Railway Infrastructure Pricing in Europe for High-Speed and Intercity Services

Abstract

European railway reform separated infrastructure managers from railway undertakings and established financial relationships between the parties by using Directive 2001/14/EC and its amendments (adopted in most countries by 2004). These relationships were defined as infrastructure charging systems, in which infrastructure managers provided non discriminatory access to railway capacity. Numerous studies have discussed the resulting practices, and differences in the philosophy, methodology, structure, and charging levels of the implemented charging systems have been revealed. Most systems kept evolving and many were significantly changed. From 2005 through 2012, the disparity continued to increase, with some systems maintaining low charges and simple structure, whereas others increased charges and complicated the calculation methodology by adding new variables. The state of the practice in 2012 and evolution for 2007 through 2012 is assessed here; the focus is on high-speed and intercity services. Also assessed is the significance of charges for the two main players: railway undertakings and infrastructure managers. Infrastructure charges, which are costs for railway undertakings, make up 10% to 50% of estimated railway undertaking revenues. As for the profitability of infrastructure managers for the evaluated high-speed lines, infrastructure charges cover line maintenance costs and generate net positive revenues. In a comparison of initial investment costs with infrastructure manager net revenue, large differences are noted in charging levels between infrastructure managers and between infrastructure manager net revenues for cross-border lines. As the single European high-speed market matures, a question is how important such differences are for the stakeholders and the European Commission in the establishment of a common railway market.