Transport Economics and Management最新文献

This paper theoretically and quantitatively investigates the effects of structural reforms – separation between infrastructure operations and train operations and the introduction of competition – on the degree of market power downstream, as measured by the Lerner index, by explicitly considering economies of scale at the infrastructure level and regulated access fees. We find that vertical separation reduces the degree of market power when there is a monopoly downstream. Besides, under vertical separation, the Lerner index under duopoly downstream exceeds that under monopoly when economies of scale are large enough. This follows from incomplete pass-through of access fees to prices. Our quantitative analysis indicates that, compared to separation, the Lerner index is higher and consumer surplus and social welfare are also higher in the case of a vertically integrated monopoly. With competition downstream, an integrated structure yields decreases in the integrated operator’s degree of market power and modest gains in terms of consumer surplus and social welfare for low degrees of product differentiation compared to separation. Larger economies of scale result in lower rail prices and access fees, which enhance consumer surplus and industry profits although the Lerner indices go up.

The regulatory change in takeoff and landing restrictions that occurred at Newark Liberty Airport provides an opportune set of conditions to study the effect of a plausibly exogenous shock to airfares. In 2016, the Federal Aviation Administration changed Newark Liberty’s classification from Level 3 to Level 2 (less restrictive designation). In order to isolate the policy impact on airfares, we compare airfare changes in markets that include Newark as endpoint with markets that do not. These markets are analyzed before and after the policy event with a special emphasis on United Airlines which controlled 73% of the slots at Newark. While airfares declined overall, the airfare gap between the Newark and non-Newark markets suggests that Newark airfares were shielded from the full extent of the airfare decrease, resulting in a lesser decline than would have been anticipated in the absence of the regulatory change.

The Real Options (RO) approach is a powerful tool for decision analysis in dynamic or non-stationary stochastic settings, as it considers the value of decision flexibility under uncertainty. In recent years, there has been a significant increase in the use of the RO approach in the transportation literature, where it has been applied to model and analyze various topics in different transportation sectors. To better understand the development of RO analysis in transportation research, we conduct a review of 51 papers from 19 internationally-renowned transportation journals published in the past 30 years. These publications are categorized into three main areas: maritime, aviation, and road/railway/transit. We examine the themes, sources of uncertainty, models, and solving methods used in each publication to identify possible future research directions. Overall, our review highlights the growing use of the RO approach in transportation research and its potential for improving decision-making in uncertain environments. The insights gained from this review can help researchers identify areas for future investigation and facilitate the development of more effective and efficient transportation systems.

This study investigates the pricing regime choices between per-flight and/or per-passenger charges for international airports. Each country may choose (i) mix charges for per-flight and per-passenger charges, (ii) per-flight charges only, (iii) per-passenger charges only, and (iv) marginal-operating-cost pricing for each type of charge (Duo-MOC pricing). Each country’s airline competes on flight frequency and passenger volume in the next stage. The global welfare maximization shows that the global welfare levels rank as follows: mix charges (which leads to the first-best outcome), per-passenger charges only, and per-flight charges only (equivalent to Duo-MOC pricing). Regarding local welfare maximization, if both countries choose the same pricing regime in the first stage, then each country’s maximum local welfare achieved in the second airport stage is ranked as follows: Duo-MOC pricing, per-flight charges only, mix charges, and per-passenger charges only. If each country is allowed to choose different regimes, each chooses mix charges to achieve a unique equilibrium. A typical prisoner’s dilemma occurs. The local (and global) welfare rankings under local welfare maximization, combined with the unique equilibrium in the pricing regime choice game, provides clear and sharp policy implications for international airports.