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Although the expansion of privately owned passenger cars is remarkable
in recent years, the role played by public transport system is still great in
the maintenance and improvement of people's lives. Further, the importance of
public transport system is more keenly felt from the viewpoints of the effective
utilization of the traffic space, reduction in environmental pollution by transport,
and saving of natural resources and energy.
To secure public transport system, radical measures are required"such as
the removal of urban concentration of the population and socio-economic activities
and the adequate arrangement of regional functions. Since materializa tion of
such measures takes time, it is urgently required to promote first those measures
which are considered most easily feasible in solving pressing problems" such
as efforts for business rationalization in all the transport facilities encourage
ment of utilization of public transport system adequate fixing of fares and
fees, and aid measures of the Government--so that the existence of public transport
system will be secured in future.
1) Business Rationalization and Encouragement of Utilization of Public Trans
port System
ln public transport system, an ever-increasing need is felt, due to an acute
labor shortage and a steep rise of wages, for increased efficiency and labor
saving in transport. For increasing efficiency, an innovation of the forms of
transport is in progress, including an increase in sizes of transport equipment,
specialization and containerization; and for achieving labor saving, the following
measures are being promoted: the automation of sales and examination of railway
tickets, establishment of unattended railway stations, intensive operation of
railway stations and remodelling of buses into one-man buses. As a result, physical
labor productivity per employee is on the rising trend except at a part of transport
facilities, as shown in Fig. 19. The rationalization of business should be promoted
actively in future, but it would be impossible to absorb all the increase in
costs by the efforts of the management, in view of the fact that the transport
business is generally high in intensiveness of labor, and the drastic improvement
in transport requires a huge fund. In future it would be necessary to promote
more expansion of public transport system in order to satisfy necessary traffic
demand while utilizing the traffic space more effectively and ensuring the conservation
of living environments for regional inhabitants by means of the total quantity
control of exhaust gases and the prevention of traffic accidents. Especially,
it would be necessary to examine concrete measures for putting a maximum limit
to the total milage of automobiles in excessively populated regions.
It would be also necessary to materialize further the use-promoting measures
of various transport facilities such as improvements on the transfer system
and terminal systems under mutual cooperation of the transport facilities.
2) Adequate Fixing of Freight and Aid Measures by the Government
The revenue and expenditure condition of public transport operator, especially
ground transport operator, is chronically deteriorating since several years
ago and their ratios of revenue to expenditure invariably dropped below 100
per cent.
In principle, freight charges should be fixed at a level which will ensure
that not only the cost of the transport service is recovered but also an adequate
surplus is obtained for future expansion of the service. Otherwise, necessary
plant and equipment invest'ment will be delayed, resulting in depriving carriers
of the ability to improve their business and in the degradation of the service
standard. More than that, once the business fails, it would require more than
necessary expenses to build up the business again.
It is necessary, therefore, to grasp the freight problem always rationally
in future and solve it at the proper time in the proper way.
However, a part of the operating cost of transport facilities may have to
be bone by the Central Government or local public entitles, if it is actually
impossible for carriers to pay all the required expenses with the freight income--in
such cases as local transport where transport demand is dwindling, development
of urban railways and other transport infrastructure which require tremendous
costs for construction of facilities, and leading traffic investment for the
purpose of regional development.
In fiscal 1973, it was planned to expand the subsidy system and to increase
the amounts of subsidies, including the aid for construction costs of underground
high-speed railways, expansion of the aid by the Railway Construction Public
corporation for private railways and assistance for operation costs of buses
for newly-built residential areas. In view of the present condition of public
transport system in cities and regional areas, it would be necessary to strengthen
aids by taking into consideration the abovementioned necessity for aids.
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