IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jotrge/v70y2018icp114-122.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Systemic transformation and changes in surface transport companies in Poland: A synthesis after twenty-five years

Author

Listed:
  • Taylor, Zbigniew
  • Ciechański, Ariel

Abstract

The milestone of 25 years of political and economic transformation in a post-communist country offers a good occasion to sum up change processes in its transport sector. This paper thus seeks to reconstruct post-1989 organisational and ownership transformations in Poland’s rail-, road-, and urban-transport companies, as well as those involved in inland shipping. Where freight is concerned, carriage on standard- and broad-gauge railways can be evaluated as mostly deregulated. In turn, in relation to the carriage of passengers, all carriers existing up to mid-2005 had originated within the PKP (Polish State Railways) Group. The most common form of transformation in ownership of passenger carriers is communalisation of existing companies, with shares in the hands of regional authorities. The first private operator appeared as late as 2007 (the present-day Arriva in the province (voivodship) of Kujawsko-Pomorskie). The disintegration of the national road carrier (PKS) resulted in the founding of about 40 new freight-transport firms, the majority of which were closed down soon. Equally, in the case of the PKS passenger enterprises, the most common form of privatisation has involved leasing by workers. The privatisation occurring previously involved, not only Polish investors, but also foreign capital (Veolia, later taken over by Arriva, and the Israeli Egged Holding via its affiliate Mobilis). However, the share of public-capital ownership remains substantial, often resulting in final bankruptcy of road companies. Among the operators involved in urban transport, public ownership remains dominant in various forms (commercialised, communalised, or budgetary units). In contrast, small private firms dominate in inland shipping. Moreover, systemic transformation plus Poland’s EU accession have given rise to the conditions underpinning the emergence of Europe’s largest shipowners (OT Logistics, the former Odratrans Group).

Suggested Citation

  • Taylor, Zbigniew & Ciechański, Ariel, 2018. "Systemic transformation and changes in surface transport companies in Poland: A synthesis after twenty-five years," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 114-122.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jotrge:v:70:y:2018:i:c:p:114-122
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2018.05.016
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0966692318301005
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jtrangeo.2018.05.016?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bennathan, Esra & Gutman, Jeffrey & Thompson, Louis, 1991. "Reforming and privatizing Hungary's road haulage," Policy Research Working Paper Series 790, The World Bank.
    2. Ranko Jelic & Richard Briston, 1999. "Hungarian Privatisation Strategy and Financial Performance of Privatised Companies," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(9‐10), pages 1319-1357, November.
    3. Ranko Jelic & Richard Briston, 1999. "Hungarian Privatisation Strategy and Financial Performance of Privatised Companies," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(9-10), pages 1319-1357.
    4. Jon Shaw, 2001. "Competition in the UK passenger railway industry: Prospects and problems," Transport Reviews, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(2), pages 195-216.
    5. Didier van de Velde, 2013. "Long-distance coach services in Europe," Chapters, in: Mattias Finger & Torben Holvad (ed.), Regulating Transport in Europe, chapter 5, pages 115-139, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    6. Shafik, Nemat, 1995. "Making a market: Mass privatization in the Czech and Slovak Republics," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 23(7), pages 1143-1156, July.
    7. Augustin, Katrin & Gerike, Regine & Martinez Sanchez, Manuel Josue & Ayala, Carolina, 2014. "Analysis of intercity bus markets on long distances in an established and a young market: The example of the U.S. and Germany," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 245-254.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Štraub, Daniel & Kębłowski, Wojciech & Maciejewska, Monika, 2023. "From Bełchatów to Żory: Charting Poland's geography of fare-free public transport programmes," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    2. Sandra Żukowska & Beata Chmiel & Marcin Połom, 2023. "The Smart Village Concept and Transport Exclusion of Rural Areas—A Case Study of a Village in Northern Poland," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(1), pages 1-23, January.
    3. Patrycja Krawczyk & Patrycja Kokot-Stepien, 2020. "The impact of the exchange rate on the financial result of enterprises in the transport sector," Ekonomia i Prawo, Uniwersytet Mikolaja Kopernika, vol. 19(1), pages 47-60, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ranko Jelic & Richard Briston, 2003. "Privatisation Initial Public Offerings: the Polish Experience," European Financial Management, European Financial Management Association, vol. 9(4), pages 457-484, December.
    2. Marisetty, Vijaya B. & Subrahmanyam, Marti G., 2010. "Group affiliation and the performance of IPOs in the Indian stock market," Journal of Financial Markets, Elsevier, vol. 13(1), pages 196-223, February.
    3. Farinos, Jose E. & Garcia, C. Jose & Ibanez, Ana Ma, 2007. "Operating and stock market performance of state-owned enterprise privatizations: The Spanish experience," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 367-389.
    4. Claude Laurin & Anthony E. Boardman & Aidan R. Vining, 2004. "Government Underpricing of Share‐Issue Privatizations," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 75(3), pages 399-429, September.
    5. Aarhaug, Jørgen & Fearnley, Nils, 2016. "Deregulation of the Norwegian long distance express coach market," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 1-6.
    6. Muhammad Faisal Rizwan & Safi-ullah Khan, 2007. "Long-run Performance of Public vs. Private Sector Initial Public Offerings in Pakistan," The Pakistan Development Review, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, vol. 46(4), pages 421-433.
    7. Roslily Ramlee & Ruhani Ali, 2012. "Liquidity, Initial Public Offering (IPO) Long-Term Return and Government Ownership Evidence from Bursa Malaysia IPO Stocks," Asian Academy of Management Journal of Accounting and Finance (AAMJAF), Penerbit Universiti Sains Malaysia, vol. 8(Supp. 1), pages 39-66.
    8. Yan Zeng & Josie McLaren, 2015. "The impact of large public sales of Government assets: empirical evidence from the Chinese stock markets on a gradual and offer-to-get approach," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 45(1), pages 137-173, July.
    9. Ben-Nasr, Hamdi, 2016. "Labor protection and government control: Evidence from privatized firms," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 52(PB), pages 485-498.
    10. Vijay Jog & Bruce J. McConomy, 2003. "Voluntary Disclosure of Management Earnings Forecasts in IPO Prospectuses," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(1‐2), pages 125-168, January.
    11. Dimitris Kenourgios & Spyros Papathanasiou & Emmanouil Rafail Melas, 2005. "Initial Performance of Greek IPOs, Underwriter’s Reputation and Oversubscription," Finance 0512023, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    12. Henna Malik & Malik Muhammad Shehr Yar & Attiya Yasmin Javid, 2017. "New Issues Puzzle: Experience from Karachi Stock Exchange," Working Papers id:12182, eSocialSciences.
    13. Ranko Jelic & Richard Briston & Wolfgang Aussenegg, 2003. "The Choice of Privatization Method and the Financial Performance of Newly Privatized Firms in Transition Economies," Journal of Business Finance & Accounting, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(7‐8), pages 905-940, September.
    14. Anderson, James H. & Korsun, Georges & Murrell, Peter, 2003. "Glamour and value in the land of Chingis Khan," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 34-57, March.
    15. Moshe Givoni, 2020. "The high‐speed bus (HSB) as an alternative to the high‐speed rail (HSR): A conceptual approach examined through a case study," Regional Science Policy & Practice, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 12(3), pages 507-518, June.
    16. Samuel de Haas & Daniel Herold & Jan Thomas Schaefer, 2017. "Entry deterrence due to brand proliferation: Empirical evidence from the German interurban bus industry," MAGKS Papers on Economics 201731, Philipps-Universität Marburg, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics, Department of Economics (Volkswirtschaftliche Abteilung).
    17. Beria, Paolo & Nistri, Dario & Laurino, Antonio, 2018. "Intercity coach liberalisation in Italy: Fares determinants in an evolving market," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 260-269.
    18. Brand, Christina & Sieg, Gernot, 2020. "The impact of delays on the welfare effects of on-track competition: The case of transfer passengers with operator-tied tickets," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C).
    19. Kilani, Moez & de Palma, André & Proost, Stef, 2017. "Are users better-off with new transit lines?," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 95-105.
    20. de Haas, Samuel & Herold, Daniel & Schäfer, Jan Thomas, 2022. "Entry deterrence due to brand proliferation: Empirical evidence from the German interurban bus industry," International Journal of Industrial Organization, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jotrge:v:70:y:2018:i:c:p:114-122. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/journal-of-transport-geography .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.