“Currently, in Romania, passenger rail transport is mainly represented by automotive vehicles, 82.2%, buses, 12.9% and only 4.9% by railways. Road freight transport has a market share of 76.3%, while only 18.5% of freight volumes is carried by rail. Thus, railway transport has become a transport mode of minor importance at national level”, said Marius Chiper, General Manager, CFR SA, present at the Railway Pro Technology and Services Forum, organized by Club Feroviar and Railway Pro together with the Romanian Railway Industry Association (AIF), in Arad on 5-6 April.
“Compared to other transport modes, rail transport generates the smallest external costs. For example, in Romania, the external costs of automotive transport are taken over by the state, which generates a competitive advantage of railway transport compared to this transport mode”, underlined Marius Chiper.
A comparative analysis on external costs, carried out by CFR SA, shows that a 10% modal transfer from road to railway could generate an annual saving of 1% of GDP. The report between road and railway transport, on track access costs, is 20 to 1, placing railway transport in a competitive disadvantage.
The report between railway and road transport, regarding the public funds allocated for transport infrastructures is 1 to 10, the latter being the share of road transport, a fact that also disadvantages railway transport from a competitive point of view.
Underfinancing is necessary to compensate for the competitive disadvantages artificially generated, but also for the distortions in the transport market. The decline of the railway transport is mainly generated by the unfair competition environment in the transport market, shows CFR SA’s report.
To re-establish a fair competitive environment in land transport, we must act on two directions, thus, we need to recreate the public financing balance, as well as to rebalance the distribution of operation costs for land transport modes.
“It is necessary to create mechanisms to charge automotive transport the way railway transport is charged and it is also necessary to create another competitive mechanism to finance railway transport and the financing needs to be dimensioned in such a way as to cover all the costs of the railway infrastructure manager”, said Marius Chiper.
“If we apply this action plan and we focus on the activity of adjusting the gaps between two transport modes, we will be capable to have a financially self-supporting rail transport or even profitable rail transport”, added CFR SA’s general manager.
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