Home
»
Trains Magazine
»
Forums
»
General Discussion
»
Could open access operators work in the US?

Edit post

Edit your reply below.

Post Body
Enter your post below.
If so-called open access improved competition, it could be a good step.  There may be a lesson in the privatization of the Australian electric power system that might be a workable model. In Victoria, which is one of Australia's states - Australia like the United States is a federal system, the state owned electric system was privatized. It was broken-up into three components: generation, transission, and distribution, and each was sold off to the highest bidder. The power plants (generation) were sold to operators from China, UK, U.S., and Australia.  The distribution system (poles, wires, and energy services) was broken-up into five companies and sold to operators from the UK, U.S., Australia, and Canada. The transmission system was sold to one operator. The designers recognized that breaking-up the transmission system did not make any sense.  It would not enhance competition.  Instead, the transmission system was sold to a third party, which could not own a power plant or distribution company.  The transmission operator developed a set of standards for open access, which allowed the generators and distribution companies to buy space on the transmission system as long as they met the performance standards.  It works pretty well. The same concept might be applicable to the railroads, except I would not see just one infrastructure company.  The U.S. is too large and complex for just one track company. The nation might be better off with three or four track companies.  Any company that met the performance, safety, health, etc. standards could operate a train on the system(s), as long as it demonstrated the financial depth to pay for the access. The rates would be set to recover the fully allocated cost of the system.   The biggest hurdle to open access is the investor owned railroads.  They would never agree to it, unless a crisis beset the rail industry, and they had no better alternatives.
Tags (Optional)
Tags are keywords that get attached to your post. They are used to categorize your submission and make it easier to search for. To add tags to your post type a tag into the box below and click the "Add Tag" button.
Add Tag