Syuzanna Petrosyan (p), Vahram Abrahamyan

Fumitoshi Mizutani

Transport is one of the most important sectors of the country's economic development. The developed transportation system is the basis for the development and competitiveness of all the sectors of the country's economy, the expansion of foreign economic ties and integration into the world economic system.
Under the current conditions, due to globalization processes, when the economic and trade relations between the states are continuously expanding, the integration of the transit transport routes of the country into the international transport system is of vital importance. For Armenia, which does not have direct access to the sea and whose cross-border transport communication channels do not operate with the 2 neighboring countries, Azerbaijan and Turkey, the development, expansion and effective management of transport routes is of strategic importance.

Mehmet Güney Celbiş (p), Louafi Bouzouina

Syuzanna Petrosyan

Walking and bicycle use are two main active mobility modes. Specifically, within the context of commuting, the adoption of active mobility modes is considered to generate a wide range of positive outcomes with regard to well-being in the individual, social, urban, and spatial levels. The present study aims to discover and interpret novel information regarding the adoption of walking and cycling activities as commuting modes by university students. We investigate complementarity and substitutability between walking and cycling and other modes in a spatial context through the analysis of an original survey dataset collected from the university campuses in Lyon, France. Our research questions are centered on the theme of discovering complex patterns (if they exist) within the determinants of the usage of walking and cycling as a transit mode by students in Lyon through part or the entirety of their commutes.

Fumitoshi Mizutani (p)

Mehmet Guney Celbis

Railway services are generally regulated by the government. Due to the inherent nature of railways as natural monopolies, policies have been implemented to maximize social welfare by keeping the market under government regulation rather than introducing competition into the market. However, under these circumstances, problems have been noted, such as inefficiency in railway organizations. One method of avoiding such problems is to implement unbundling policies such as horizontal separation, vertical separation of rail operation from infrastructure management, and functional separation of passenger and freight services. In addition, privatization, which shifts the provider of railway services from the public to the private sector, and liberalization policies such as the liberalization of market entry, as well as deregulation and the introduction of competition, are also included in these policies.

Various reforms are underway in the railway business worldwide. In Japan, many among the more than 150 railway operators as of 2023 are privately owned, and most provide passenger services. Unlike their European counterparts, many of these operators provide rail services through vertically integrated rail organizations, though some do provide their services through vertically separated rail organizations, as in Europe.

Rail fares are basically regulated by the government. In practice, there are various fare structures such as fares based on km, fares based on block-km, zone fares and flat fares. Furthermore, with regard to fare regulation policies, there are some characteristics such as ceiling fare (price capping) which regulates maximum fares, imposing yardstick regulations for several groups or assessing fares for each individual company. Furthermore, although fares are regulated, special rail charges for providing express service are not strictly regulated but are required to be reported to the government. Furthermore, commuter and school discount rates are applied to regular users who pay regular fares. Fares are set under these various circumstances.

This study analyzes the structure of passenger rail fare of railway operators in Japan. Specifically, this study will analyze (i) what kinds of fare systems actually exist, (ii) whether there is any relationship between the fare system and the demand structure and costs of railway operators, (iii) whether the average fare of railway operators is close to the marginal cost or the average cost, (iv) whether there are any rules for the discount rate of regular fares, and (v) whether there is any relationship between the types of railway industry (e.g. ownership, vertical structure, regulatory policy) and the aforementioned items.