MUTUAL COOPERATION IN PUBLIC TRANSIT

Twenty years of cooperation within transit cooperatives and transit federations in West Germany have resulted in significant improvements for passengers in terms of coordinated schedules, combined networks, and unified fares. These convincing advantages have led to a more area-covering system of federations in large urban areas. Today, especially in urban areas, it is hard to imagine how to handle public transit without "transport communities." Despite an increase in private auto use from 174 to 457 cars per 1,000 inhabitants over this 20-year period and despite other unfavorable preconditions, such as car-oriented changes in settlement structures, public transit roughly held its position in absolute numbers of journeys; that, however, means a declining share of total transport performance. Transit cooperatives are especially successful in terms of patronage and modal split where improvements of transit services are accompanied by comprehensive parking concepts for the inner city to control the number of vehicles by parking supply and by parking rates. For most of the transit federations, park-and-ride is an important planning issue to attract car drivers to public transit. Transit federations, as well as public transit in general, do not reach cost coverage. The extremely high deficit of the Rein-Ruhr cooperative has caused concern about costs and benefits. In terms of deficit per inhabitant within the service area, the deficits of the different transit federations are similar. The costs for the head agency of a transit federation itself account for about 1 to 2% of revenues. Without transit federations in urban areas, there would be even lower economic results and lower and more inconvenient transit supply and consequently less patronage and more private automobile traffic.

• Record URL:
  • https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.c104685899?urlappend=%3Bseq=317
• Availability:
  • Find a library where document is available. Order URL: http://worldcat.org/oclc/7938948
• Corporate Authors:

  Eno Transportation Foundation

  P.O. Box 2055, Saugatuck Station
  Westport, CT  United States  06880-0055
• Authors:
  • Topp, H H
• Publication Date: 1990-4

Media Info

• Features: Figures; Tables;
• Pagination: p. 303-315
• Serial:
  • Transportation Quarterly
  • Volume: 44
  • Issue Number: 2
  • Publisher: Eno Transportation Foundation
  • ISSN: 0278-9434

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Cooperatives; Deficits; Improvements; Level of service; Modal split; Park and ride; Parking regulations; Public transit; Ridership; Urban areas
• Geographic Terms: Germany
• Old TRIS Terms: Transit federations
• Subject Areas: Planning and Forecasting; Public Transportation;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00494570
• Record Type: Publication
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: May 31 1990 12:00AM