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José A. Gómez-Ibáñez Professor Department of Urban Planning and Design |
Publications
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Competition in the Railway Industry: An Inernational Comparative Analysis Regulating Infrastructure: Monopoly, Contracts,
and Discretion Essays in Transportation Economics
and Policy: Revitalizing Toledo's Historic Core
Regulation for Revenue: The Political
Economy of Land Use Exactions, Going Private: The International
Experience with Transport Privatization Autos, Transit and Cities Competition in the Railway Industry:
An Inernational Comparative Analysis
Numberous countries have attempted to improve the performance of their railways by introducting more competition, but there is fierce debate and no consensus on how this is best achieved. This book reveals how railways were an obvious target for refore because they were often loosing traffic and money, and because the government was typically deeply involved as either owner or regulator. This book summarizes and assesses the evidence from the experiences of rail reform in Europe, Latin America, and the United States. In short, the book reveals that no one approach has proven to be best across a wide variety of circumstances. It highlights how unbundling (separating infrastucture from train operations so that independent train operators could compete over common tracks) although attractive in theory, has so far proved complex to implement and delivered only some of the promised benefits. Privatization and deregulation have had more demonstrated success in the freight systems of North and South America, but are still largely untested in the more complex railway networks of Europe. The evidence is arguably slightly stronger for privatization and deregulation than for unbundling, but the jury is still out. Competition in the Railway Industry is invaluable in that it compares the strategies and experiences of different countries in introducting competition in railways, rather than simply focusing on one country and its approach. As such, it will appeal greatly to those inindustry and government interested in railway policy and performance, and privatization and deregulation of utilities more generally. It will also appeal to academics and researchers of public sector, transport and industrial organization.
Regulating Infrastructure: Monopoly, Contracts, and Discretion, 2003, (The Harvard University Press)
In the 1980s and '90s many countries turned to the private sector to provide infrastructure and utilities, such as gas, telephones, and highways--with the idea that market-based incentives would control costs and improve the quality of essential services. But subsequent debacles including the collapse of California's wholesale electricity market and the bankruptcy of Britain's largest railroad company have raised troubling questions about privatization. This book addresses one of the most vexing of these: how can government fairly and effectively regulate "natural monopolies"--those infrastructure and utility services whose technologies make competition impractical? Rather than sticking to economics, José Gómez-Ibáñez draws on history, politics, and a wealth of examples to provide a road map for various approaches to regulation. He makes a strong case for favoring market-oriented and contractual approaches--including private contracts between infrastructure providers and customers as well as concession contracts with the government acting as an intermediary--over those that grant government regulators substantial discretion. Contracts can provide stronger protection for infrastructure customers and suppliers--and greater opportunities to tailor services to their mutual advantage. In some cases, however, the requirements of the firms and their customers are too unpredictable for contracts to work, and alternative schemes may be needed.
Essays in Transportation Economics and Policy:
This comprehensive survey of transportation economic policy pays homage to a classic work, Techniques of Transport Planning, by renowned transportation scholar John R. Meyer. With contributions from leading economists in the field, it includes added emphasis on policy developments and analysis. The book covers the basic analytic methods used in transportation economics and policy analysis; focuses on the automobile, as both the mainstay of American transportation and the source of some of its most serious difficulties; covers key issues of urban public transportation; and analyzes the impact of regulation and deregulation on the U.S. airline, railroad, and trucking industries. In addition to the editors, the contributors are Alan A. Altshuler, Harvard University; Ronald R. Braeutigam, Northwestern University; Robert E. Gallamore, Union Pacific Railroad; Arnold M. Howitt, Harvard University; Gregory K. Ingram, The World Bank; John F. Kain, University of Texas at Dallas; Charles Lave, University of California, Irvine; Lester Lave, Carnegie Mellon University; Robert A. Leone, Boston University; Zhi Liu, The World Bank; Herbert Mohring, University of Minnesota; Steven A. Morrison, Northeastern University; Katherine M. O'Regan, Yale University; Don Pickrell, U.S. Department of Transportation; John M. Quigley, University of California, Berkeley; Ian Savage, Northwestern University; and Kenneth A. Small, University of California, Irvine. Contents
The Toledo studies were conducted in two phases. In the first phase, carried out during the fall of 1993, participants in a graduate seminar at the Kennedy School of Government examined the social and economic strategies that might be employed to ensure the continued vitality of Toledo's core. In the second phase, carried out in the spring of 1994, students in a studio at the Graduate School of Design considered design interventions to support the vitality of the core. The design students received the policy analysis papers prepared in the fall seminar before going to Toledo in January 1994. Central to the design were questions about the extent and manner in which it may be feasible to intervene inside the walls in order to provide for the activities essential to a live, functioning city while, at the same time, strengthening the integrity of the historic center. Revitalizing Toledo's Historic Core documents the results of the findings of both phases. Contents
Over the past two decades Americans have become increasingly skeptical about the benefits of community growth and hostile to new taxes -- while continuing to demand improvements in local services. One response to this tension has been a burgeoning movement to raise public revenue by regulating growth. In this timely book, the authors explain that most growing localities now require private developers to finance public improvements as a condition for receiving permits to build. These permit conditions, known as "exactions," are most commonly used to ensure that infrastructure capacity will be adequate to serve the occupants of new real estate developments and to lessen the harmful effects of these developments on other local citizens. Exactions are often used to finance new roads, water and waste disposal facilities, and public open space, but some communities have begun to require developer financing for such services as day care, job training, low-cost housing, and ride sharing. The authors see the dramatic growth of exaction financing as an epochal shift in the character of American land use regulation. A function once isolated from the local government mainstream is now close to the heart of fiscal and public works decision-making. Politicians find exactions an extremely valuable tactic for resolving land use conflict. Lawyers and developers worry about how to establish appropriate limits on the use of exactions, economists debate their equity and efficiency, and planners consider their effect on urban form. Regulation for Revenue offers an integrated appraisal of exaction financing, showing that exactions come in many forms and that they can be meaningfully evaluated only by comparison with realistic alternatives. These include growth restrictions, tolerance of infrastructure overload, and increased tax and user charges. Contents
"In the 1980s many countries turned to private sources to provide services formerly offered by public agencies. Europeans, particularly the British and the French, were leaders in this movement. Europe has the greatest number of state enterprises to sell back to private investors, since it had nationalized many industries that had remained in the private sector elsewhere in the industrialized world. Developing countries also experimented extensively with privatization in the 1980s, with varying enthusiasm and effectiveness. Finally, political developments in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe at the end of the 1980s made privatization a worldwide phenomenon, popular with a remarkable range of governments. Transport was no exception to this pattern; indeed, in many ways it was at the cutting edge. . . ." (excerpt from Chapter 1) Contents 1. Introduction PART ONE - Privatizing Services: Urban Bus Transit PART TWO - Privatizing Infrastructure: High-Performance
Highways PART THREE - Profitability and Privatization: Airports
and Urban Rail Transit PART FOUR - Conclusion Index Tables Figures
Urban transportation problems have frequently been touched upon in the many urban policy studies sponsored by the Twentieth Century Fund. But it was not until José A. Gómez-Ibáñez and John R. Meyer submitted a proposal for a thorough assessment of urban transportation policies, that the Fund was presented with an opportunity to sponsor and supervise a project that focused directly on the role of transportation in our cities. This study provides fresh and compelling documentation of the pervasive role of the automobile. Despite the energy crisis, and despite the loss of the competitive edge once held by the American automobile industry -- which pioneered in mass production and which has had so great an economic, social, and cultural influence on our society -- Americans continue to rely, perhaps excessively, on the automobile. Certainly, our attachment to the automobile has been accompanied by multiple problems for our cities -- street and highway congestion, high levels of gas consumption that have contributed to air pollution and affected our balance of payments, and high accident and casualty rates that have increased insurance premiums and resulted in tragedy for those involved. The public policy response to these and other problems -- which has involved billions in expenditures -- has been either ineffective or inadequate. It is the thesis of Gómez-Ibáñez and Meyer that the automobile will remain the nation's dominant form of urban transportation and that transportation programs that fail to assume -- and accept -- its continued significance cannot work. Their own policy recommendations are directed at taming and containing the automobile and its role, in part by redesigning and reengineering the automobile itself. They also consider the options available in the form of mass transit facilities and other, more modest, arrangements. But they make a strong case that critical attention must be paid to civilizing the automobile. This solution may itself seem tame or pedestrian. In reality, though, it may be the beginning of wisdom for getting out of the transportation mess. (excerpts from Foreword)
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This report documents studies of the historic center of Toledo,
Spain, conducted by students in the Graduate Schools of Government
and Design at Harvard University during academic year 1993-94.
The studies were performed in collaboration with Complutense University
in Madrid and the University of Castilla-La Mancha in Toledo and
under the sponsorship of the Real Colegio Complutense, an academic
center established in cooperation with Harvard University.
