Zbornik radova Koridor 10 - Kirilo Savić

3rd International Scientific and Professional Conference
CORRIDOR 10 - a sustainable way of integrations
FINANCIAL ANALYSIS OF RAIL INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS
Luka Lazarević, University of Belgrade, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Belgrade, Republic of Serbia
Zdenka Popović, University of Belgrade, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Belgrade, Republic of Serbia
Cesar Queiroz University of Belgrade, Faculty of Civil Engineering, Belgrade, Republic of Serbia
Goran Mladenović, Consultant, Roads and Transport Infrastructure, Former World Bank Highways
Adviser, Washington, DC USA
Abstract:
There are two European rail corridors that pass through Serbia: the Danube Corridor VII and the
Corridor X. If it is considered that almost 50% of rail freight traffic in Serbia is transit, according to the
World Bank study, one can conclude that Serbian railways have very favorable position in European
rail network. This is necessary, but not sufficient precondition for successful economic functioning of
rail transport. There are a lot of challenges that Serbian railways must address in order to achieve
good financial performance and operational efficiency. This paper presents the key indicators that
should be considered in financial analysis, and also their application. Also, this paper presents
financial models for infrastructure projects developed by the World Bank.
Key words: railways, financial analysis, financial models, World Bank
1. INTRODUCTION
The European Union (EU) defined a common transportation policy in its document entitled White
Paper "Roadmap to a Single European Transport Area – Towards a competitive and resource efficient
transport system". This policy defines ten goals for reaching a competitive and resource efficient
transport system. Four of these ten goals are directed towards the use of rail transport:
- to shift 30% of road freight over 300 km to rail or waterborne transport by 2030, and more than 50%
by 2050,
- to complete European high-speed rail network by 2050, triple the length of the existing high-speed
rail network by 2030 and maintain a dense railway network in all European Member States,
- to complete a fully functional and EU-wide multimodal Trans-European Traffic Network (TEN-T) by
2030, with a high quality and capacity network by 2050 and a corresponding set of information
services,
- to connect by 2050 all network airports to the rail network, preferably high-speed, and to ensure that
all seaports are sufficiently connected to the rail freight and, where possible, inland waterway system
[1].
Therefore, European Comission recognize rail transport as a one of the priorities, and it defines
primary objective as development of an interoperable railway network and reinforcement of the role of
rail as an essential component in integrated European transport system. So, modern railways should
represent most important segment in future multimodal transportation chain [2].
Current problem with fulfilling the traffic policy from [1] is unequal development of the infrastructure in
the eastern and western part of Europe, which needs to be unified. In the Southeast Europe railways
have low performance, especially in the Western Balkan countries [3]. It implies Serbian railway
network.
2. CHALLENGES FOR SERBIAN RAILWAYS
As it was defined at the Helsinki conference in 1997, two out of ten traffic corridors in the European
territory pass through Serbia: The Danube waterway Corridor VII and the road-railway Corridor X
(Figure 1).
Belgrade, 2012 61