In order to analyze the question from a different perspective, this book sets out to combine different approaches from economics as well as business administration to stimulate scientific discourse and to support decision-makers in their efforts to ameliorate the situation.
The first part of this book contributes to the empirics of the relationship between transport and economic growth, or more specifically, whether "decoupling" of transport and economic growth appears possible. For this purpose previously unavailable regional data for Italy and Germany were collected and analyzed. The results indicate that transport makes an important contribution to economic growth.
Therefore, the second part of this book goes into more detail. Given the economic importance of transport and the resistance against the expansion of the transport infrastructure, it is essential to make efficient use of the already existing transportation network. For this purpose the author investigates which characteristics of transport are perceived as most important by decision makers, applying an adaptive conjoint analysis. The results show that transport quality in terms of timeliness, reliability, etc. seems to be at least as important as the monetary transport costs.
Ms. Feige currently works as a Research Manager at the Institute for Mobility Research (ifmo) in Berlin. Ms. Feige completed her master’s degree in the field of Economics and Business Administration at the University of Innsbruck, the Wirtschaftsuniversität Vienna and the University of Verona. This book is a component of her doctoral studies in the Department of Economics at the University of Innsbruck.