Organising authorities
 What are organising authorities?
Organising authorities (OA) refer to a public or publicly-owned organisation with a legal responsibility to plan or regulate public transport services in a specified geographic area.
See the UITP Organising Authorities Division
Developments and trends
The framework in which public transport companies operate is largely determined by the organising authority.
First of all, the organising authority determines the level of competition within a given area or on a given route. Indeed, although public transport has often been supplied in a monopolistic way, another option is to give a temporary concession that is tendered periodically (‘competition for the market’). The government can also establish competition ‘in’ the market, where everyone who complies with general regulations can offer any regular route.
Second, the organising authority determines the ownership regimes: a public transport company can be a public administration, a publicly-owned company at arms’ length from the government administration, or a privately-owned company.
Third, in each of these frameworks, the organising authorities can set some of the characteristics of the supply of public transport by imposing public service requirements (PSR) such as providing accessibility, special fares for designated groups, stringent environmental and accessibility requirements, and commercially unviable routes and time schedules.
Consequently, public transport companies request some sort of compensation for fulfilling these PSR. Moreover, organising authorities often impose maximum prices that will often not enable the recovery of fixed costs. This is certainly the case of public transport modes with high infrastructure costs such as rail. As recognition of this situation, public transport financing also includes public funding.
Writing explicit contracts between authorities and operators (where both the PSR and the corresponding compensations are written down), is becoming more and more accepted as a tool to govern the relations between operators and authorities. Of course, this trend creates new challenges for both parties, and the exchange of good practices in this field will become crucial.
Read more
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The need for restructuring of authorities in Eastern and Central Europe
Public Service Contracts in the European Union and Contractual Relationships
2nd UITP International Conference on Public Transport Financing
The Finance Dilemma: Growing Requirements versus Declining Funds
Organisation and Major Players of Short Distance Public Transport
Next events
COMMITTEE
ORGANISING AUTHORITIES
7-8 October 2010, Hamburg, Germany
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UITP Organising Authorities Division
Missions and issues List of members Working groups Information for members
Introduction
The UITP Organising Authorities Division consists of two bodies:
- the Organising Authorities Assembly
- the Organising Authorities Committee
The Organising Authorities Committee deals with issues of mobility policy, organisation and funding of public transport. The Committee meets twice a year in one of the member cities.
The current Chairman of the Organising Authorities Assembly is Coen Volp, General Director, Provincie Gelderland, Arnhem, The Netherlands.
The current Chairman of the Organising Authorities Committee is Claudio Masi, Federmobilità Delegate, Federmobilità, Milano Italy.
CONTACT: Adrien Moulin
Missions and Issues
Download the Organising Authorities Mission Statement (PDF)
Download the Organising Authorities Case Studies (PDF)
The UITP Organising Authorities Division consists of two bodies:
- the Organising Authorities Assembly;
- the Organising Authorities Committee
The Organising Authorities Committee was founded in 1999 and is hence the youngest committee of the UITP. The first meeting happened in Brussels , 15-16 February 1999.
According to its terms of reference, the Committee deals with the following topics:
| 1. Mobility Policy: |
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Coordination between regional planning and transport policies; |
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Traffic plans and measures promoting public transport and "soft traffic" (pedestrians, bicycles); |
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Parking policy; |
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Transportation of goods and deliveries; |
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Accessibility for everyone: specific measures designed to benefit certain categories of public transport users; |
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Mobility Management; |
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Environmental protection: measures aimed at reducing air pollution and noise; |
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Body studying mobility (statistics and surveys), "benchmarking" of cities. |
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| 2. Organisation and funding of public transport: |
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Institutional inter-municipal and inter-regional measures for the organisation of public transport and intermodal coordination; |
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Organisation of intermodal transport: funding and management of interchange points and park-and-ride schemes; |
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Financing of investments in public transport; |
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Public transport pricing policy and how to fund the operation of public transport networks; |
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Public service obligation; |
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Contractual arrangements between public transport authorities and operators (opening up to competition, sharing of commercial risks, quality incentives, etc.); |
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Means employed to learn about the transport market and monitor operators' compliance with the terms of their contracts. |
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The work programme of the Organizing Authorities Committee will be discussed on the occasion of the upcoming Organizing Authorities Committee meeting in Bologna, Italy on 18-19 October 2007. |
The Committee meets twice a year in one of the member cities to discuss the outcome and the further steps of the Committee.
List of members
See the list of members
Working groups
- Definition and structure of Organising Authorities
- Financing
- Urbanisation
- Sustainable mobility and transport
- Quality in public transport service contracts
- E-ticketing and fare management systems
Information for members :
The Terms of Reference of UITP Divisions and Commissions are only available to UITP members. Please enter your login and password here and click on the section ‘Working bodies’ in the menu.
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