Can HSR Services Increase Regional Economic Integration? Evidence from the Italian Case

Leonardo Piccini and Mario Tartaglia ()
Additional contact information
Leonardo Piccini: IRPET
Mario Tartaglia: Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane

A chapter in Socioeconomic Impacts of High-Speed Rail Systems, 2024, pp 131-147 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract As High-speed rail networks have been developed both nationally and internationally as a successful alternative to both air and road over medium-long distances. Inter-city and inter regional traffic, especially between the major metropolitan areas has benefitted greatly from the investment in this network. HSR infrastructure investments are also often viewed by governments in many countries as effective tools to stimulate economic growth. Economic literature has analyzed in many studies the magnitude of the impact of HSR investments. On economic growth, employment, and transportation efficiency. Less studied is the impact of HSR services on economic integration: by improving connectivity and reducing travel time between regions, HSR services can enhance the flow of people, goods, and services between regions, leading to increase trade and investment. This effect can be observed through the lens of Multi Regional Input–Output Tables, a tool used to analyze the interdependence of economic activities between different regions and sectors. The scope of this paper is to assess the effect of HSR connection and passenger flows between regions on their trade integration across different sectors, using Italian regions as case studies. HSR network connects major cities throughout Italy, and, by extensions, their surrounding regional economic systems. After carrying out a descriptive analysis of the major trend in HSR in Italy (both from a passenger and a service perspective), we define potential catchment areas of HSR services and operationalize their evolution since 2010. Then we put this evolution in correlation with a sectorial disaggregated index of economic integration between regions computed on Multi Regional Input–Output Tables, in a quasi-counterfactual setting. We compare pairwise combination of regions with a direct HSR connection with unconnected similar pairs of regions and evaluate if their economic integration indexes are significantly different.

Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:prbchp:978-3-031-53684-7_6

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/9783031536847

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-53684-7_6

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().