Re: BHP nailed down to National tracks - "The Age" Article

[krel4203@netconnect.com.au (Krel )]

>>In today's Business section of "The Age"
>>at 
>
>>http://www.theage.com.au/daily/990224/bus/bus10.html
>
>
>This is a good article and it brings up a couple of interesting points.
>National Rail are yet to make a profit and are experiancing increased annual 
>losses.

Slightly misleading. NRs losses have increased by much less than the
state 'setup' payments have decreased. Also NR have decreased the
overall loss on interstate rail freight from many hundreds of millions
(IIRC $600-700m) to around $20m now in five years. An improvement but
still along way to go. 

>Under these sorts of conditions NRC should be making respectable  profits,so 
>whats wrong.?

One must ask why track access charges in one state are about three
times the charges for the same train in most other states? Also, NRC
(& all other rail operators) pay heaps in fuel taxes that are used for
funding road improvements.

>One has to ask what would any private owner of NRC do differantly to change 
>things around.?
>
More effectively lobby governments - a cynic might suggest that
certain governments are more likely to listen to a private concern
rather than a state owned enterprise.
They also might more agessively chase NEW business to rail.
Of course, MarkBau may be on to something, too ;-).

Cheers

Krel

Just another eccentric crank.