High speed travel service system design cooperating rail and air transport

This paper develops a methodology to assess the possibility of air and rail cooperation in a corridor. A generalized travel model is adopted to find the equilibrium price of rail and air transport in studied routes, and a profit satisfaction index is calculated to determine the cooperation possibility from operators' perspective. The methodology is subsequently applied to a case involving 6 city-pairs and a high speed travel service system is designed accordingly. The general conclusions suggest that the relative location of cities, market capacity and transfer cost are key factors affecting cooperation and competition.