[sustran] Re: urban rail and transport problems in KL

[Alan P Howes]

On Thu, 23 Sep 1999 12:35:32 -0400 (EDT), Eric Bruun
<ebruun at rci.rutgers.edu> wrote:

>On Thu, 23 Sep 1999, SUSTRAN Resource Centre wrote:
>
>> From: "Kathy & Eng Hwa" <katnlim at pd.jaring.my>
>>   
>> The sad thing is that in most countries, eg Europe, the public transport
>> systems have always been cross-subsidised and are not able to "stand alone"
>> as a business venture. Even so, if I am not mistaken, the European
>> experience is that PT is fighting a losing battle as ridership for rail and
>> PT decline.
>>   
>  This is an exaggeration. 

I agree with you there.
>
>Deregulation does not work. It has been a disaster for the UK.

But not entirely there. UK Dereg worked in that it achieved what the
government wanted - big cuts in subsidy. (OK, they also said they
wanted to revitalise Public Transport, but if you believed that ...)
And IMO the public as a whole (including taxpayers) got better value
for money out of PT after Dereg than before it. But crucially, Dereg
failed to provide a PT system which would tempt people out of their
cars, and the absence of effective anti-trust legislation in the UK
resulted in abuse of monopoly power by a few large bus groups.

>London area did not deregulate and it did not suffer the ridership
>losses the rest of the UK did. 

Yes, but London is different in many other ways too.

>A planned network with integrated fares
>works much better. But the trick is to get innovative and responsive
>planning without having to resort to total deregulation, which throws out
>much of the good in order to get rid of the bad (unresponsive public
>monopolies).

Quite right. Many UK transit authorities were too politically
motivated to look after PT effectively - for instance, spending money
on rail lines used by relatively few middle-income passengers, while
not supporting bus services used by lower income groups.

I firmly believe that the best transport networks are those planned by
operators motivated by profit - BUT, working under the right
regulatory framework. Which brings me back to my usual hobby-horse,
Curitiba (Brazil).

As well as having a splendid "Bus Metro", they have a rather
interesting regulatory system. There are several operators, operating
on routes and at fares set down by the TA (if I remember correctly -
I'm quoting from memory). I am not sure if they are limited in the
bus-kms they run - though I guess they are. The clever bit is that the
TA collects all the revenue, and allocates it to operators on the
basis of bus-kms run. So the operators have an interest in maximising
revenue on the system as a whole, but not in competing with other
operators for revenue.

Neat, don't you think? I would have thought the Curitiba model might
be of interest in KL.

>> Any comments ,  views , especially the pro-Keynesian advocates ??

I used to work in Milton Keynes - will that do?
-- 
Alan Howes, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (Formerly Perthshire, Scotland)
alanhowes at usaksa.com
http://www.users.zetnet.co.uk/alanhowes/  [Needs Updating!]

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