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Bus deregulation in other countries - iMarkeh - 16/04/2019 01:50
Does anyone know of other countries where the bus services are privatised. Whether it be a franchised system like London or fully privatised. I am interested to see how the rest of the world works. I know quite a lot of areas have government owned buses but there must be somewhere else where buses are deregulated.
RE: Bus deregulation in other countries - Brickmill - 16/04/2019 13:35
(16/04/2019 01:50)iMarkeh Wrote: Does anyone know of other countries where the bus services are privatised. Whether it be a franchised system like London or fully privatised. I am interested to see how the rest of the world works. I know quite a lot of areas have government owned buses but there must be somewhere else where buses are deregulated.
Franchising or similar is common across Europe and I think North America but full deregulation is largely confined. to so called "Third World" countries
RE: Bus deregulation in other countries - gilesbus1 - 16/04/2019 19:47
New Zealand privatised its bus network in the early 1990's and went for a franchising system, this was why at one stage both Wellington City Transport and Auckland City Transport were owned by Stagecoach, they further changed the regulation two years ago to favour smaller groups, rather than Richies and Infratrilthe large group that succeeded Stagecoach, hence why Wellington received a large batch of Optare MetroCity's then. The network is regulated and not on a large scale deregulation model though.
Australia similarly has gradually privatised its network on a state by state basis in some cases, Melbourne did it several years ago and Sydney is doing it with some parts of NSW going to Transit Systems the Australian owners of Tower Transit in London, however again they haven't gone for large scale deregulation and in Australia buses in most major cities must ware a corporate state livery. Here operators like Tower, Comfort Delgro, RATP and Transdev have largely mopped up City Services, with one or two exceptions.
In rural area's in Australia buses have never been publicly owned and are just operated by various different independent operators, but I aren't sure if its to regulation or whether they just run what they want, however there seems to be no competition on routes.
Hong Kong's routes are provided as they always have been by large Privately owned groups but under contract to the state, not on a free for all.
Singapore have started selling off their operations to Private owners and Transit Systems and Go Ahead have won area franchises here, but again its a State livery and State regulated network.
As Brickmill says apart from in the UK outside London I thing full competition without legislation is largely confined to some African, and maybe Caribbean Countries and also outside large Cities in Asia due to political unrest. It wasn't deregulation there just isn't people to implement regulation and a lack of people to enforce any regulation, and gangs that would not follow or would use violence not to follow legislation. If you want to know more about the situation in various Major Cities around the World you need to read Janes Urban Transit Systems in a larger local Library, you wouldn't want to buy it, firstly because its out of Print and when it was copies cost about £700 each, I have managed to pick up secondhand volumes over the years for a fraction of the Price. Cities like Liverpool and Manchester should have copies of Jane's in their local Libraries reference sections, although it is likely they will be several years old, due to cuts in local authority funding.
RE: Bus deregulation in other countries - iMarkeh - 16/04/2019 22:43
Thank you both for your input, it's interesting that no non third world country has opted for the full deregulation model. I know it has it's pros and cons but as does the government owned model. I would have expected one or two more countries to have opted for a full deregulation model (obviously we have the traffic commissioner and people like that to keep an eye on things but the services are upto the companies (commercial) or the council (funded).
RE: Bus deregulation in other countries - gilesbus1 - 17/04/2019 13:30
(16/04/2019 22:43)iMarkeh Wrote: Thank you both for your input, it's interesting that no non third world country has opted for the full deregulation model. I know it has it's pros and cons but as does the government owned model. I would have expected one or two more countries to have opted for a full deregulation model (obviously we have the traffic commissioner and people like that to keep an eye on things but the services are upto the companies (commercial) or the council (funded).
I believe no market except the UK has ever embraced deregulation in the Third World they were never regulated in the first place so not de-regulation as such but no regulation. The initial scheme in New Zealand is the nearest from what I understand, and that had some advice taken from the UK as to privatisation, but its more on a London model than anything else and the Country as far as I know unlike others owns no buses all are sourced by the operator and merely painted in the town or cities chosen livery. One victim of the New Zealand scheme was Christchurch when it first started.
The Corporation lost most of the work to Richies, a substantial independent meaning one depot had to close however under its new name Red Bus it managed to retain most of the rest of the network and also won other work back later.
Christchurch of course was the only place in the Southern Hemisphere that operated Bristol RELL's, these were fitted with Leyland 510 engines as on a Leyland National and sounded exactly like Leyland Nationals rather than the Bristol RE's we were used to find here, although some later were fitted with Gardner's in secondhand ownership, they still had a largely Leyland National noise coming from them. This was like Northern Ireland these were built in the late 1970's because the operator didn't want Leyland Nationals and threatened to buy German built buses otherwise. Leyland agreed to do Bristol RE's provided they were fitted with the Leyland 510 engine rather than lose the work. Christchurch later had a Leyland B21 which was a bus built with Leyland National running units but fitted with local bodywork, It looked little different from the Bristol RE but remained unique in Christchurch, more Leyland B21's ran in Australia were only one Mark 2 Leyland National was sold to an independent.
RE: Bus deregulation in other countries - gilesbus1 - 22/04/2019 19:28
Paris and French Bus markets to open up to tendering and UK operators Arriva and FirstGroup said to be interested and encouraged by the French Government.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-france-transportation-buses/paris-region-opens-bus-system-to-competition-idUKKCN1RT1S4
RE: Bus deregulation in other countries - Barney - 26/04/2019 15:29
(22/04/2019 19:28)gilesbus1 Wrote: Paris and French Bus markets to open up to tendering and UK operators Arriva and First Group said to be interested and encouraged by the French Government.
https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-france-transportation-buses/paris-region-opens-bus-system-to-competition-idUKKCN1RT1S4
Isn't Arriva a wholly-owned subsidiary of the German government that is preparing to sell its stake in said company?
Also, how is it that when talk of franchising in the UK outside of London is mentioned people's heads start spinning but it is deemed acceptable for British companies to bid for franchises in Europe?
RE: Bus deregulation in other countries - gilesbus1 - 26/04/2019 19:39
(26/04/2019 15:29)Barney Wrote: Isn't Arriva a wholly-owned subsidiary of the German government that is preparing to sell its stake in said company?
Also, how is it that when talk of franchising in the UK outside of London is mentioned people's heads start spinning but it is deemed acceptable for British companies to bid for franchises in Europe?
Yes, Arriva is a wholly owned company owned by Deutsche Bahn which is German Government owned, and it does state that in the article posted above, as for the second part of the question you'd have to ask the operators concerned why, as the profits in France anyway are said to be fairly low and rural services between towns tend to be operated by coaches and independent operators anyway already.