Schienen-Control Newsletter Schienen-Control

7th Symposium of Schienen-Control in October

On October 4, 2022, the 7th Symposium of Schienen-Control will take place in the Dachsaal of the Urania in Vienna.
The event's motto is"Current Topics in Competition Regulation" and will bring international experts from the railway sector to Vienna for a high-level exchange.

The speakers will provide the basis for exciting discussions with presentations on topics such as international rail competition, the interoperability of rail transport, current rulings by the European Court of Justice, European integration in the rail sector, booking international rail tickets, the development of rail transport in Austria, and rail customer satisfaction.

The symposium program can be viewed here: Program 2022

Please register by September 27: symposium@schienencontrol.gv.at

Schienen-Control 2021 annual report

In June, Schienen-Control duly published its annual report for 2021. The year was marked by a recovery in the rail sector from the declines caused by the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Overall, the performance indicators for rail passenger transport rose again, continuing the encouraging growth trend seen in the years prior to 2020. In rail freight transport, where volume and transport performance had grown in the single-digit percentage range, an upward trend was observed in all indicators.

Passenger numbers rose by a good 15 percent in 2021, mainly due to the increase in passenger numbers. The range of mobility options was greater than ever before due to the gradual return to the regular timetable and its targeted expansion. Long-distance transport, which was suspended at times for extended periods in 2020, increased by 18 percent. As a result, the average journey distance increased slightly in 2021.

In rail freight transport, growth rates in the upper single digits were recorded for both net and gross tonne-kilometers traveled and net tonnage transported. Rail Cargo Austria and its competitors again reported higher figures, with the gains being greater for railways outside the ÖBB Group. As a result, their market share increased by several percentage points for all three indicators, reaching almost 40 percent for volume and around 37 percent for transport performance.

At the end of 2021, there were 81 railway companies in Austria. A total of 62 companies were authorized to operate trains on the ÖBB network. Four of these are part of the ÖBB Group. Eleven other companies are owned by foreign incumbents (market-dominating companies) due to direct or indirect shareholdings. The group of private companies continued to grow strongly, already comprising 36 companies in 2021. Finally, eleven companies were majority-owned by public institutions. The data can be found in our annual report, which you can access here.

apf takes stock of the first half of the summer in the aviation and rail sectors

The 2022 summer travel season is drawing to a close, and it is therefore time for our arbitration board to take stock of the situation. Due to operational hurdles and a sharp rise in passenger numbers, the number of cases in the air and rail sectors is also increasing and has now returned to pre-crisis levels.

From the perspective of the apf arbitration board for aviation, the summer of 2022 was very turbulent. A wide variety of problems led to flight irregularities throughout Europe. In addition, passenger numbers rose sharply in the summer. The number of passengers this year almost reached pre-crisis levels.
With the start of the travel season, this has created major personnel and operational hurdles. In the course of our arbitration work, this is evident on the one hand from the large number of complaints we have received, and on the other hand from the fact that we have received an unusually high number of complaints on issues outside our jurisdiction.

These include all kinds of baggage problems and problems with booking platforms. Between July and August , we received a total of 1,070 complaints, which led to 670 proceedings being opened. As was already the case in 2019, the actual arbitration proceedings often involved delays due to capacity bottlenecks in various airspaces or, as frequently reported in the media, problems with check-in and security checks. The latter two issues were characteristic of this summer, with hardly any passengers unaffected, especially at the beginning of the season. As of August 31, 2022, the apf was able to mediate a total of EUR 144,000 in the form of refunds, compensation, and penalty reductions in the aviation sector.

In the rail sector, apf has observed significantly longer response times at Austria's largest rail company, ÖBB-Personenverkehr AG, for several months. According to the EU Rail Passenger Rights Regulation, the company must respond within one month or, in the case of compensation for delays, make payment. Ticket refunds requested by passengers must be paid out within two months at the latest, in accordance with EisbBFG. In total, apf recorded 235 complaints or inquiries in the rail sector in July and August. This represents a significant increase of more than 60% in inquiries compared to summer 2021. In the 162 cases opened, a total of EUR 12,500 was obtained for rail passengers in the form of refunds, penalty reductions, or compensation.

The apf also takes a critical view of the changes to the contact form used by ÖBB-Personenverkehr AG. In the event of a complaint, passengers receive an automated confirmation of receipt without any reference to the content of the complaint, such as a reference number or a confirmation including the text of the complaint. In the opinion of the apf, this represents a deterioration in service, as these services were previously offered by ÖBB.

However, it is also no longer possible to contact the company directly by email. In many cases, telephone enquiries are referred to the above-mentioned contact form. This means that those affected currently have to fill out a new form in order to follow up on an enquiry that has already been submitted. After apf pointed out these problems, ÖBB Personenverkehrs AG rejected the suggested changes, citing data protection concerns.

Federal Network Agency to take over IRG-Rail chairmanship in 2023

Annegret Groebel and Karsten Otte from the Federal Network Agency (BNetzA), the German rail market regulator, will chair IRG-Rail in 2023. This was decided at the plenary meeting of the European Network of Railway Regulators in Split.

At the plenary meeting of the Independent Regulators' Group-Rail (IRG-Rail), work was also carried out on the regulators' position on impact analysis in the context of the planned amendment to the Freight Corridor Regulation (EU) 2010/913. A corresponding paper has now been published and is available here.

A unanimously adopted and now published position paper addresses the role of regulators in connection with the publication of service facility descriptions on web portals. The IRG-Rail position has been communicated to RailNet Europe (RNE) and the International Union for Road-Rail Combined Transport (UIRR), among others, which jointly operate such a portal, and can be accessed here.

The next IRG-Rail plenary meeting, the last one chaired by Nikola Popović from the Croatian regulator HAKOM, will take place on November 15 and 16 in Dubrovnik.

IRG-Rail Market Report: Austria remains the number one rail country among EU member states

IRG-Rail published its 10th annual market observation report back in April. It shows that Austria remained the number one rail country within the European Union in 2020 with 832 kilometers of rail (2019: 1,507 kilometers). Close behind, with similarly sharp declines, were France (829 kilometers) and Sweden (783 kilometers), followed by Denmark, Germany, and Belgium.

The 10th IRG-Rail Annual Market Monitoring Report covers developments in European rail transport and COVID-related relief measures in 2020. It provides a comprehensive overview of developments and economic conditions in the rail sector.

ÖBB performance data for Q2 2022 / New market entrants

At the end of the second quarter of 2022, freight transport performance (gross tonne-kilometers) on the ÖBB infrastructure network was five percent higher than in the same quarter of 2021. Compared with the pre-COVID figure from the second quarter of 2019, this represents an increase of four percent. A direct comparison of freight train kilometers traveled also shows growth of four percent between 2021 and 2022, with the 2019 level already slightly exceeded. Freight train numbers, on the other hand, were below the figures for previous years, with only the historically worst second quarter of 2020 being exceeded in this respect.

Passenger transport has once again grown strongly, with ten percent more train kilometers traveled compared to 2021 and eight percent more compared to 2019 – resulting in another record high. Six percent more train journeys compared to 2021 and significantly more compared to all previous years underscore the strong increase.

Rail Cargo Austria's transport performance declined slightly compared with the second quarter of the previous year and fell by 11 percent compared with 2019. As a result, its market share is down again by three percentage points to 60 percent. The share of "traditional" block train transport in total rail freight transport volume has grown slightly to 39 percent. Combined freight transport, which had recently grown strongly, has declined to 31 percent, while single wagon transport, which is in decline, stands at just under 30 percent.

 

infrastructureThe electrification of the Graz-Köflacher Bahn rail infrastructure began with the groundbreaking ceremony in Deutschlandsberg on July 12, 2022. The takeover by ÖBB Infrastructure is to be legally effective retroactively as of January 1, 2022. A GKB customer service center is to be set up and operated at the Weststeiermark station on the newly built Koralmbahn railway line.

COVID aid

The reference period of Regulation (EU) 2020/1429 (which includes, among other things, the possibility of reducing or suspending the IBE) has been extended until the end of 2022 by Delegated Regulation (EU) 2022/1036. The former now covers the period from March 1, 2020, to December 31, 2022.

Market participant updates

• MMV-Rail Austria GmbH has been operatingunder the new name PSP Cargo Group Austria GmbH since July 1, 2022 .
• RheinCargo GmbH has been operating onthe ÖBB network as a new rail transport company since August 1, 2022. The company was founded in 2012 as a logistics service provider and operates six Rhine ports (including in Düsseldorf, Cologne, and Neuss) as well as its own international rail transport company.
• RegioJet AT has hada usage agreement with ÖBB Infrastructure since March 15, 2022. The takeover of operational management (previously provided by WESTbahn) took place on April 1, 2022. RegioJet's services between Prague and Budapest via Vienna Central Station are now operated independently on the Austrian section of the route (Břeclav – Hegyeshalom).

New WESTBahn services to Innsbruck and Munich

ÖBB-Personenverkehr AG has withdrawn its application for an assessment of the economic balance of its transport services.
This brings the proceedings before the Schienen-Control to an end and means that, from a regulatory perspective, WESTbahn Management GmbH's new transport services from Vienna to Innsbruck can be implemented when the timetable changes in December 2022.

WESTbahn Management GmbH had notified the Schienen-Control of its intention to operate trains between Vienna and Innsbruck from the 2023 timetable period onwards. ÖBB-Personenverkehr AG then applied to the Schienen-Control to examine whether these new trains would jeopardize the economic balance of its services.

The intention to operate a new commercially viable rail passenger service must be notified to the regulatory authority at least 18 months before the start of the network timetable period in which the services are to be operated. This is based on Section 65(5) of the EisbG, which implements Article 38(4) of Directive 2012/34/EU. In particular, railway undertakings operating public service transport on the same route may, in this case, request an examination of the economic equilibrium. Further details on the methodology of the examination can be found here.

As a result, the Schienen-Control , as the regulatory authority, will examine whether the new service is likely to have a significant negative impact on existing services within the framework of a public service contract.
Following the withdrawal of the application by ÖBB-Personenverkehr AG, there are no regulatory obstacles to a new service between Innsbruck and Vienna.

In addition, WESTBahn Management GmbH has been operating services between Vienna Westbahnhof and Munich Central Station since April 2022.
Since August, the service has comprised six trains per day in each direction. According to information from WESTBahn, three trainsets are to run daily to Innsbruck, thereby expanding long-distance services in Tyrol.