Urban transport governance reform in Barcelona

Daniel Albalate, Germà Bel and Joan Calzada

No 201009, IREA Working Papers from University of Barcelona, Research Institute of Applied Economics

Abstract: The unusual mixed public-private structure of the urban bus market in the metropolitan area of Barcelona provides an interesting context in which to analyze the management challenges and opportunities of the partial privatization of public services. Initiatives used by the public regulator to promote competition for contracts, such as short term concessions to private contractors and the removal of entry barriers, have considerable potential for improving efficiency and quality. The growth in the share of routes managed by private firms in recent years shows that privatization is a credible threat that may well stimulate improved performance among public managers. The type of reform implemented in Barcelona is of interest to all metropolitan areas large enough to operate under constant returns to scale regimes, and suitable for potential concessions of routes in segregated areas inside the metropolitan area, so as not to miss out on the benefits of economies of density.

Keywords: Privatization; mixed public-private; regulation; competition JEL classification: (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 32 pages
Date: 2010-06, Revised 2010-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-pbe, nep-reg and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.ub.edu/irea/working_papers/2010/201009.pdf (application/pdf)

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:ira:wpaper:201009

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IREA Working Papers from University of Barcelona, Research Institute of Applied Economics Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Alicia García ().