Consumers’ Satisfaction and Regulation of Local Public Transport: Evidence from European Cities

Abstract

In the last three decades a wave of privatization and deregulation policies affected most European countries. This process involved many sectors, among which the provision of public transport. The research question addressed by this work is straightforward: is satisfaction correlated to the number of providers of local transport services? We use the results of a large survey conducted in 2009 in 33 European cities and analyse the probability of satisfaction with standard probit models. Results show that highest levels of satisfaction are correlated to the presence of one single provider, as opposed to an industry structure where more providers compete with one another or are not integrated.

Keywords: consumer satisfaction, liberalisation, urban transit

JEL Classification: L50, O18, R42