engleski

Financial Aspects of Urban Transport

The demand for urban transport quality is typically above financing possibilities of public authorities. Financing urban transport has always been one of the prime problems of city authorities because of the necessity to connect the city centres with their surroundings and to enable time saving and thus better quality of life for the citizens. This problem especially emerges in the twenty-first century when the citizen requirements for better urban and suburban connectivity are coupled with smart, intermodal and energy-efficient urban transport. The financing problem of urban transport is somewhat simpler in very populated and developed areas as the growing number of public transport users continuously finance urban transport fleet renewal. However, less developed areas have to have integrated pricing and social policies towards the end users of urban transport, which often turns to be unsustainable in the longer period of time. Depending on the project size, financial strength of municipalities and/or central state, urban transport infrastructure construction and maintenance are typically financed from national or local state funds or borrowing. Some urban transport lines can also be given in a concession. Financing urban transport encompasses either financing urban transport infrastructure construction or financing fleet renewal, or combined financing of both urban transport infrastructure and fleet renewal. The EU funds have contributed much to financing urban transport needs, especially in large metropolitan areas. Yet, many countries opt for financing regional and cross regional connectivity by roads, rail, airports or waterways, while urban transport remains a care of national or local public authorities. Most literature is devoted to rail, road and port infrastructure construction in general, while urban transport fleet renewal and operating performance of urban transport operators have not been widely discussed. This chapter aims to partly fill in this gap for the selected cities of formerly planned economies of the Central and Eastern Europe and Southern and Eastern Europe.

urban transport, operating performance, fleet financing, transition economies

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