IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/trapol/v42y2015icp34-41.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The looming crisis in French public transit

Author

Listed:
  • Bouf, Dominique
  • Faivre d’Arcier, Bruno

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to present the problems of French public transit, facing a funding crisis. The prominent features of the French transit are presented. First, we describe the complex and opaque bidding process which is for the entire network. Then we evoke a payroll tax especially devoted to the transit and underline the fact that the system is heavily subsidised. As competing for the entire network might find its rationale in the scale and scope economies, we test some very simple models devoted to this issue. We found no evidence of economies of scale for bus networks. This, given the funding crisis of transit authorities, leads us to recommend a gradual reform of French transit competitive tendering process. This reform should lead to a slowdown in the upward trend of transit employee's salaries. Some smaller parts of the networks would be submitted to bidding processes. The contracts might be improved as well.

Suggested Citation

  • Bouf, Dominique & Faivre d’Arcier, Bruno, 2015. "The looming crisis in French public transit," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 34-41.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:trapol:v:42:y:2015:i:c:p:34-41
    DOI: 10.1016/j.tranpol.2015.04.004
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0967070X15300044
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.tranpol.2015.04.004?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
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. von Hirschhausen, Christian & Cullmann, Astrid, 2010. "A nonparametric efficiency analysis of German public transport companies," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 46(3), pages 436-445, May.
    2. Iseki, Hiroyuki, 2010. "Effects of contracting on cost efficiency in US fixed-route bus transit service," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 44(7), pages 457-472, August.
    3. Hensher, David A. & Stanley, John, 2010. "Contracting regimes for bus services: What have we learnt after 20 years?," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 140-144.
    4. Dominique Bouf & Julien Lévêque, 2006. "Yardstick Competition for Transport Infrastructure Services," Post-Print halshs-00092671, HAL.
    5. Odeck, James, 2008. "The effect of mergers on efficiency and productivity of public transport services," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 42(4), pages 696-708, May.
    6. Mehdi Farsi & Aurelio Fetz & Massimo Filippini, 2007. "Economies of Scale and Scope in Local Public Transportation," Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, University of Bath, vol. 41(3), pages 345-361, September.
    7. Sakai, Hiroki & Takahashi, Yoshinori, 2013. "Ten years after bus deregulation in Japan: An analysis of institutional changes and cost efficiency," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 215-225.
    8. William Roy & Anne Yvrande-Billon, 2007. "Ownership, Contractual Practices and Technical Efficiency: The Case of Urban Public Transport in France," Post-Print halshs-00107375, HAL.
    9. van de Velde, Didier & Wallis, Ian, 2013. "‘Regulated deregulation’ of local bus services—An appraisal of international developments," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 21-33.
    10. Peoples, James & Talley, Wayne K. & Wang, Bin, 2008. "U.S. public transit earnings, employment and privatization," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(1), pages 99-106, January.
    11. Amaral, Miguel & Saussier, Stéphane & Yvrande-Billon, Anne, 2009. "Auction procedures and competition in public services: The case of urban public transport in France and London," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 17(2), pages 166-175, June.
    12. William Roy & Anne Yvrande-Billon, 2007. "Ownership, Contractual Practices and Technical Efficiency: The Case of Urban Public Transport in France," Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, University of Bath, vol. 41(2), pages 257-282, May.
    13. David A. Hensher & Ian P. Wallis, 2005. "Competitive Tendering as a Contracting Mechanism for Subsidising Transport: The Bus Experience," Journal of Transport Economics and Policy, University of Bath, vol. 39(3), pages 295-322, September.
    14. Mathisen, Terje Andreas & Solvoll, Gisle, 2008. "Competitive tendering and structural changes: An example from the bus industry," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 15(1), pages 1-11, January.
    15. William Roy & Anne Yvrande-Billon, 2007. "Ownership, Contractual Practices and Technical Efficiency: The Case of Urban Public Transport in France," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-00107375, HAL.
    16. Preston, John & Almutairi, Talal, 2013. "Evaluating the long term impacts of transport policy: An initial assessment of bus deregulation," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 208-214.
    17. van de Velde, Didier & Veeneman, Wijnand & Lutje Schipholt, Lars, 2008. "Competitive tendering in The Netherlands: Central planning vs. functional specifications," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 42(9), pages 1152-1162, November.
    18. Gwilliam, Ken, 2008. "A review of issues in transit economics," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(1), pages 4-22, January.
    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. Hirschhorn, Fabio & Veeneman, Wijnand & van de Velde, Didier, 2019. "Organisation and performance of public transport: A systematic cross-case comparison of metropolitan areas in Europe, Australia, and Canada," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 419-432.

    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. Ida, Yoram & Talit, Gal, 2015. "Regulation of public bus services: The Israeli experience," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 156-165.
    2. Epstein, Bryan & Givoni, Moshe, 2016. "Analyzing the gap between the QOS demanded by PT users and QOS supplied by service operators," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 622-637.
    3. Cinzia Daraio & Marco Diana & Flavia Di Costa & Claudio Leporelli & Giorgio Matteucci & Alberto Nastasi, 2014. "Efficiency and effectiveness in the urban public transport sector: a critical review with directions for future research," DIAG Technical Reports 2014-14, Department of Computer, Control and Management Engineering, Universita' degli Studi di Roma "La Sapienza".
    4. Mouwen, Arnoud & van Ommeren, Jos, 2016. "The effect of contract renewal and competitive tendering on public transport costs, subsidies and ridership," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 78-89.
    5. Filippini, M. & Koller, M. & Masiero, G., 2015. "Competitive tendering versus performance-based negotiation in Swiss public transport," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 158-168.
    6. Daniel Albalate & Germà Bel & Joan Calzada, 2012. "Governance and regulation of urban bus transportation: Using partial privatization to achieve the better of two worlds," Regulation & Governance, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 6(1), pages 83-100, March.
    7. Karlaftis, Matthew G. & Tsamboulas, Dimitrios, 2012. "Efficiency measurement in public transport: Are findings specification sensitive?," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 46(2), pages 392-402.
    8. Daniel Albalate & Germà Bel & Joan Calzada, 2010. "Urban transport governance reform in Barcelona," IREA Working Papers 201009, University of Barcelona, Research Institute of Applied Economics, revised Jun 2010.
    9. Augustin, Katrin & Walter, Matthias, 2010. "Operator changes through competitive tendering: Empirical evidence from German local bus transport," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 36-44.
    10. Avenali, Alessandro & Boitani, Andrea & Catalano, Giuseppe & D’Alfonso, Tiziana & Matteucci, Giorgio, 2018. "Assessing standard costs in local public bus transport: A hybrid cost model," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 48-57.
    11. Sheng, Dian & Meng, Qiang, 2020. "Public bus service contracting: A critical review and future research opportunities," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    12. Cambini Carlo & Filippini Massimo & Piacenza Massimiliano & Vannoni Davide, 2011. "Corporatization and Firm Performance: Evidence from Publicly-Provided Local Utilities," Review of Law & Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 7(1), pages 191-213, July.
    13. Wegelin, Philipp, 2018. "Is the mere threat enough? An empirical analysis about competitive tendering as a threat and cost efficiency in public bus transportation," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 245-253.
    14. Germà Bel & Jordi Rosell, 2016. "Public and Private Production in a Mixed Delivery System: Regulation, Competition and Costs," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(3), pages 533-558, June.
    15. Campos-Alba, Cristina M. & Prior, Diego & Pérez-López, Gemma & Zafra-Gómez, Jose L., 2020. "Long-term cost efficiency of alternative management forms for urban public transport from the public sector perspective," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 16-23.
    16. Avenali, Alessandro & Boitani, Andrea & Catalano, Giuseppe & D’Alfonso, Tiziana & Matteucci, Giorgio, 2016. "Assessing standard costs in local public bus transport: Evidence from Italy," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 52(C), pages 164-174.
    17. Andrea ZATTI, 2011. "Organizational models in European local public transport: is the new paradigm really dominant," Departmental Working Papers 2011-29, Department of Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods at Università degli Studi di Milano.
    18. Andrea ZATTI, 2012. "New Organizational Models In European Local Public Transport: From Myth To Reality," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 83(4), pages 533-559, December.
    19. Francesco, Gastaldi & Lucia, Quaglino & Carlo, Stagnaro, 2012. "Il trasporto pubblico locale e la concorrenza. Cambiare paradigma per salvare il servizio: il caso ligure [Local Public Transportation and Competition. Changing Paradigm to Save the Service: The Ca," MPRA Paper 49464, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    20. Tiznado, Ignacio & Galilea, Patricia & Delgado, Felipe & Niehaus, Markus, 2014. "Incentive schemes for bus drivers: The case of the public transit system in Santiago, Chile," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 77-83.

    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:trapol:v:42:y:2015:i:c:p:34-41. 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: http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/30473/description#description .

    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.