Model definition and optimisation of unit cost functions in service integration of bus services

The paper summarizes the socio-economic evaluation of impacts, revenues, costs and performances of transit systems as perceived from a different point of view by local authorities and by economic operators, requiring therefore an independent perspective to evaluate the level of supplied services, the amount of subsidies and the definition of minimum services.The introduction in Italy of bids for the market in the recent legislation implies that more potentialoperators can compete for the franchise, therefore increasing the elasticity of supply in the publictransport system, a system which in Italy still relies strongly on subsides. In the paper the use oftraditional indicators, combined with the analysis of operating costs, is proposed to evaluate theperformances offered by alternative configurations of a transit system operating in an urban area by using an efficiency approach.A comparison between the application of the proposed procedure to a company operating under publicpropriety and a private operator highlights the stress points when different approaches are led tooperate side by side. Considerations are presented in the conclusions.