Rail infrastructure charging in Indonesia the issue of improving rail service

SANTOSO, Kurniawan Agung, Prof. Dr. Ir. Siti Malkhamah, M.Sc

2010 | Tesis |

This paper is focused largely on the implementation of rail infrastructure charging in Indonesia and its underlying problems while its application in Britain is used as a comparator. In line with the restructuring of Indonesian railways, the setting of track access charges (TAC) is one of the important considerations during restructuring. The current implementation does not reflect the reform of Indonesian railways allowing the multiple train operators. Another important consideration is the separation between the infrastructure provider and the train service operator; this necessary change in the institutional reform is needed in order to support a fair and non-discriminatory mechanism in applying TAC as well as improving the track quality through a better maintenance system. In the case study, there are two methods for setting the TAC which are proposed. First, a cost based system is derived from the infrastructure maintenance and operation (IMO). This method is derived in order to to observe the basic charge per individual train; the passing tonnage-km of the train plays an important role in determining the basic charge. Secondly, a capacity charge is introduced to manage the operation of train services in the peak and off-peak periods. The analysis on the network taken as the case study showed that the current operation of the train service does not optimise the capacity available in the network; more slots are still available in the network. The varying characteristics of train operation together with the limited amount of rolling stock available and demand considerations influence the reduced use of capacity available. It is argued that the implementation of rail infrastructure charging will derive an efficient use of rail infrastructure. As the new institution of rail infrastructure has been established in the railway reform in Indonesia, a fair mechanism in charging the TOCs for using the rail infrastructure can be achieved in multiple train operators. This will lead to a better quality rail infrastructure leading to improvements to train services for both passenger and freight.

Kata Kunci : Rail infrastructure charging,Railways restructuring,Separation of infrastructure and operation