Bundling Road and Railway Infrastructure Operators: Analysis of the Impact on Efficiency

Abstract

With the increase in the complementarity of road and railway systems and a growing integration of logistical chains, there is an urgent need to coordinate the management of these two often-independent systems. Portugal has adopted a more radical approach, and with the argument of capturing synergies and reducing costs, merged the road and railway companies, creating the largest Portuguese infrastructure manager, responsible for overseeing the entire road and railway network. This research analyzes from an efficiency perspective the effects of such a policy option. The methodology used was to calculate several scores (using data envelopment analysis), and analyze the impact of a number of external factors [e.g., gross domestic product (GDP) growth, employment, financial crisis, and so on], and policy options (the merger itself), on those scores through multiple regressions. The results show that the merger had a positive impact on efficiency. The merger also improved the overall performance toward negative economic cycles, thus increasing its economic resilience.