Efficiency benchmarking and its determinants in high-speed railways: Reference for China

The high-speed railway (HSR) performance has drawn considerable attention from international scholars and policymakers. One heatedly-discussed topic is measuring HSR efficiency and its important determinants, particularly HSR organizational structures. The main contribution of our research is the adoption of the multi-stage Network Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and Tobit Model, which provides a rational and coherent method to address this issue.

We select the dataset from main HSR countries during the period of 2009–2018, and rank the efficiency of HSRs of different countries. Subsequently we examine the relationship between HSR efficiency and characteristic determinants, along with geographical and economic indicators that may influence the model.

The results have revealed the HSR productivity difference do exist among countries. Overall, Asia's HSR systems demonstrate higher efficiency compared to those in Europe; while China's HSR efficiency ranks medium in the HSR multi-stages chain but higher in the service stage. Furthermore, the determinants of organizational structure can significantly effect on the effectiveness of HSR systems under a certain transport density threshold. In conclusion, regulators and operators should endeavor to increase traffic by meeting the demand to improve system efficiency. For China, focusing on vertical integration should be the key aspect of future HSR reform.