaggiatori S.p.A., Roma, febbraio 2011, 60 p. [formato PDF, 9,80 MB].

Chris Nash (Univ. of Leeds), When to Invest in High-Speed Rail Links and Networks?. (Discussion Paper No 2009-16). OECD/ITF, December 2009, 24 p. [formato PDF, 556 kB]. "Most successful applications of high speed rail seem to arise when there is both a need for more rail capacity and a commercial need for higher speeds. It seems difficult to justify building a new line solely for purposes of increased speed unless traffic volumes are very large, but when a new line is to be built, the marginal cost of higher speed may be justified; conversely the benefits of higher speed may help to make the case for more capacity. It follows from the above that appraisal of HSR will need to include assessment of the released capacity benefits for freight, local and regional passenger services and the changes in service levels on the conventional lines. It also follows that the case for HSR is heavily dependent both on future economic growth and on the assumption that demand for long distance passenger and freight transport will continue to increase. If long run economic recession, or environmental constraints prevent this from occurring then far less new HSR will be justified than in a =business as usual‘ scenario. Already the current recession will have at least delayed the case for some new lines, although increased government spending to reflate the economy may have the opposite effect. High speed rail is more successful at competing with air than car, and there is evidence for the widely quoted 3 hour rail journey time threshold (although this evidence predates the increased security and congestion at airports which is believed to have increased this threshold). Where rail journey times can be brought close to or below 3 hours HSR can be expected to take a major share of origin-destination aviation markets. Of the measured indirect benefits of HSR investment, congestion is the most significant. Relief of road congestion is, however, unlikely to be a major part of the case for high speed rail except where chronic congestion is spread throughout the day along much of the route. Relief of airport capacity through transfer of domestic legs from air to rail is potentially more important where capacity is scarce and expansion is difficult, costly and has a serious environmental impact, as in the case of Heathrow. Environmental benefits are unlikely to be a significant part of the case for high speed rail when all relevant factors are considered, but nor are they a strong argument against it provided that high load factors can be achieved and the infrastructure itself can be accommodated without excessive environmental damage. A key factor here is the approach to cities, where the choice may be between use of conventional tracks at reduced speed or expensive tunnelling. The issue of wider economic benefits remains one of the hardest to tackle; such benefits could be significant, but vary significantly from case to case, so an in depth study of each case is required. The breakeven volume of passengers to justify a new high speed line is very variable, ranging from 3m to 17m in the first year of operation under possible assumptions examined, but typically even under favourable conditions at least 9m passengers per annum will be needed. Whilst it appears that all the French high speed lines comfortably exceeded this volume, it is clear that some proposals are being developed where traffic is very much less dense (the Madrid-Seville line, for instance, carried less than 3m passengers in its second year of operation and is still only at around the 5m level). The most important variable in determining the breakeven volume is the construction cost, which varies enormously according to circumstances. It is important to consider network effects. The benefits of a high speed line may be maximised by locating it where it may carry traffic to a wide number of destinations using existing tracks beyond the end of the high speed line, whilst extensions to an existing network lead to greater benefits than isolated new lines by attracting increased traffic to the network as a whole. Obviously this implies technical compatibility between HSR and existing rail as a prime requirement."

Cristina Calenda, Loredana C. Travascio (Università degli Studi di Napoli Federico II), Gli effetti socio-economici e spaziali del servizio Alta Velocità: due casi a confronto. TeMA, vol. 1, n.1, marzo 2008, 91-100 (10 p.) [formato PDF, 988 kB]. English abstract. "The article analyses the high speed train from a spatial and socialeconomic point of view. It articulates in two parts. In the first, it focuses upon the effects of high speed line on organization of territory, both in terms of space-time convergence, placing particular emphasis on the tunnel effect, and in terms of the location of economic activities around the stations and variation of transport demand. In the second part are proposed two cases of study: Spain and Japan, where the effects of high speed rail were very interesting. In Spain the launch in 1992 of high speed service of Lanzaderas that connects Madrid-Puertollano-Ciudad Real, has favored the increase of commuters that travel every day to go and work among the three cities and has changed the hierarchy between these towns. In fact, the high speed rail is contributing to improve the role of Ciudad Real in comparison to Puertollano and it’s promoting a process of territorial integration between Madrid, Ciudad Real and Puertollano creating a discontinuous metropolitan area. In Japan, the high speed line (Shinkansen) has produced the increase of population in the towns which are stations of high speed lines in comparison to the others in the proximities of the railway line and to national rate of growth; and the increase of rates of occupation in the trade and in industries ten years after the construction of high speed lines in comparison to the cities without a high speed station."

Daniel Albalate, Germà Bel (Universitat de Barcelona), "High-Speed Rail: Lessons for Policy Makers from Experiences Abroad". (IREA Working Paper 2010/03). Institut de Recerca en Economia Aplicada Regional i Pública, Universitat de Barcelona, 2010, 34 p. [formato PDF, 704 kB]. "In April 2009 the US government unveiled its blueprint for a national network of high-speed passenger rail (HSR) lines aimed at reducing traffic congestion, cutting national dependence on foreign oil and improving rural and urban environments. In implementing such a program, it is essential to identify the factors that might influence decision making and the eventual success of the HSR project, as well as foreseeing the obstacles that will have to be overcome. In this article we review, summarize and analyze the most important HSR projects carried out to date around the globe, namely those of Japan, France, Germany, Spain, and Italy. We focus our attention on the main issues involved in the undertaking of HSR projects: their impact on mobility, the environment, the economy and on urban centers. By so doing, we identify lessons for policy makers and managers working on the implementation of HSR projects."

Ginés De Rus, Concepción Román (Universidad de Las Palmas), Análisis económico de la línea de alta velocidad Madrid-Barcelona. Revista de Economía Aplicada, n.42, vol. 14, 2006, p. 35-79 [formato PDF, 1,55 MB]. "La inversión en infraestructura de alta velocidad ferroviaria es de alto coste y de naturaleza irreversible; sus beneficios están sujetos a incertidumbre y la construcción de la red puede realizarse gradualmente. En estas circunstancias, la evaluación económica ex ante es especialmente valiosa porque los proyectos pueden retrasarse. La inversión pública en esta tecnología requiere estimar el coste inicial de construcción de la infraestructura y los flujos de beneficios y costes operativos esperados durante la vida del proyecto. En el flujo de beneficios netos debe incluirse, junto a la disposición a pagar de los usuarios, los ahorros derivados de la reducción de la congestión en el pasillo de tráfico afectado, así como los costes evitados gracias a la introducción de la nueva tecnología. Sobre la base de un modelo simplificado de evaluación económica para la línea Madrid-Barcelona, las estimaciones de las disposiciones a pagar de los individuos y de la estructura de costes, se han obtenido los niveles de demanda mínimos que se requieren para alcanzar un valor actual neto de la inversión positivo, bajo ciertos supuestos sobre la tasa de descuento, vida del proyecto, crecimiento anual de los beneficios netos, y generación de tráfico. La evaluación realizada se fundamenta en la estimación de modelos de demanda desagregados a partir de la información obtenida mediante encuestas en los corredores: Madrid-Zaragoza y Madrid-Barcelona. En el primer caso, con la alta velocidad en funcionamiento se ha estimado un modelo de elección modal basado en datos de preferencias reveladas de los usuarios de dicho corredor. En el segundo caso, el modelo es mixto preferencias declaradas/reveladas. Los datos de las preferencias declaradas se basan en un experimento de elección modal entre avión y tren de alta velocidad que incluye, además de los atributos de nivel de servicio típicos, variables latentes de confort y fiabilidad."

Francisco Javier Campos Méndez, Ginés De Rus Mendoza y Ignacio M. Barrón de Angoiti, El transporte ferroviario de alta velocidad: una visión económica. (Documentos de Trabajo, 3/2009). Fundación BBVA, Bilbao, Marzo 2009, 46 p. [formato PDF, 484 kB]. "Tras recopilar información sobre 166 proyectos de alta velocidad ferroviaria en todo el mundo, este documento de trabajo analiza algunas de las cuestiones empíricas más relevantes relacionadas con el desarrollo que ha tenido en los últimos años este nuevo modo de transporte. El estudio comienza discutiendo la definición económica de alta velocidad, identificando para ello los diferentes modelos de explotación ferroviaria que existen en la actualidad. A continuación, a partir de los parámetros más representativos de la misma, se realiza una estimación de los costes de la construcción de una línea de alta velocidad ferroviaria. El análisis se extiende posteriormente a los gastos de operación y mantenimiento, así como a los principales costes externos. Finalmente, se estudia la demanda y sus proyecciones futuras, particularmente en el contexto europeo y en el horizonte de 2020."

Javier Campos, La financiación de la alta velocidad ferroviaria en España desde la perspectiva del análisis económico. III Jornadas Internacionales sobre Ingeniería para Alta Velocidad, Córdoba, 24 de Junio de 2009, 15 slides [formato PDF, 888 kB].

Javier Campos, La financiación de la alta velocidad ferroviaria en España desde la perspectiva del análisis económico. "Paradojas de la Alta Velocidad", Córdoba, Junio de 2009, 22 p. [formato PDF, 530 kB]. "Este documento analiza, desde la perspectiva del análisis económico, la financiación de las inversiones en alta velocidad ferroviaria en España. El trabajo comienza evaluando el alcance y objetivo de dichas inversiones en el vigente Plan Estratégico de Infraestructuras de Transporte (PEIT) del Ministerio de Fomento y estudia las fuentes de financiación previstas en dicho plan para alcanzar dichos objetivos. Frente a la situación actual, en la que la realización de las distintas inversiones parece estar condicionada a la disponibilidad de financiación presupuestaria y/o ayudas comunitarias, este trabajo argumenta que un criterio fundamental para la evaluación de la aprobación y periodificación de dichas inversiones también debería ser la demanda esperada de cada proyecto, proponiéndose finalmente algunos mecanismos simples para implementar tal evaluación."

Klaus Ebeling, High-speed Railways in Germany. Japan Railway & Transport Review 40 (March 2005) p.36-45 [formato PDF, 1,47 MB].

Jan-Eric Nilsson, Roger Pyddoke, Höghastighetsjärnvägar – ett klimatpolitiskt stickspår (High-speed railways – a climate policy sidetrack). (VTI Rapport 655). VTI (Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute), Linköping, September 2009, 90 p. [formato PDF, 663 kB]. "Through all shades of political opinion there seems to be a perception that large-scale investments in high-speed railways is a climate policy necessity. Against this background this report studies whether “Götalandsbanan” – a high-speed railway between Stockholm and Göteborg via Skavsta, Jönköping and Landvetter – is a cost-effective way of reducing emissions of carbon dioxide. Our work is based on a report that the Swedish National Rail Administration commissioned from the WSP consultancy. Our examination of the supporting material that has been prepared leads to three main conclusions: • Investment in Götalandsbanan in the form studied is not socially cost-effective. This does not rule out that implementing other and less costly project forms could be justified. • Rail investments are not cost-effective climate policy instruments. The reason is that despite great investment costs it is only possible to affect a very small part of carbon dioxide emissions from the transport market. One way of illustrating this conclusion is that the benefit must be SEK 8 per kilo carbon dioxide that the project would contribute to eliminating, for the project’s cost-effectiveness to be changed from minus to plus. This corresponds to a petrol price of more than SEK 30. • The economic analysis of Götalandsbanan that has been presented by the Swedish National Rail Administration is of a high standard in many respects. Nonetheless, some shortcomings remain. We have pointed out deficiencies in statistical reporting of rail transport, calculations of initial capital expenditure and calculations of the costs of accidents, environmental impact and wear as well as corresponding taxes. It is not a good state of affairs to approve investments in the region of SEK 100 billion on the basis of analyses that are unclear on these points. Consequently, results reporting must be developed to make the decision-making data more transparent. This applies to both analyses of Götalandsbanan and infrastructure projects in general." [English summary].

Federal Railroad Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation, Vision for High-Speed Rail in America. High-Speed Rail Strategic Plan, April 2009, 28 p. [formato PDF, 1,98 MB]. "President Obama proposes to help address the nation's transportation challenges by launching a new and efficient high-speed passenger rail network in 100-600 mile corridors that connect communities across America. The Strategic Plan outlines the President’s vision that would transform the nation’s transportation system by rebuilding existing rail infrastructure while developing a comprehensive high-speed intercity passenger rail network through a long-term commitment at both the federal and state levels. This plan draws from the successful highway and aviation development models with a 21st century solution that focuses on clean, energy-efficient rail transportation. Building on the plan, the FRA has prepared Interim Program Guidance that makes grant funds available for the High-Speed Intercity Passenger Rail Program. High-speed rail (HSR) is a family of transportation options that address longer-distance passenger transport needs in heavily populated corridors. Implementing HSR will promote economic expansion (including new manufacturing jobs), create new choices for travelers in addition to flying or driving, reduce national dependence on oil, and foster urban and rural livable communities. With the successful completion of the original phases of the Northeast Corridor (NEC) Transportation Project offering Amtrak's 150 mph train service, known as “Acela,” between Washington, New York, and Boston, efforts have expanded beyond the NEC. A number of high-speed rail corridors are being planned by States that range from upgrades to existing rail lines to entirely new rail lines exclusively devoted to 150 to 250 mph trains."

Randal O'Toole, Policy Report. Why Ohio Should Not Build High-Speed Rail. Columbus OH, Buckeye Institute for Public Policy Solutions, June 2009, 24 p. [formato PDF, 2,22 MB]. "In February 2009, Congress dedicated $8 billion of stimulus funds to high-speed rail projects. In April 2009, President Obama released his high-speed rail “vision” for America, which includes 8,500 miles that the Federal Railroad Administration (FRARA) had identified as potential high-speed rail routes in 2001. In June, the FRARA announced its criteria for states to apply for high-speed rail grants out of the $8 billion in stimulus funds. Yet the FRA has no estimates how much high-speed rail will ultimately cost, who will ride it, who will pay for it, and whether the benefits can justify the costs. A realistic review shows that high-speed rail will be extremely costly and will add little to American mobility or environmental quality. The best available data indicate that the FRA plan will cost about $90 billion, or roughly one-fifth the inflation-adjusted cost of the Interstate Highway System. This plan will provide trains with average speeds of 140-150 miles per hour (mph) in California, 75-85 mph in Florida, and moderate-speed trains averaging 55-75 mph in Ohio and 30 other states. The average American will ride these trains less than 60 miles per year, or about 1/70th as much as the average American travels on interstate freeways. In fact, most of the taxpayers who pay for high-speed trains will rarely or never use them. Because of a premium fare structure and downtown orientation, the main patrons of high-speed trains will be the wealthy and downtown workers, such as bankers, lawyers, and government officials, whose employers pay the fare. A true high-speed rail system, with average speeds of 140-150 mph connecting major cities in 33 states, would cost well over $500 billion. Meeting political demands to close gaps in the system could bring the cost close to $1 trillion. At twice the cost of the Interstate Highway System, such a true high-speed rail system would provide less than 1/10th the mobility offered by the interstates. These costs include only the projected capital costs. States that decide to build moderate- or high-speed rail may be responsible for cost overruns, operating losses, and the costs of replacing and rehabilitating equipment about every 19 years. Upgrading the 450 miles of Ohio tracks in the FRARA plan to run trains at 110 mph would cost taxpayers close to $1.6 billion, or nearly $140 for every Ohio resident. Subsidizing passenger trains over those routes will cost more than $30 million per year. Yet the average Ohioan will take a round trip on such trains only once every 17 years. Far from being an environmental savior, high- and moderate-speed trains are likely to do more harm to the environment than good. In intercity travel, automobiles are already as energy-efficient as Amtrak, and the energy efficiencies of both autos and airliners are growing faster than trains. The energy cost of constructing new high-speed rail lines will dwarf any operational savings. As the state of Florida concluded in 2005, “the environmentally preferred alternative is the No Build Alternative.” To add insult to injury, the administration is likely to require states that accept high-speed rail funds to regulate property rights in a futile effort to discourage driving and promote rail travel. These regulations will deny rural landowners the right to develop their land while they make urban housing unaffordable and disrupt neighborhoods through the construction of high-density housing. For all of these reasons—high costs, tiny benefits, and interference with property rights—Ohio should not attempt to provide high-speed rail service. Instead, it should use its share of the $8 billion stimulus funds solely for incremental upgrades, such as safer grade crossings and signaling systems, that do not obligate state taxpayers to pay future operations and maintenance costs."

Toshiji Takatsu, The history and future of high-speed railways in Japan. Japan Railway & Transport Review 48 (August 2007) p.6-21 [formato PDF, 4,94 MB].

Ginés de Rus and Chris Nash, In what circumstances is investment in High Speed Rail worthwhile?. (ITS Working Paper 590). Institute of Transport Studies, University of Leeds, February 2007, 34 p. [formato PDF, 711 kB]. "By High Speed Rail (HSR) we normally mean rail technologies capable of speeds of the order of 300km ph on new dedicated track. Such systems offer journey times that are more competitive with other modes, and particularly air, than traditional train services, and very high capacity. But their capital cost is also high. The proposals of the European Commission for the Trans European Transport Network (TEN-T) envisage expenditure of 600b euros, of which 250b euros is for priority projects, and a large part of this expenditure is for high speed rail. Thus it is extremely important to have a robust appraisal methodology for these huge investments. It is not clear that this has happened in the case of the Trans European Networks. Individual projects are suggested by, and appraised by, member state governments, even though they are applying to the European Commission for assistance with funding. Research for the European Commission has appraised the TEN-T network as a whole, but has not appraised the individual elements of the programme to ensure that they are all worthwhile (TML, 2005). The aim of this paper is to consider the methodology for the appraisal of high speed rail proposals, and to produce some indication of the circumstances in which such proposals might be worthwhile. In the next section we present an overview of the principal costs and benefits which need to be taken into account in an HSR appraisal. Then we illustrate the process for two particular contrasting examples – the study of HSR proposals in Great Britain, and an ex post evaluation of the Madrid-Seville line in Spain. In section four of the paper we formulate a model to incorporate the principal parameters influencing the outcome of an appraisal and in section five we use this model to draw conclusions on the circumstances in which high speed rail may be justified."

Javier Campos, Ginés de Rus, Ignacio Barrón, Myths and facts about high-speed rail around the world: an empirical approach. 4th Annual Conference on Railroad Industry Structure, Competition and Investment, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, October 19-21, 2006, 32 p. [formato PDF, 788 KB]. Interessante confronto dei costi infrastrutturali e operativi delle linee ad alta velocità ferroviaria.

Rete Ferroviaria Italiana, Rete AV/AC : analisi dei costi. Marzo 2007, 39 slides [formato PowerPoint, 2,83 MB]. (Analisi presentata il 27.03.2007 in audizione al Senato e scaricabile dal sito della senatrice Anna Donati). Analisi dei costi delle linee di alta velocità/ alta capacità realizzate e in costruzione in Italia, confrontati con i costi delle linee costruite in Francia e Spagna.

Ignacio Barrón de Angoiti, Alta Velocidad: servicios regionales e interconexión de redes. Ingeniería y territorio, n. 76, 2006 (Transporte ferroviario metropolitano y regional), p.76-85 [formato PDF, 788 KB]. Analisi delle caratteristiche e della rete di alta velocità in Europa e Giappone.


MAGLEV, TRENI A LEVITAZIONE MAGNETICA

Eckert Fritz, Johannes Klühspies, Roland Kircher, Michael Witt, Laurence E. Blow, Energy Consumption of Track-Based High-Speed Transportation Systems: Maglev Technologies in Comparison with Steel-Wheel-Rail. Research Series Volume 3. The International Maglev Board, November 2018, 30 p. [formato PDF, 869 kB]. Public Full-Text. "Energy consumption is an important criterion of the total operating costs. This paper compares the secondary energy demand of different wheel-rail systems, such as ICE, TGV and Shinkansen, with maglev systems, such as Transrapid and Chuo Linear Shinkansen. From a scientific point of view, a fair and objective comparison is needed, without any distortion of results. Therefore, a comparison of energy values based on "normative usable areas" inside the high-speed systems will be introduced and evaluated in this paper. The results give ranges of expected energy demand of different systems dependent on maximum speed level: Up to the design speed of wheel-rail systems there are slight advantages in terms of energy consumption for the Transrapid maglev. But, as a whole, energy consumption cannot be seen as major advantage of high speed maglev systems over conventional steel-wheel-rail, when compared at same speeds."

Kazuo Sawada (Railway Technical Research Institute), Magnetic Levitation (Maglev) Technologies. 1. Superconducting Maglev Developed by RTRI and JR Central. Japan Railway & Transport Review 25 (2000) 58-61 [formato PDF, 1,28 MB].

Munenobu Murai and Masao Tanaka, Magnetic Levitation (Maglev) Technologies. 2. Normal-conducting HSST Maglev. Japan Railway & Transport Review 25 (2000) 61-67 [formato PDF, 1,28 MB].

J. Paul Elhorst and Jan Oosterhaven (Univ. of Groningen), Integral cost-benefit analysis of Maglev projects under market imperfections. Journal of Transport and Land Use, 1 (2008) 65–87 [formato PDF, 700 kB]. "This article evaluates a new mode of high speed ground transportation, the magnetic levitation rail system (Maglev). The outcomes of this evaluation provide policy information on the interregional redistribution of employment and population and the national welfare improvement of two Dutch urban-conglomeration and two Dutch core-periphery projects. This article also compares the results of an integral cost- benefit analysis with those of a conventional cost-benefit analysis and concludes that the additional economic benefits due to market imperfections vary from –1% to +38% of the direct transport benefits, depending on the type of regions connected and the general condition of the economy." Questo studio accurato conclude che i costi d'investimento e di gestione di possibili linee ferroviarie a levitazione magnetica nei Paesi Bassi non verrebbero coperti dalle entrate nè verrebbero compensati dalla riduzione di costi esterni.

Urban Maglev Technology Development Program, Colorado Maglev Project. Executive Summary of Final Report. Federal Transit Administration, Washington, DC, June 2004, 59 p. [formato PDF, 2,62 MB]. "The overall objective of the urban maglev transit technology development program is to develop magnetic levitation technology that is a cost effective, reliable, and environmentally sound transit option for urban mass transportation in the United States. This project will include the design of an urban maglev system and the development and demonstration of advanced hardware subsystems to verify advanced technology aspects of proposed system concepts. The system design may be derived from integrating existing subsystem technologies (to create a new system) or by improving an existing system using advanced technologies. The Colorado Maglev Project represents the prototype system design for a full-scale maglev system in the U.S."


LIBERALIZZAZIONE, PRIVATIZZAZIONE

Andrea Giuricin, Roberto Tosatti, The history of Italo and the benefits of competition in the Italian HSR sector. CESISP Working Paper N. 6. CESISP (Centro di Ricerca in Economia e Regolazione dei Servizi, dell'Industria e del Settore Pubblico), Università di Milano-Bicocca, 2018, 28 p. [formato PDF, 1,8 MB]. "The purpose of this study, divided in three different parts, is to represent the evolution of the Italian high-speed railway (HSR) sector from the origin to the competition phase, focusing attention on the non-public competitor, Italo, recently became an American company. In the first part of the study will be provided a presentation about the liberalization of the Italian rail market under EU regulation. This theme will be address within a legal point of view. In the second part of the paper will be represent the evolution of the HSR sector in the country, from an infrastructural and economics point of view. In particular we will discuss about the development of the service until the competition phase. In the last part we will talk about the history of NTV and its service (Italo). We will talk about the origins and the current commercial situation. Lately we will analyse the results of its first 6 years of life, comparing the HSR sector before and after its entry and the benefits it produced."

Gunnar Alexandersson, Staffan Hultén, Jan-Eric Nilsson, Roger Pyddoke, The liberalization of railway passenger transport in Sweden – Outstanding regulatory challenges. (CTS Working Paper 2012:5). Centrum för Transportstudier (CTS), Stockholm, 2012, 24 p. [formato PDF, 174 kB]. "The purpose of this paper is to describe Sweden’s recent reforms to open the railway passenger markets to entry, and to addresses four critical issues for the success of the reforms; the allocation of infrastructure capacity, the provision of maintenance and terminal facilities, the access to rolling stock and the provision of information and ticketing to travelers. The analysis shows that the legislation and regulatory tools that are needed to handle these challenges to a large extent remain to be developed."

Jean-Marie Geveaux, Thierry Lepaon, L'ouverture à la concurrence des services ferroviaires régionaux de voyageurs. Conseil économique, social et environnemental (CESE), Paris, Juillet 2012, 138 p. [formato PDF, 3,92 MB]. "Le Transport Express Régional de voyageurs (TER) a connu grâce à la régionalisation un essor remarquable. Mais son coût tend à s’accroître et son développement paraît sous contrainte, alors que l’Union européenne a engagé une libéralisation progressive des transports ferroviaires. Dans ce contexte, le Premier ministre a demandé l’avis du CESE sur l’ouverture à la concurrence des transports régionaux de voyageurs, en particulier quant au périmètre géographique, à la propriété du matériel roulant, aux relations contractuelles entre région et exploitant, ainsi qu’à sa dimension sociale.Pour le CESE, la décision d’ouvrir, même à titre expérimental, les TER à la concurrence est politique et relève du gouvernement. Dans cet esprit, l’avis esquisse un chemin de réforme qui permette, via une expérimentation maîtrisée, d’avancer prudemment sur ce dossier sensible, en associant l’ensemble des parties prenantes. L’enjeu est en effet de maintenir, voire d’amplifier le succès de la régionalisation des TER, afin de favoriser la compétitivité et l’accessibilité des territoires, la mobilité des personnes, la préservation de l’environnement et le développement de la filière ferroviaire."

Ugo Arrigo e Vittorio Ferri, La separazione delle reti ferroviarie. Insegnamenti per l’Italia dalle riforme di Svezia e Gran Bretagna. (IBL Special Report). Istituto Bruno Leoni, Torino, maggio 2012, 48 p. [formato PDF, 1,27 MB]. "I paesi che hanno liberalizzato i trasporti ferroviari e separato proprietariamente l’infrastruttura dall’erogazione del servizio hanno visto crescere l’efficienza del servizio e aumentare i passeggeri. L’Italia è l’unico paese, assieme a Portogallo e Grecia, ad aver osservato una contrazione del traffico passeggeri tra il 1994 e il 2011."

Inge Vierth (VTI), 15 years deregulated rail freight market – lessons from Sweden. European Transport Conference 2011, Glasgow, Scotland, UK, 10–12/10/2011, 20 p. [formato PDF, 470 kB]. "Sweden was one of the first countries to implement the current EU policy for rail freight. Rail infrastructure and running services were separated in 1988. The rail freight market was deregulated in 1996 (the market for not tendered passenger services was opened recently). The national Swedish rail company was commercialised and split into companies for passenger transport (SJ AB), freight transport (Green Cargo AB), real estate and maintenance etc. in 2001. A regulatory body has been established in 2004. The EU rail freight market was completely opened in 2007. An extensive follow up of the intramodal competition in the Swedish rail freight market since 1996 has been carried out with help of literature, agencies' statistics, operators' annual reports and interviews with operators, shippers and authorities. As far as possible developments in the market sectors for kombi trains, system trains, wagonload trains resp. national versus international services are analysed. It is shown which operators started freight transport services, which got bankrupt and which are still in business. Today fifteen operators offer freight transport services. They are owned public and/or private bodies from Sweden and other countries. The market share of new entrants is limited. In 2009 the Green Cargo concern, Green Cargo AB and three daughter companies, stood for about 84 per cent of the total turnover. The incumbents' revenues decreased during the recession while new operators could increase their incomes. It is shown that efficiency in terms of tonne-km per employee, turnover per employee, tone-km per wagon etc. has increased since 1996. New types of services have been developed, especially for kombi and system trains. The prices for rail and road transports have followed each other quite well. The rail share in the freight market has been relatively constant, in contrast to the EU-level where rail has lost market share since 1996. However, the profitability of the rail freight companies is relatively poor. Return on capital is in most cases below ten per cent. Companies' solidity and their ability to withstand losses are generally low. Potentials and remaining obstacles for competition are analysed. Operators see problems regarding access to common facilities and services such as appropriate access to the infrastructure that is shared with passenger services, access to tracks and transhipment services in kombi-terminals. Other barriers are the limited competition in the markets for shunting/marshalling and maintenance of the rolling stock. Access to rolling stock and staff seems to be a minor problem. The existence of economies of scale and sunk costs can also be barriers for new entrants. In this context the limited size of the Swedish market is important. For the time being the development of the rail freight markets in other European countries (Germany, Netherlands, UK) are studied and comparisons with the outcomes form the follow up of the deregulation of the Swedish rail freight market are planned. The experience from Sweden may have some lessons for other countries."

Daniel Albalate del Sol, Maria Lluïsa Sort García, Universitat de Barcelona, La liberalización del ferrocarril de mercancías en europa: ¿éxito o fracaso?. (Documentos de Trabajo No 592). Fundación de las Cajas de Ahorros, Madrid, abril de 2011, 40 p. [formato PDF, 313 kB]. "Tras años de caída en la cuota de mercado del transporte de mercancías por ferrocarril en la mayoría de los países de la Unión Europea, se han impulsado medidas de Política Económica destinadas a la mejora del desarrollo de éste modo de transporte. El objetivo del presente trabajo es evaluar, en términos de cuota de mercado y con la estimación de un pool de datos para 20 países de la Unión Europea para el período 1997-2007, el impacto de dicha política. Los resultados obtenidos son, principalmente, que la separación entre la gestión de la infraestructura y la operadora ha conllevado mejoras en la cuota de mercado del ferrocarril, mientras que la total apertura de los derechos de acceso a la infraestructura, la ha hecho disminuir."

Rafael Lalive, Armin Schmutzler, Entry in Liberalized Railway Markets: The German Experience. Review of Network Economics, vol. 7, n.1, March 2008, 37-52 [formato PDF, 112 kB]. "In Germany, competitive franchising is increasingly being used to procure passenger railway services that were previously provided by a state monopolist. This paper analyzes 77 tenders that differ with respect to network size, service frequency, contract duration and the proximity to other lines that are already run by competitors of DB Regio, a subsidiary of the successor of the former state monopolist. Our analysis shows that competitors are more likely to win small networks and more recent auctions. Other controls such as contract duration and the adjacency to other lines run by entrants are insignificant."

Gunnar Alexandersson, Staffan Hultén (Stockholm School of Economics), The Swedish Railway Deregulation Path. Review of Network Economics, vol. 7, n.1, March 2008, 18-36 [formato PDF, 116 kB]. "This paper deals with railway deregulation and related reforms by means of a case study of Sweden, studying the 1988 split of railway infrastructure from operations and the subsequent steps of vertical and horizontal disintegration to a market characterized by decentralization and intra-modal competition. We also analyze the current market situation, in terms of the actors and their roles, and industrial organization measures. This assessment is used to discuss the sustainability of the current regulatory structure, concluding that although it seems more sustainable than in the past, regulators will sooner or later have to deal with some of its inconsistencies."

Javier Campos (University of Las Palmas, Spain), Recent Changes in the Spanish Rail Model: the Role of Competition. Review of Network Economics, vol. 7, n.1, March 2008, 1-17 [formato PDF, 149 kB]. "After a brief historical overview of its main achievements, this paper examines some of the most relevant characteristics of the Spanish rail system and its performance in recent years. It particularly focuses on the new organizational model emerging from the 2003 Railroad Law which, after January 2005, introduced vertical separation and competition in the traditional monopolistic structure of this sector. Although it is early to fully evaluate the results of this change, some interesting lessons can be learnt for countries following the same model."

Johanna Ludvigsen, Oddgeir Osland (Institute of Transport Economics TOI), Liberalisation of Rail Freight Markets in the Old and New EU-Member States. European Journal of Transport and Infrastructure Research, 9(1), March 2009, 31-45 [formato PDF, 194 kB]. "This article examines whether the European Commission succeeded in reducing the negative socio-environmental externalities of road transport in Northern, Central and South-eastern Europe by introducing the First Infrastructure Package and Interoperability Directive that opened rail freight markets to competition. Using results from the EC-sponsored REORIENT project, the article searches for causal links between the completeness of legislative adherence and the occurrence of market rivalry. In so doing, it draws on the New Public Management (NPM) theorem which provided conceptual underpinnings for liberalisation policy and the notion of path-dependency warning that effectiveness of any public policy is contingent on the features of its implementation context. The article contrasts the adoption of rail deregulation directives by the old and rich EU-states in the Nordic region with the newly liberated, more recent EU-members in Central and South-eastern Europe in order to expose how the political, economic and cultural features of these countries affected the quality of legislative compliance and market rivalry. This method unearthed a clearly polarised picture of inter-country compliance and competition pattern. Norway, Sweden and Finland exhibit high levels of legal adherence without however, much intra-rail competition. Cut-off from the government subsidies, these countries’ state railways compete today with road operators, without however facing much rivalry from truckers. On the other hand, the new EU-members still lag on legislative conformance, but their licensing authorities granted operating permits to quite many private entrants. These carriers compete fiercely with the national incumbents, but the rail service quality they provide does not as yet threaten the dominance of truck in national freight transport. As a result, no inter-modal competition exists there. These findings indicate that liberalisation of rail freight market has not as yet reduced the road-rail imbalance in European freight markets nor curbed the negative socio-environmental externalities associated with motorised transport. Methodologically, this article exposed the analytical shortcoming of the NPM theorem and the strong empirical relevance of the path-dependency hypothesis."

A.S. Fowkes and C.A. Nash (Univ. of Leeds), Rail privatisation in Britain - lessons for the rail freight industry. In: ECMT Round Table 125 "European Integration of Rail Freight Transport", 2004, 33 p. [formato PDF, 611 KB]. "Until 1994, the rail industry in Britain – as in most of Europe – was organised in the form of a single integrated state owned company providing passenger and freight services, and the infrastructure on which they ran, throughout the country. It is true that significant reforms did take place in the 1980s, grouping rail services into a number of sectors (Inter City, London and South East and regional passenger, and trainload, distribution and parcels for freight) with their own objectives, management and accounts (Nash, 1988). Also activities such as hotels and rolling stock manufacture were hived off and privatised. However, by the early 1990s the government was determined to go further and privatise the entire rail network. After much debate about options they determined on a pattern that had come to be seen as the norm for network industries – a regulated monopoly infrastructure provider with competitive operators using it. The infrastructure was placed in the hands of a new infrastructure company, Railtrack, which levied charges to cover its costs and was subsequently privatised. Operations were divided into a number of separate companies and also privatised. However, for a mixture of good and bad reasons they were not willing – at least initially – to leave the question of what passenger services would be provided at what charges up to the market. Thus passenger services were franchised out, with franchise requirements as to minimum levels of service and regulation of some fares. In the case of freight services, the approach of the government had long been that services should be run on commercial principles, with specific subsidies for flows of traffic which would otherwise use road and where this would impose sufficient social costs that the subsidy was justified. This was essentially the approach carried through into privatisation. Thus the policy for freight was to implement complete open access for any licensed train operating company, and to seek to create a number of competing freight operating companies by splitting up and privatising the former freight business of British Rail. This paper will proceed as follows. First, the history of rail freight privatisation in Britain will be charted, sector by sector. It will be seen that there has been relatively little entry into the industry, and the reasons for that will then be explored. The particular issues of the price and availability of track access, and of the availability of government grants will then be discussed. Prospects for the rail freight business in Great Britain are then considered. Finally we draw together some lessons which may be learned for other countries embarking on the privatisation and/or deregulation of rail freight. An appendix presents detailed estimates of trends in rail and road freight in Great Britain."


TRASPORTO DI MERCI

Julien Harache, Fret ferroviaire: analyse des déterminants des trafics français et allemand. (Études et documents N.87). Commissariat général au développement durable, La Défense, Juillet 2013, 26 p. [formato PDF, 491 kB]. "L’Allemagne est souvent citée en exemple pour le dynamisme de son transport ferroviaire de marchandises. En effet, près de deux décennies après sa transition d’un statut public à un statut privé, la Deutsche Bahn a réussi à faire connaître à sa branche fret ferroviaire une forte croissance sur ces dix dernières années. De son côté, le fret ferroviaire français a connu une forte décroissance depuis 2000, le volume transporté étant pratiquement divisé par deux pour atteindre en 2010 son niveau historique le plus bas, avant de connaître une légère remontée en 2011. Devant ce constat, il est apparu intéressant de chercher à identifier les facteurs de réussite du transport ferroviaire de marchandises à travers une étude comparative."

The RETRACK Project – Reorganization of Transport Networks by Advanced Rail Freight Concepts. Final report. TNO, Delft, November 2012, 56 p. [formato PDF, 5,45 MB]. "TNO and its project partners in the European FP7 RETRACK project have succeeded in their task to realize a fully privately owned and operated international “open” rail freight service across Europe. The service runs on a corridor between the Benelux and Hungary. The project has demonstrated that new train services can compete with incumbent rail operators and road freight in terms of speed and attract cargo on the basis of availability, frequency and reliability without recourse to deep pricing discounting to secure business."

Laetitia Dablanc, Patrick Nierat, Cécile Ruby, Gunnar Knitschky, Barbara Lenz, Pierre Zembri, EvalOFP. Evaluation d’expérimentations d’opérateurs ferroviaires de proximité. Rapport Final. (Prédit GO5. Convention ADEME-INRETS n°0866C0132). INRETS, Noisy le Grand, Octobre 2010, 147 p. [formato PDF, 5,41 MB].

José Blanco, Plan estratégico para el impulso del transporte ferroviario de mercancías en España. Ministerio de Fomento, Madrid, 14 de septiembre de 2010, 58 slides [formato PDF, 9,82 MB].

Hans Kaspar Schiesser, Manual Schienengüterverkehr Schweiz. Eine Einführung für die Praxis, Politik und Medien. (VöV_Schriften_07). Verband öffentlicher Verkehr VöV, Bern, Oktober 2009, 150 p. [formato PDF, 5,91 MB]. Un panorama del trasporto merci su ferro in Svizzera e nel mondo: tecnologie, mercato, quadro istituzionale e politica dei trasporti.

Autoroutes maritimes et ferroviaires. Critères de choix par les entreprises pour le transport non accompagné. Rapport d’études. Bagneux, Service d'études sur les transports, les routes et leurs aménagements (Sétra), Septembre 2007, 47 p. [formato PDF, 1,26 MB]. "Cette étude pilotée par le Sétra propose une réflexion sur les critères de pertinence du transport routier non accompagné pour le transport de marchandises sur moyenne et longue distance. L’objectif est de comprendre, à travers les enseignements tirés des expériences d’utilisateurs actuels, comment et sous quelles conditions un transporteur routier est prêt à utiliser un service de transport non accompagné." Lo studio analizza gli esempi dell'autostrada del mare Toulon-Civitavecchia e l'autostrada ferroviaria alpina Aiton-Orbassano.

Enrico Musso, Movimento delle merci nei porti italiani e ruolo del trasporto ferroviario. Relazione a "Sistema portuale e sistema ferroviario", Taranto, 9 novembre 2004, 24 slides [formato PDF, 420 KB].

Inhibitors to the Growth of Rail Freight. Research Project carried out for the Scottish Executive by the Road Haulage Association Ltd. Scottish Executive, Edinburgh, September 2007, 13 p. [formato PDF, 696 KB]. "This report outlines the findings of a research study into the opportunities for multi-modal shift of freight from our roads and onto rail. The study was funded on the basis of its potential to support Scottish Ministers’ policy of transferring freight onto more environmentally friendly rail, or waterborne, alternatives. In particular, the study sought to establish how easy or difficult it might be for any of the small companies (with fleets of less than 50 HGVs) that predominate Scotland’s road haulage industry to use rail as an alternative, and more environmentally friendly, mode of freight transport. In this report of their study, the authors argue that by combining the strengths of the road haulage and rail freight industries, there would be advantages for road hauliers, rail freight operators and their customers, in addition to environmental benefit." Il rapporto mette in evidenza i limiti delle compagnie di trasporto ferroviario scozzesi in termini di flessibilità, completezza del servizio e costo, il che rende molto difficile assorbire traffico merci dal trasporto su strada, e cita diversi casi di "prove" effettuate da aziende scozzesi con risultati negativi. Secondo l'associazione dei trasportatori stradali, servono anche in Scozia aziende intermodali specializzate come Hupac, Cemat ecc., mentre le attuali aziende di trasporto ferroviario non sono all'altezza del compito che il governo scozzese vorrebbe loro affidare, cioè il trasferimento dalla strada alla rotaia.

Allan G. Woodburn (Univ. of Westminster), The non-bulk market for rail freight in Great Britain. University of Westminster Eprints, 2006, 32 p. [formato PDF, 278 KB]. (published in: Journal of Transport Geography, 14 (2006) 299-308).

Gruppo CLAS, Research on the rail freight market in Italy. January 2003, 51 p. [formato PDF, 1,03 MB]. Una panoramica abbastanza dettagliata del mercato del trasporto ferroviario merci in Italia negli anni '90.


DOCUMENTI

Yves Crozet, Paolo Beria, Heike Link, Thierry Vanelslander, The Promises of European Rail. Report. Centre on Regulation in Europe (CERRE), Brussels. June 2023, 116 p., [formato PDF, 4,6 MB]. "Rail transport is presented within the European Union as a major lever in the decarbonisation of transport. It is indeed one mode of transport which is not heavily dependent on fossil fuels, and which is characterised by increasing returns. In terms of greenhouse gas emissions and pollutants, but also in terms of accidents, space consumption and negative effects on biodiversity, it is the most environmentally friendly mode of transport. However, despite these obvious advantages for passengers and freight, the development of European rail transport faces the equivalent of the glass ceiling. This report, led by Yves Crozet with the support of Paolo Beria, Heike Link and Thierry Vanelslander, identifies several challenges and highlights important gaps between the ambitions Europe has for its rail sector and the policies and financing required to meet them. On this basis, the report presents policy recommendations and ideas for new forms of financing, drawing from national case studies on Belgium, France, Germany, and Italy."

Garrett Fullerton, C. Tyler Dick (University of Illinois), Operational Considerations of Transitioning to Emerging Ultra-Low Emission Locomotive Technologies for Heavy-Haul Freight Rail Applications, IHHA 2015 Conference, 21 - 24 June 2015, Perth, Australia, 10 p. [formato PDF, 251 kB]. "To reduce transportation emissions in certain urban areas, railways in North America may be faced with the challenge of integrating dedicated regional fleets of alternative fuel locomotives into the mainline heavy-haul freight rail network. Regional fleets of alternative technology locomotives introduce various operational issues as locomotive exchanges are added to mainline train runs through urban areas. Four potential technologies to reduce emissions are examined from an operational perspective: diesel-electric with after treatment, liquefied natural gas, diesel hybrid with battery tender cars, and electrification. Each technology is applied to three case studies of heavy-haul bulk unit train operations into an urban area with emissions restrictions. Each scenario involves different commodities and shipment distances. The emissions, energy use, energy cost, and fleet size required for each scenario are presented to illustrate the impact of limiting rail interoperability on the heavy-haul freight rail industry in North America."

Ugo Arrigo e Giacomo Di Foggia, L'alta velocità della spesa pubblica ferroviaria. Un contributo alla spending review. (IBL Special Report). Istituto Bruno Leoni, Torino, marzo 2014, 34 p. [formato PDF, 614 kB]. "Qual è, e quale è stato in un arco temporale ampio, l'onere complessivo per le finanze pubbliche italiane derivante dal trasporto ferroviario? È stato ed è maggiore o minore rispetto agli altri paesi, tenuto conto delle diverse dimensioni delle reti e del traffico? Si può, in un'ottica di spending review, ridurlo? I governi che si sono succeduti sono riusciti a controllare questa spesa e a indirizzarla verso obiettivi di efficienza, crescita del settore, riequilibrio modale? Quale contributo ha dato la spesa pubblica per le ferrovie alla formazione del debito pubblico italiano? Poiché la risposta a nessuna di queste domande è nota, il presente studio si è posto l’obiettivo di ricostruire i sussidi pubblici complessivi erogati nell'ultimo quarto di secolo al trasporto ferroviario in cinque grandi paesi europei: Italia, Gran Bretagna, Germania, Francia e Svezia. Obiettivo principale è di valutare la congruità dei trasferimenti concessi nel caso italiano in rapporto a casi europei confrontabili in un'ottica di contenimento e razionalizzazione della spesa pubblica, di miglioramento dell'efficienza complessiva del sistema e anche di tutela della concorrenza in un mercato che presenta, almeno da un punto di vista legislativo, segmenti pienamente liberalizzati. La spesa pubblica ferroviaria dell'Italia nei 21 anni trascorsi dalla trasformazione di FS in società per azioni (1992-2102) è stata enorme: 207,7 miliardi di euro, di cui 84,8 di parte corrente e 122,8 in conto capitale, ricostruiti sommando i dati storici, senza alcuna rivalutazione monetaria. Essi corrispondono a una media annua di 9,9 miliardi, valore che rappresenta una quota notevole del deficit pubblico annuale dell'Italia. Nello stesso arco temporale la spesa ferroviaria francese è stata di 153,6 miliardi, ma il settore ferroviario francese è il doppio di quello italiano per dimensioni dell’infrastruttura e più che doppio per il livello del trasporto passeggeri. La spesa ferroviaria britannica è stata invece di soli 69,3 miliardi di euro, un terzo di quella italiana, nonostante la rete britannica sia della stessa lunghezza di quella italiana e il traffico trasportato praticamente uguale nell'intero periodo considerato. Anche il confronto con la Germania conferma l'eccesso di spesa dell'Italia. Il dato tedesco, disponibile solo per i 9 anni compresi tra il 2002 e il 2010, ammonta a 88 miliardi totali (contro gli 85 dell'Italia nello stesso periodo) che corrispondono in media a 9,8 miliardi annui. Ma il settore ferroviario tedesco è due volte e mezza quello italiano."

Arne Beck, Heiner Bente, Martin Schilling, Railway Efficiency: An Overview and a Look at Opportunities for Improvement. (Discussion Paper No. 2013-12). International Transport Forum, Paris, May 2013, 44 p. [formato PDF, 1,32 MB]. "Railway efficiency is a topic of interest worldwide for railway managers operating in competitive markets and for fiscally strained governments. Several recent studies indicate that European railways differ in terms of their efficiency. Based on a comparison with some major non-European railway systems, our analysis provides further evidence that significant efficiency gaps exist. Indeed, some railways have managed to achieve a high level of efficiency while others, for reasons controlled by management and/or government, can be classified as relatively inefficient. Key efficiency benchmarking indicators, further evidence through interviews with railway efficiency experts and additional research confirm the existence of railway efficiency gaps between railways. Differences in asset utilization, staff productivity, freight rates, and cost/revenue ratios are all key indicators highlighted in this discussion paper that further prove this point. Moreover, our analysis brought further evidence for why these efficiency gaps exist. Regulations and infrastructure constraints, such as regulations that impact freight train length, have a major impact on efficiency. New technologies are also a central driver of railway efficiency, as effective technology allows for improved and more effective maintenance of assets, better communication with customers, and automation of processes. In general, the reasons for efficiency gaps vary widely across countries and depend on nation or region-specific factors. Further levers to efficiency that can be implemented by government and regulatory bodies include opening the rail market to competition and providing steady, reliable funding for rail improvements that improve public mobility and air quality. It is also critical that the government and railway managers clearly define the role as chiefly a business or as an organization with the primary purpose to support public priorities (mobility, environmental and social priorities)."

Jean-Louis Bianco, Claude Sardais, Ludovic Espinasse, Recommandations pour réussir la réforme du système ferroviaire. Ministère de l'écologie, du développement durable et de l'énergie, Paris, avril 2013, 22 p. [formato PDF, 2,07 MB]. "M. Jean-Louis Bianco a été chargé par le gouvernement d'une mission de concertation sur le projet de réforme du système ferroviaire français, de manière à permettre la préparation d'un projet de loi. Depuis 1997, le système ferroviaire est caractérisé par la séparation de Réseau ferré de France (RFF), propriétaire de l'infrastructure, et de la SNCF, gestionnaire d'infrastructure délégué, en charge de la maintenance du réseau et de la gestion des circulations. L'auteur étudie les modalités de création d'un GIU (gestionnaire d'infrastructure unifié) en charge de l'ensemble des fonctions de gestion de l'infrastructure, et rattaché à la SNCF via un pôle public ferroviaire."

Jacques Auxiette, Un nouveau destin pour le service public ferroviaire français : les propositions des régions. Avril 2013, 69 p. [formato PDF, 3,27 MB]. "Parallèlement à la mission de Jean-Louis Bianco, Jacques Auxiette, président de la commission transports de l'Association des régions de France, a été chargé de formaliser les attentes et les propositions des régions en tant qu'autorités organisatrices pour les services régionaux de voyageurs."

Railway Handbook 2012. Energy Consumption and CO2 Emissions. International Energy Agency, International Union of Railways, Paris, 2012, 116 p. [formato PDF, 32,1 MB]. "In this book you will find the result of the harmonization of the UIC energy/CO2 railway database with the IEA world energy balances (IEA, 2011a) and CO2 from fuel combustion (IEA, 2011b) databases. The publication is composed of a European part, followed by a selection from Non-European countries where partial data were available".

Gerardo Marletto (Univ. di Sassari), I nuovi tunnel ferroviari del Frejus e del Gottardo: un confronto politico-istituzionale (The New Railway Tunnels of Frejus and Gothard: a Political and Institutional Comparative Analysis). TeMA, Journal of Land Use, Mobility and Environment, Vol 4, No 4, dicembre 2011, p. 69-78 (10 p.) [formato PDF, 336 kB]. "Le nuove gallerie ferroviarie del Frejus e del Gottardo hanno caratteristiche tecnico-economiche simili. Ma, mentre il nuovo San Gottardo è in costruzione e dovrebbe entrare in esercizio nel 2017, il progetto del nuovo Frejus è fermo alle fasi preliminari. Le ragioni di questa differenza sono da attribuire al diverso schema istituzionale e politico in cui le due grandi opere si inseriscono. Il tunnel svizzero è parte di un vasto disegno di politica dei trasporti, finalizzato al potenziamento del trasporto ferroviario e allo spostamento del traffico dalla strada alla ferrovia, anche grazie all’introduzione di una nuova tassa sul traffico stradale di merci. Tale disegno è stato sostenuto da ben tre referendum confermativi. Il tunnel italiano non è integrato in nessuna politica nazionale dei trasporti e si inquadra solo parzialmente nella politica europea dei trasporti e nel Protocollo sui trasporti della Convenzione delle Alpi: esso infatti non è affiancato da misure per lo spostamento del traffico dalla strada alla rotaia. Solo in Francia l'approvazione del progetto ha previsto il ricorso a meccanismi consolidati di partecipazione; in Italia il tardivo – e non sempre coerente – ricorso a tali meccanismi non è stato sufficiente per fronteggiare la persistente opposizione al progetto." "Projects of the two new railway transalpine tunnel of Frejus and Gothard have similar technical characteristics: an identical length (57 km), a similar cost (10 billion Euros) and the existence of a highway along the same Alpine corridor. But, whilst the new Gothard is now under construction and should become operational in 2017, the new Frejus is at standstill at preliminary phases and has faced a very strong local opposition on the Italian side of the Alps. This difference can be explained by analysing the political and institutional framework of the two projects. The new Swiss tunnel is integrated into a national scheme of transport policy which is based on: the development of a new system of railway infrastructures, which features two new transalpine tunnels (the new Gothard and the Loetschberg); the implementation of a distance-related heavy vehicle fee, which is levied on the basis of total weight, emission level and the kilometres driven; the provision of financial resources to stimulate the transfer of transalpine freight from road to railway. The approval of such a scheme started twenty years ago: it was based on a constitutional decree, implemented through several Federal acts and supported by three confirmatory referenda. The new French-Italian infrastructure is not integrated in any transport policy scheme. The new tunnel is only partially consistent with the overall goals of the European transport policy and the Transport Protocol of the Alpine Convention (which has not yet been ratified by the Italian Parliament): actually no action for modal shift is envisaged. Moreover, the new tunnel was initially supported by a structured consultative and participative procedure – based on the ‘débat public’ technique – only in France. In Italy this megaproject was not backed by an effective deliberation process, neither at the local nor the national level; on the contrary: it was considered among the strategic projects of the so-called ‘Legge obiettivo’ and therefore it could bypass the ordinary administrative procedures (and the otherwise mandatory environmental impact assessment). The late creation of a consultative committee (the so-called ‘Commissione Virano’) and the implementation of participative procedures have not been always consistent and has not proved valid to stop the fierce opposition to the project."

Il pedaggio delle reti ferroviarie in Europa. (I quaderni dell'Ufficio Studi n.2). Nuovo Trasporto Viaggiatori S.p.A., Roma, ottobre 2011, 160 p. [formato PDF, 15,70 MB]. "In conclusione a noi sembra che con questo Quaderno 2 sia stato con chiarezza evidenziato che il pedaggio per l’utilizzo delle reti ferroviarie rappresenta ben di più di uno strumento economico-finanziario: è di fatto un fondamentale strumento di politica dei trasporti, mediante il quale indirizzare l’andamento del mercato ferroviario sia sul lato dell’offerta (monopolio o concorrenza) sia sul lato della domanda (competizione tra modalità di trasporto). Non è superfluo ricordare che tutti i paesi del nord Europa, pur appartenenti a differenti tradizioni culturali e politiche (dal liberismo britannico alle socialdemocrazie scandinave), quando si sono ritrovati al crocevia del mercato hanno sempre scelto negli ultimi decenni di avviarsi sulla strada della concorrenza, raggiungendo in tal modo la meta di un significativo rilancio del trasporto ferroviario, oggettivamente dimostrato dalla crescita della sua quota modale."

Annita Serio, Sergio De Lazzari e Marcello Martinez (a cura di), Il treno. Regole, rete e servizi per i cittadini: un'utopia?. Federmobilità, Roma, 9 maggio 2011, 15 p. [formato PDF, 293 kB].

Michael Holzhey, Schienennetz 2025/2030. Ausbaukonzeption für einen leistungsfähigen Schienengüterverkehr in Deutschland (La rete ferroviaria nel 2025/2030. Proposta di espansione per un efficiente trasporto merci su rotaia in Germania). (Texte 42/2010). Umweltbundesamt, Dessau-Roßlau, August 2010, 180 p. [formato PDF, 35,3 MB]. "Die vorliegende Studie ermittelt den Neu- und Ausbaubedarf für das deutsche Schienennetz unter der Zielvorgabe der UBA-Strategie, 213 Mrd. tkm im Schienengüterverkehr 2025 absorbieren zu können." "A tailor-made eleven-billion-euro investment programme would put the German rail network in a position to double the present rail freight volume within the next two decades. The programme is detailed in a study done by the KCW GmbH on behalf of the Federal Environment Agency."

Marcello Martinez e Antonella Oliva, Rail focus 2010 : Rail Industry Monitoring. (Rapporti CESIT 2010). Cesit - Centro Studi sui Sistemi di Trasporto Carlo Mario Guerci, Napoli, 2010, 42 p. [formato PDF, 661 kB]. Il rapporto comprende una parte sui progetti di alta velocità ferroviaria negli USA e in Russia e una sui progetti di light rail in Francia e Gran Bretagna (in lingua italiana).

Per Kageson, Environmental aspects of inter-city passenger transport. (Discussion Paper No 2009-28). OECD/ITF, December 2009, 27 p. [formato PDF, 526 kB]. "Many governments in different parts of the world are investing in high speed rail. Some of them do so thinking that it will be an important part of climate change mitigation. Intercity traffic over medium distances is particularly interesting in the environmental context as it constitutes the only transport segment where aircraft, trains, coaches and cars naturally compete for market shares. This report calculates the effect on emissions from building a new high speed link that connects two major cities located 500 km apart. It assumes that emissions from new vehicles and aircraft in 2025 can be used as a proxy for the emissions during a 50 year investment depreciation period. The emissions from the marginal production of electricity, used by rail and electric vehicles, are estimated to amount on average to 530 gram per kWh for the entire period. Fuels used by road vehicles are assumed to be on average 80 percent fossil and 20 per cent renewable (with a 65% carbon efficiency in the latter case). Traffic on the new line after a few years is assumed to consist to 20 per cent of journeys diverted from aviation, 20 per cent diverted from cars, 5 per cent from long-distance coaches, and 30 per cent from pre-existing trains. The remaining 25 per cent is new generated traffic. Under these assumptions would the investment result in a net reduction of CO2-emissions of about 9,000 tons per one million one-way trips. Assuming 10 million single journeys per year, the total reduction would be 90,000 tons. When the price of CO2 is $40 per ton, the socio-economic benefit of the reduction would amount to $3.6 million, which is very little in the context of high speed rail. The sensitivity analysis shows that alternative assumptions do not significantly change the outcome. One may also have to consider the impact on climate change from building the new line. Construction emissions for a line of this length may amount to several million tons of CO2. There is no cause to prohibit investment in high speed rail on environmental grounds so long as the carbon gains made in traffic balances the emissions caused during construction. However, marketing high speed rail as a part of the solution to climate change is clearly wrong. Investment in infrastructure for modal shift should only be considered when traffic volumes are high enough to carry the cost. The principal benefits of high speed rail are time savings, additional capacity and generated traffic, not a reduction of greenhouse gases."

Hirohiko Kakinuma (JR Hokkaido), Development of Dual Mode Vehicle and its Effects. Japan Railway and Transport Review n.51 (2009) 28-39 [formato PDF, 1,07 MB]. "The JR Hokkaido DMV is a modified microbus that runs on both roads and rails. Attempts to build such a vehicle have been a transport dream for about 75 years. The system as a whole is composed of the DMV vehicle operating on roads and rails, the mode interchange system for changing between road and rail quickly, and the traffic control system managing DMV operation. Development of the overall system is ongoing at the Dual mode Transport System (DTS)." I primi risultati della sperimentazione a Hokkaido di un minibus dotato di doppie ruote (strada/ferrovia).

La gare contemporaine. Rapport à M. le Premier Ministre de Mme Fabienne Keller, sénatrice du Bas-Rhin. Paris, 10 mars 2009, 298 p. [formato PDF, 8,73 MB]. "Dans le cadre de la mission qui lui a été confiée par le Premier ministre sur le concept de gare contemporaine, Fabienne Keller recommande notamment de mettre en oeuvre : un plan d'information multimodale pour les voyageurs en gare, un "Grand Plan des petits travaux" pour faciliter le quotidien des usagers, des investissements importants à court et moyen terme pour aménager les "Grandes Gares", avec un plan spécifique pour l'Ile-de-France."

Chieh-Hua Wen, Chih-Huai Lin, Sheng-Jun Peng (Feng Chia University), Reforming conventional rail services to compete against high speed rail. Journal of the Eastern Asia Society for Transportation Studies 7 (2007) 1844-1858 [formato PDF, 280 kB]. "The Taiwan high speed rail (HSR) system is anticipated to begin operation in 2007. As expected, when the HSR joins the intercity transport market, the conventional rail (CR) in Taiwan will receive severe competition from HSR, particularly for medium- and long-distance trips. The objective of this paper is to develop an intercity mode choice model that can be used to evaluate the impact of changes in CR services in response to the new HSR. Stated preference techniques and discrete choice models were employed to identify important variables influencing intercity passenger choice of the HSR, CR and other intercity modes. The empirical results indicate that travelers are more sensitive to the changes in travel cost than in travel time. The potential market for CR in the medium- and long-distance ranges is non-business travel. A declining distance-based fare structure is particularly useful to attract non-business travelers."

Rickard Persson (VTI), Tilting trains. Description and analysis of the present situation. A literature study. (VTI rapport R595A). VTI, Linköping, 2007, 98 p. [formato PDF, 1,22 MB].

Andrea Debernardi, Lineamenti strategici per lo sviluppo della rete ferroviaria del Friuli Venezia Giulia. Versione 1.1. Giugno 2008, 40 p. [formato PDF, 3,34 MB]. Studio redatto per il WWF Italia. "Questa breve relazione, redatta a seguito della partecipazione dell’autore al Gruppo Tecnico Istruttorio istituito dalla Regione per esaminare la tratta mediana della nuova linea (Ronchis-Ronchi Sud)1, nasce come libero contributo per la definizione di un orizzonte programmatico orientato al potenziamento del sistema di trasporto ferroviario secondo una logica integrata, a livello regionale, nazionale ed internazionale. In tal senso, essa prende in esame le prospettive di evoluzione del sistema sia a breve che a medio-lungo termine, tentando di ricostruire uno schema di relazioni funzionali atte a definire il ruolo dei singoli interventi in rapporto a successivi rafforzamenti dell’offerta ferroviaria, sia merci che passeggeri. Vista la loro natura eminentemente “culturale”, le riflessioni presentate travalicano volutamente i confini regionali ed anche nazionali, assumendo un’ottica di integrazione dei servizi di trasporto ferroviario a scala internazionale, con riferimento non solo ai grandi corridoi europei, ma anche alle problematiche emergenti nell’area transfrontaliera giuliano-slovena. In quanto tale, il contributo fa propri diversi spunti emergenti dalla programmazione di settore slovena, spesso ispirata ad un utile pragmatismo, tale da bilanciare le suggestioni relative ai grandi corridoi continentali ed agli interventi strategici di lungo periodo, tipiche della politica di settore italiana, con la preoccupazione per la concreta attuazione di interventi di potenziamento localizzati, già a breve ed a medio termine."

Javier Campos (Univ. of Las Palmas), Recent Changes in the Spanish Rail Model: the Role of Competition. Review of Network Economics, Vol.7, Issue 1, March 2008, 1-17 [formato PDF, 149 kB]. "After a brief historical overview of its main achievements, this paper examines some of the most relevant characteristics of the Spanish rail system and its performance in recent years. It particularly focuses on the new organizational model emerging from the 2003 Railroad Law which, after January 2005, introduced vertical separation and competition in the traditional monopolistic structure of this sector. Although it is early to fully evaluate the results of this change, some interesting lessons can be learnt for countries following the same model."

Gunnar Alexandersson, Staffan Hultén (Stockholm School of Economics), The Swedish Railway Deregulation Path. Review of Network Economics, Vol.7, Issue 1, March 2008, 18-36 [formato PDF, 116 kB]. "This paper deals with railway deregulation and related reforms by means of a case study of Sweden, studying the 1988 split of railway infrastructure from operations and the subsequent steps of vertical and horizontal disintegration to a market characterized by decentralization and intra-modal competition. We also analyze the current market situation, in terms of the actors and their roles, and industrial organization measures. This assessment is used to discuss the sustainability of the current regulatory structure, concluding that although it seems more sustainable than in the past, regulators will sooner or later have to deal with some of its inconsistencies."

Rafael Lalive (University of Lausanne), Armin Schmutzler (University of Zurich), Entry in Liberalized Railway Markets: The German Experience. Review of Network Economics, Vol.7, Issue 1, March 2008, 37-52 [formato PDF, 112 kB]. "In Germany, competitive franchising is increasingly being used to procure passenger railway services that were previously provided by a state monopolist. This paper analyzes 77 tenders that differ with respect to network size, service frequency, contract duration and the proximity to other lines that are already run by competitors of DB Regio, a subsidiary of the successor of the former state monopolist. Our analysis shows that competitors are more likely to win small networks and more recent auctions. Other controls such as contract duration and the adjacency to other lines run by entrants are insignificant."

Preserving Freight and Passenger Rail Corridors and Service. A Synthesis of Highway Practice. (NCHRP Synthesis 374). Transportation Research Board, Washington, DC, 2007, 40 p. [formato PDF, 1,06 MB]. "This synthesis will be of interest to state department of transportation (DOT) personnel, as well as to others who work with them in the area of rail corridor preservation. Today, the shrinkage of rail service seems to vary dramatically from state to state. However, the rising cost and complexity of establishing new transportation corridors and growing congestion on all surface modes of travel focuses new attention on the issues surrounding retention of rights-of-way or restoration of rail services. Survey results indicated that some of the best restoration efforts appeared to include direct engagement by the future rail service providers from the earliest stages of rail line assessment. Six respondents claimed success in restoration of previously dormant rail corridors, with activity centered in North Carolina, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. California’s Rail Inventory, undertaken by the California DOT in 2001, signaled the start of corridor evaluation for passenger rail or public transit use. More detailed investigations yielded six interesting rail corridor success stories where it was said that vision, perseverance, and the ability to reach out to multiple stakeholders brought about the preservation of properties."

Cour des comptes, Le réseau ferroviaire : une réforme inachevée, une stratégie incertaine. Rapport public thématique. Paris, 2008, 167 p. [formato PDF, 848 kB]. "Dans son rapport, la Cour des comptes revient sur les dix ans d'existence de Réseau Ferré de France (RFF), relève les difficultés rencontrées, évalue les résutats et précise les progrès qui restent à faire. La séparation entre RFF, gestionnaire de l'infrastructure, et la SNCF à la fois entreprise ferroviaire utilisatrice et gestionnaire déléguée de l'infrastructure est à l'origine de sérieux dysfonctionnements et se traduit par une confusion des responsablilités."

Paolo Beria (Politecnico di Milano), Le ferrovie. Descrizione del settore ferroviario in Italia ed Europa. (TRASPOL Working paper). Politecnico di Milano, Laboratorio di Politica dei Trasporti, Milano, 10 gennaio 2008, 13 p. [formato PDF, 224 kB]. "Scopo del presente documento è di fornire una descrizione del settore ferroviario in Italia e in Europa. Il settore viene prima descritto fisicamente, fornendo alcune informazioni relative alle reti italiane. In seguito sono forniti alcuni dati sulla domanda continentale e italiana. Un approfondimento è dedicato alle limitate informazioni pubbliche sulla domanda delle reti ad alta velocità. Il documento si conclude con una descrizione economica del settore: struttura dei costi, ricavi, investimenti loro redditività socio-economica."

Rico Merkert (Univ. of Leeds), The restructuring and future of the British Rail system. (ITS Working Paper 586). Institute of Transport Studies, University of Leeds, 2005, 50 p. [formato PDF, 800 KB]. "The paper focuses mainly on reviewing and analysing the restructuring of Britain’s railways, including the recently published proposals for its future. The objective is to investigate the current market structure, the market behaviour and the overall performance of the British rail system over time. In order to learn what other people think about the problems of the industry and their solutions, interviews with key people associated with the industry and several submissions of some key interest parties to the 2004 railway structure review are used in this paper. The results are that all major characteristics of the rail reform in Britain are seen as workable and empirical data reveal that they have worked comparatively successfully, before Hatfield. Because of bad implementation some of the features, and in particular the private infrastructure manager, have not worked well. Most of the problems have arisen because of indecision over refranchising and the disruption following Hatfield. Furthermore the policy of the Government after Hatfield created an extremely risk averse culture within the industry, at a time when Railtrack had not enough insights about the state of the rail network. Although empirically unjustified, safety improvement became the main issue, costs escalated and reliability and productivity experienced a huge fall. The current White Paper “The Future of Rail” is seen as partially misleading and not at all detailed. At present it is only clear that the proposals will result in further increase of political interference. Much will depend on the precise implementation of the proposed measures and therefore the future of British rail remains unclear."

Andrey Zarucheyski (All Russian Railway Research Institute VNIIZhT), Les locomotives a gas en Russie. Third UIC Energy Efficiency Conference, September 19-21 2007, Portorož, Slovenia, 7 slides [formato PDF, 1,73 MB]. Locomotive diesel di manovra alimentate a gas naturale compresso.

Junji Kawasaki (East Japan Railway Company), Development of a fuel cell hybrid railcar. Third UIC Energy Efficiency Conference, September 19-21 2007, Portorož, Slovenia, 22 slides [formato PDF, 10,8 MB]. L'autore mette a confronto le prestazioni del treno diesel ibrido (in servizio) con quelle, migliori dal punto di vista del rendimento energetico, del treno sperimentale a celle a combustibile.

Javier Campos (Univ. of Las Palmas), Changing the rail model in Spain: the 2003 law. Third Conference on Railroad Industry Structure, Competition and Investment, Stockholm School of Economics, 20-22 October 2005, 29 p. [formato PDF, 252 KB]. "This paper examines some of the most relevant characteristics of the Spanish rail system and its performance in recent years. It particularly focuses on the new organizational model emerging from the 2003 Railroad Law, which introduced vertical separation and competition in the traditional monopolistic structure of this sector. Although it is early to fully evaluate the results of this change, some interesting lessons can be learned for countries following the same model."

Javier Campos (Univ. of Las Palmas), Changing the rail model in Spain: the 2003 law. Presentation, Third Conference on Railroad Industry Structure, Competition and Investment, Stockholm School of Economics, 20-22 October 2005, 20 slides [formato PDF, 2,56 MB].

Department for Transport, Delivering a sustainable railway, White Paper presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State for Transport, London, July 2007, 156 p. [formato PDF, 2,68 MB]. "The White Paper looks at the potential future challenges for the railway over a 30-year horizon. It identifies three long-term agendas for Government and the rail industry working in partnership: increasing the capacity of the railway, delivering a quality service for passengers, and fulfilling rail's environmental potential." Il libro bianco del governo britannico fissa gli obiettivi per le ferrovie dal 2009 al 2014.

Nienke Uil (ECORYS Nederland BV), Analysis of the financial situation of railway undertakings in the European Union. Final Report. Rotterdam, February 2006, 164 p. [formato PDF, 912 KB]. "For the member states of the European Union and Norway and Switzerland, the railway undertakings with an annual turnover of at least € 50 million have been analysed with respect to their financial situation and compliance with EC regulations regarding separation of accounts, cross subsidies and public support. Therefore the annual accounts of the 96 railway undertakings presented in the tables below have been consulted and analysed in order to answer for the following questions each undertaking: • Are separated accounts available for freight and transport services and for transport services and infrastructure management? • Are the accounts clear with respect the non existence of cross subsidies? • Is the public support transparent? • How is the railway undertaking operationally and financially performing?"

Joaquin Jiménez Otero (ADIF - Administrador de Infraestructuras Ferroviarias), Developing the European Rail Freight Network in Spain. UIC, TREND Project Conference, Paris, 4th july 2006, presentation, 38 slides [formato PDF, 5,40 MB]. Lo sviluppo del sistema ferroviario spagnolo nell'ambito delle reti europee, con particolare attenzione alle direttrici transfrontaliere attraverso i Pirenei e le Alpi.

Johann Narrenhofer (ÖBB Holding), Existierende und zu erwartende Schieneninfrastruktur-Engpässe als Drohpotential für Einsebahnverkehrsunternehmen im Güter- und Personenverkehr (i colli di bottiglia ferroviari esistenti e futuri come potenziale minaccia per le imprese di trasporto ferroviario di merci e persone), Wien, 5.07.2006 [presentazione], 25 slides [formato PDF, 1,83 MB]. (Situazione e prospettive della rete e del trasporto ferroviario in Austria, centrato sul trasporto merci).

Robert Rivier, Yves Putallaz, Audit sur l’état du réseau ferré national français, rapport, 7 septembre 2005, EPFL, Lausanne, 30 p. [formato PDF, 290 KB]. Sintesi del rapporto preparato da docenti del Politecnico di Losanna per la Rete ferroviaria francese (RFF) e la società nazionale delle ferrovie francesi (SNCF) sulle condizioni della infrastruttura ferroviaria francese e sulle misure e gli investimenti necessari a rendere sicura la rete. L’audit prevede diversi scenari, a seconda degli investimenti che si vorranno o potranno fare, con eventuali riduzioni dell’estensione della rete. Contiene anche dei confronti con altre reti ferroviarie (Spagna, Italia, Gran Bretagna) per quanto riguarda la manutenzione e il rinnovo della rete.

Progetto Interreg IIIB AlpFRail: presentazione dell’impresa di logistica Logistik-Kompetenz-Zentrum AlpFRail: from traffic axes to European systems and networks[formato PDF, 6,11 MB] e presentazione alla conferenza regionale di Ulm (17.02.2004) Alpine Freight Railway “AlpFRail” Regional conference in Ulm, presentation of the project [formato Powerpoint, 1,83 MB]

The Future of Rail Libro Bianco del governo britannico sul futuro della ferrovia nel Regno Unito (luglio 2004). Sono disponibili i singoli capitoli o il testo completo (PDF, 13,6 MB). [Il governo vuole ricoprire un ruolo importante nella pianificazione e nel controllo, senza però ri-nazionalizzare le ferrovie].

Rail Liberalisation Index 2004 Comparison of the Market Opening in the Rail Markets of the Member States of the European Union, Switzerland and Norway. (documenti in pdf, originale in lingua tedesca 0,59 MB, traduzione in inglese 0,52 MB).

Yves Crozet, Les réformes ferroviaires européennes: à la recherche des bonnes pratiques. Institut de l'entreprise, Paris, Mai 2004, 88 p. [formato PDF, 710 KB].

Russell Pittman, Structural separation to create competition? The case of freight railways. Review of Network Economics 4 (2005) 181-196 [formato PDF, 236 KB].


RIVISTE

European Railway Review "The leading quarterly magazine for the European railway industry" (alcuni articoli sono disponibili gratuitamente)

JRTR Japan Railway & Transport Review is an English-language transport magazine published quarterly by East Japan Railway Culture Foundation.


IMPATTO AMBIENTALE DELLA FERROVIA

Matthias Landgraf, Arpad Horvath, Embodied greenhouse gas assessment of railway infrastructure: the case of Austria. Environmental Research: Infrastructure and Sustainability, 2021, Accepted Manuscript, (41 p.) [formato PDF, 1,3 MB]. Open Access. "This study assesses life-cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with the entire railway infrastructure network of Austria, a first detailed study for a country, modelled through a top-down approach. Railway track is analysed for the first time in detail for a variety of specific boundary conditions using a bottom-up approach focusing on track renewal and maintenance. The methodology of standard elements allows for quantifying expected maintenance demands over the life cycle as well as determination of service life (SL). For this, the network is clustered into the main condition-affecting parameters and documented maintenance and renewal measures are analysed and interpreted accordingly to estimate future behaviour. This Austrian approach used for assessing life-cycle costs serves as input for evaluating environmental impacts, a novel model. Data were gathered via Environmental Product Declarations, governmental publications, and company-specific environmental reports to correspond to the standard supply chains of the Austrian Federal Railways' life-cycle (manufacturing, construction, maintenance, and reuse/recycling) infrastructure practices, and reflect actual transport distances, transport modes, the Austrian electricity mix, and emissions. The railway infrastructure causes 235,000 tonnes of CO2eq emissions per year (0.3% of Austria's total) based on the current infrastructure network, asset distribution, and renewal rates. Within railway infrastructure, the track (incl. rails, fasteners, sleepers and ballast) is the main contributor to GHG emissions with 55% of the total. The GHG emissions associated with the concrete tunnels are 16 times more GHG-intensive per kilometre per year than the railway track but supply only 22% of the total emissions. The railway infrastructure contributes an additional 141% of GHG emissions over emissions from passenger traffic, which is much higher than previously anticipated. In-depth analysis of railway track shows that concrete sleepers with under-sleeper pads come with lower environmental impacts than conventional concrete sleepers. Higher traffic loads as well as narrow curves cause a significant increase in environmental impacts. For rails in a straight section with a SL of 50 years and two grinding measures, the costs regarding GHG emissions amount to €6,500 (including the production, construction, and use phases) when calculating with a cost of €20 per tonne CO2eq on the market. Currently, this equals to around 5% of the economic costs, but this is expected to significantly increase as costs for environmental impacts are set to increase until 2050. Mitigation potential can be found in special rail steel production, reuse of materials, use of alternative fuels, and efficient maintenance strategies."

Panrawee Rungskunroch, Zuo-Jun Shen, and Sakdirat Kaewunruen, Getting It Right on the Policy Prioritization for Rail Decarbonization: Evidence From Whole-Life CO2e Emissions of Railway Systems. Front. Built Environ. 7:638507 (2021) 5 p. [formato PDF, 590 kB]. Opinion article. Open Access. "In the past several years, global warming has caused essential issues that all sectors must respond immediately. The Paris Agreement has turned into a critical framework provoking public and private sectors worldwide (Dimitrov, 2016; Pye et al., 2017). One approach to solving this problem involves the use of green energies and reducing CO2 emitted from all sectors. Regarding the transportation sectors, it emitted CO2 above one-fourth of the global emission. A well-known problem with over emission is that some countries have inadequate public transportation and non-environmental policies. The low-fare service and high accessibility on public transit are major strategies to reduce emission from a private car (Krishnan et al., 2015; De Andrade and D'Agosto, 2016). These schemes eventually promote a long-term shift from self-vehicle to public transportation services. The United Kingdom government has been concerned with the global warming issue and provided new strategies to reduce CO2 emission in all sectors, such as launching new public transportation (Kaewunruen et al., 2018; Logan et al., 2020). Additionally, the United Kingdom's railway network is considered the lowest CO2 emission per passenger over other public services. Regarding the global climate policies, the United Kingdom government has still intended to cut off the railway's emission by replacing it with alternative fuels and changing the current diesel engine system toward the decarbonization concept, mainly reducing the emission from the operational process. Even though the CO2 emission from the railway's life cycle predominantly comes from the railway infrastructure, the United Kingdom government and rail sectors exceptionally focus on reducing those emissions from the operational stage. In this research, the authors believe that only promoting strategies to reduce CO2 in the operational process cannot bring the United Kingdom government to reach its targets by 2050. In contrast, the government should also consider other effective and practical strategies. In order to understand the amount of CO2 emission from the railway network, the research deeply examines the entire life cycle analysis (LCA) through the high-speed rail (HSR)'s infrastructure. This research aims to provide future strategies and policies to cut the CO2 off the railway network. Furthermore, the decarbonization concepts and practical approaches to the railway system have been stated in this study."

Uwe Clausen, Claus Doll, Francis James Franklin, Gordana Vasic Franklin, Hilmar Heinrichmeyer, Joachim Kochsiek, Werner Rothengatter and Niklas Sieber, Reducing Railway Noise Pollution. Study. European Parliament, 2012, 130 p. [formato PDF, 5,22 MB]. "12 million EU inhabitants are affected by railway noise during the day and 9 million during the night. This study lists measures, funding and regulations to reduce it. The introduction of modern rolling stock will lower noise most significantly. In the short run, the replacement of cast iron by composite brake blocks on rail freight cars is most important. Developing a regulation scheme for a staged process towards low-noise rolling stock is the heart of a rail noise abatement strategy."

Jakob Oertli, Peter Hübner, Railway Noise in Europe. A 2010 report on the state of the art. International Union of Railways, Paris, September 2010, 31 p. [formato PDF, 1,90 MB]. Also available in German and French.

Jeffrey A. Zapfe, Hugh Saurenman, Sanford Fidell, Ground-Borne Noise and Vibration in Buildings Caused by Rail Transit. (TCRP D-12 Final Report). Transit Cooperative Research Program, Transportation Research Board, Washington D.C., 2010, 208 p. [formato PDF, 12,7 MB]. "Ground vibration produced by rail transit systems can be annoying to nearby building occupants when they perceive some combination of feelable vibration, re-radiated sound, and vibrationinduced rattling of household paraphernalia. Community response to rail-induced ground vibration has not been extensively researched. While the well-known Schultz dosage-response curve is routinely used to predict the prevalence of annoyance produced by airborne transportation noise, no similar relationship has gained widespread acceptance for noise and vibration due to ground vibration. The principal goal of the present research was to develop a dosage-response relationship useful for predicting community annoyance due to ground vibration produced by rail transit systems. This report documents the research conducted under the Transit Cooperative Research Program D-12 project, including a literature review, development of the study design, conduct of telephone interviews and vibration measurements, and data reduction and analyses. Telephone interviews were conducted with 1306 individuals in five North American cities: New York, Sacramento, Dallas, Toronto and Boston. Field measurements were made in each city to estimate vibration and noise exposure at each interview location. The work produced several dosage-response relationships between vibration/noise exposure and annoyance. When compared to the current noise and vibration criteria specified by the Federal Transit Administration (FTA), the dosage-response analysis predicted a probability of 0.05 to 0.10 that a D-12 respondent would be highly annoyed by vibration and noise at the current FTA criterion levels."

PricewaterhouseCoopers Advisory, Impact Assessment study on rail noise abatement measures addressing the existing fleets. Final Report. (Reference TREN/A1/46-2005). December 2007, 129 p. [formato PDF, 1,37 MB]. This study was prepared by PwC for the European Commission, Directorate General for Transport and Energy.

Evert Andersson, Piotr Lukaszewicz (Royal Institute of Technology), Energy consumption and related air pollution for Scandinavian electric passenger trains. (Report KTH/AVE 2006:46), Royal Institute of Technology KTH, Stockholm, 2006, 55 p. [formato PDF, 654 KB]. "The scope of the present study is to determine average energy consumption and the related emissions of air pollutants of representative modern trains in passenger service in Scandinavia. All the trains studied are supplied by Bombardier Transportation. Some comparisons will also be made with older train services and – to some extent – with other modes of transport."

Mikael Ögren, Noise emission from railway traffic. (VTI rapport 559A), VTI (Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute), Linköping, 2006, 41 p. [formato PDF, 420 KB]. "This report is a literature survey on how the railway noise is generated, and to what extend different measures at the source can reduce the noise emission. The report also briefly describes what limits and recommendations on noise exposure are enforced now and in the near future. Furthermore the noise propagation methods used for calculating the noise level at different receiver positions (noise exposure) from the noise emission are discussed."

Jakob Oertli (SBB), Peter Hübner (UIC), Risanamento acustico del trasporto merci su ferrovia. Stato dell'arte . UIC, Luglio 2006, 11 p. [formato PDF, 342 KB]

Verkehrsclub Deutschland, Kreisverband Bonn/Rhein-Sieg/Ahr, Bonn und der Schienengüterverkehr (Bonn e il trasporto merci su ferrovia). Fachtagung am Donnerstag, 22. Februar 2007. Bonn, 2007, 69 p. [formato PDF, 3,73 MB]. (convegno sulle potenzialità e problemi ambientali, soprattutto rumore, del trasporto merci su ferrovia, con riferimento alla realtà della regione di Bonn e della valle del Reno).


SICUREZZA

Rapporto annuale sulla sicurezza delle ferrovie. Anno 2008. Agenzia Nazionale per la Sicurezza delle Ferrovie (ANSF), Firenze, 2009, 109 p. [formato PDF, 4,77 MB]. "Il rapporto descrive l’evoluzione nel corso dell’anno 2008 della sicurezza del sistema ferroviario italiano costituito dalla infrastruttura ferroviaria nazionale concessa in gestione a Rete Ferroviaria Italiana S.p.A. con Decreto del Ministero dei Trasporti 138-T del 31/10/2000 (atto di concessione) e dal servizio di trasporto ferroviario svolto su di essa dalle imprese ferroviarie in possesso del certificato di sicurezza." (Summary in English).

Andrew W. Evans (Imperial College London), Fatal train accidents on Britain's main line railways: end of 2007 analysis. (Working Paper). Centre for Transport Studies, Imperial College, London, March 2008, 25 p. [formato PDF, 230 kB]. "This paper updates the author’s previous statistical analyses of fatal train accidents on running lines of the national railway system of Great Britain to the end of 2007, based on fatal accident data over the 41-year period 1967 to 2007. The year 2007 saw the first fatal train derailment since 2002, other than at level crossings, and there were also three fatal collisions between trains and road vehicles. That is a poorer performance than in 2006, but it is broadly in line with the estimated mean frequencies. In consequence, the trends in the estimated frequencies are changed only slightly. The paper estimates that the mean frequency of fatal collisions, derailments and overruns per year in 2007 was 0.53, and the mean number of fatalities per year in these accidents was 2.1. The paper also estimates that the mean frequency of fatal collisions between trains and road motor vehicles in 2007 was 2.7 per year, with 3.8 fatalities per year. The estimated means for collisions, derailment and overruns are slightly higher than the corresponding estimates made last year for 2006, and those for collisions between train and road vehicles are slightly lower. The paper examines the evolution of the estimates since 2001, and makes comparisons with the results of the Safety Risk Model of the Rail Safety and Standards Board."


TECNOLOGIA

The European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS) is a European cab-based signalling and train control system that offers significant capacity and performance benefits, as well as further enhancing safety beyond the capability of legacy ATP systems. ERTMS consists of two primary components; ETCS (European Train Control and Command System); and GSM-R: (the radio communications system to send information to the train).


CICLOTRENO (Vélorails, Railbikes, Schienenvelos)

Fédération des vélorails de France.

Les Vélos Rails du Bugey.

Vélorails de Provence. Un vélorails? C'est une sorte de "pédalo terrestre"... C'est un petit véhicule circulant sur une voie ferrée et qui se déplace grâce... à la force musculaire des voyageurs!


RITORNA ALLA HOMEPAGE