Europees OV: Meer vrije markt, betere spelregels

Further on the railway tendering path

Contracting in urban public transport

The Netherlands

Looking back on the period since the adoption of EU Regulation 91/440, one can observe that the Dutch railway sector has been submitted to several changes in regulatory approach. This chapter provides an overview of these developments in the Netherlands from 1992 to 2008. It provides new information by including the findings of a recent official...

The Japanisation of the Dutch railways

Naar een betere organisatie van het openbaar vervoer in Nederland: Wat kunnen we leren van het buitenland? Een terug- en vooruitblik na 18 jaar

Development of railway contracting for the national passenger rail services in the Netherlands

This article mainly gives an overview of the policy developments in the Dutch railway sector over the past decade. The sector has come a long way and the outlook now looks positive. Customer satisfaction and performance have improved and the number of people that travel by train is rising. The development of a more long-term policy window for...

Are we doing it wrong or do we expect too much? Forces that push authorities to become public transport designers

Based on experiences with tendering and organizing meetings to exchange lessons between parties involved in tendering, the authors search for reasons for disappointment of authorities in operators’ efforts to develop PT in favour of their travellers. There are three main causes: (1) there is freedom, but the contract is bad, (2) there is freedom...

Superincentive public transport contracting in the greater Amsterdam area

All suburban/regional bus services around Amsterdam City have been submitted to competitive tendering. This is done under a very innovative form of revenue-based contract that can be classified as a ‘super incentive’ contract. Payments to operators (‘subsidies’) are based on realised passenger revenues and no longer on the costs of supplying...

Railway separation: European diversity

The European railway sector currently exhibits a wide variety of institutional configu- rations as a result of the reforms initiated by European legislation. This chapter de- scribes the situation in the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Great-Britain and France, providing a good coverage of the current variety of institutional arrangements in...

Competitive tendering in The Netherlands: Central planning vs. functional specifications?

The competitive tendering regime introduced in The Netherlands in 2001 aims at stimulating innovation in service design. One can observe, in the meantime, a variety of arrangements as transport authorities vary considerably in the level of service design freedom they give to operators, both in tendering and within contracts. This paper presents...