This paper lays out a framework for managing complex asset systems, such as road networks, with a view to optimising life-cycle value of the asset base. It is based on discussions at the International transport Forum Roundtable on Sustainable Road Funding held in Paris 25-26 October 20121 and...

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...

India’s road network of over 4.1 million km is second largest in the world consisting of expressways, national highways, state highways, major district roads and other roads. These roads carry about 65 per cent of freight and 80 per cent of passenger traffic. National highways constitute only...

Many major airports are hubs for network carriers at the same time as serving a large local market. The complementarity between these functions is often seen as a prerequisite for viable hub operations, suggesting that spreading the hub network over multiple airports can be very costly and...

Expanding airports is a topic which can easily make it to the first page of the national press. But this is highly unlikely as “bad news” is “good news” and most often failures and scandals make it to the front page. Berlin airport or the on-going failure to open up a nearly-complete new...

Since the mid 90’s, public transport patronage in Île-de-France (the Paris region) has increased substantially: over the last decade alone a 20% growth was observed. This growth, even though it was an aim of the Sustainable Urban Mobility plan adopted in 2000, was not completely anticipated....

External effects or externalities “consist of the costs and benefits felt beyond or ‘external to’ those causing the effect” (Anderson, 2006). In the case of transportation, the negative externalities (costs) can take the form of air pollution, noise and accidents. Since external effects...

Origin-destination demand, trip patterns, pricing and transport networks alone cannot explain passenger demand for public transport modes. Other factors of convenience and service quality play a key role in influencing demand and mode choice but they are often more complex and harder to define,...

It is widely held that large institutional investors such as pension funds and sovereign wealth funds with long term liabilities and a low risk appetite are ideally suited to invest in transportation infrastructure assets. Despite the theoretical ideal match between a large source of capital and...

This paper is intended to serve three purposes. First, it presents a slightly abbreviated version of the summary of the book published by Regional Plan Association (RPA) in January 2011 about the serious capacity and delay problems at the three major airports in New York and what might be done...