How to improve the attractiveness of Commuter and Regional Train Services in post Covid-19 Era

The main objective of this report is to identify and share effective ways to improve the attractiveness of trains after the Covid-19 Pandemic crisis. It is based on a double direction analysis of the interactions between trains and customers (Figure 1).

At the beginning there is a compendium of novelties collected by academic literature as well as implemented or planned by railway operators. Then, it presents a complete set of recommendations, suggestions and opinions coming from different stakeholders through five qualitative studies. As a result, the actions and good practices proposed to improve railway attractiveness have been contrasted both from the demand and the service supply side.

Related to the state of the art, more than 50 papers including cases studies around the world have been consulted allowing to stablish five main thresholds on current railways attractiveness research:

• High level Operation is the most common topic, focused on new technologies applications and intelligent systems implementations.
• The improvement of High-Speed Mobility becomes by itself one of the most powerful element to increase rail attractiveness.
• Moreover, recent trends, such as the Cultural Added Value generated when travelling by train and the Sustainability Concern, mainly of young people, define railways as a “fashion transport mode” for the new generations.
• In addition, railways Tourism Inducement effects studies are increasing in importance.