05-28-2022, 11:40 AM
(05-28-2022, 10:05 AM)ac3r Wrote: Canada sure loves transportation monopolies it seems. Greygound had pretty good control over bus routes in Southern Ontario (maybe all of Canada? I'm not sure). Flair has YKF. porter has Billy Bishop. Bombardier often wins awards for contracts as there are often stipulations on projects that X% must be done by Canadian companies. I'm no capitalist but if the free market is free, then anyone should be allowed to operate a business and the best ones will prevail over the others.
In transportation it is well known that rules are required. I know of at least two problems with a “no rules” regime: first, large companies can undercut services offered by small competitors, then once the small competitor has gone bankrupt either increase prices or cancel the service entirely; second, jitneying, where buses are scheduled immediately ahead of an existing competitor’s schedule, so that they pick up the passengers waiting for the existing service.
Neither of these is a hypothetical; they actually happen if there aren’t rules.
That being said, my understanding is we had a ridiculous situation in the bus market where demand was not being serviced, but the incumbents could still prevent it from being served by arguing against the license application. Any new entrant who proposes to provide actually better service should be allowed to do so; but the service has to be an actual self-sustaining improvement on existing service, not just run one minute ahead of existing service or be subsidized by other operations of the operator.