ABSTRACT
The trend of the last 40 years in the transport sector has been towards deregulation, and in the US that has also been true of the rail sector, where in 1980 the Staggers Act largely removed regulation. Essentially it has been a part of the reform of European railways designed to achieve at least a degree of separation of infrastructure from operations and to introduce competition between different freight and passenger operators over the same infrastructure. This chapter focuses on the reasons for rail regulation in the European context. It then turns to the literature for guidance on the nature of the regulatory body most likely to succeed in regulating the rail sector. The chapter concludes that Britain comes close to having such a rail regulator and examines the experience of Britain and the degree to which its rail regulatory body has succeeded in its objectives.
