Benchmarking and Sustainable Transport Policy: Learning from the BEST Network

Abstract

Benchmarking is a widely used method of comparing performances and practices in order to learn from the best. In 2000, the so‐called ‘BEST network’ was set up to explore benchmarking as a tool to promote policies for ‘sustainable transport’. This paper reports the findings and recommendations from the BEST experience on how to address this challenge. The findings suggest that benchmarking is a valuable tool that may indeed help to move forward the transport policy agenda. However, there are major conditions and limitations. First, it is often not straightforward to measure and compare transport services in order to establish a clear benchmark. Second, ‘sustainable transport’ evokes a broad range of sometimes conflicting concerns that are hard to address fully at the level of specific organizational practices. Third, policies are not directly comparable across contexts. Attempting to benchmark ‘sustainable transport policies’ against one another would therefore be a highly complex task, which is not advised. Several other ways in which benchmarking and policy can support one another are identified in the analysis. This leads to a range of recommended initiatives to exploit the benefits of benchmarking for sustainable transport policy while avoiding some of the lurking pitfalls.

Acknowledgements

The authors thank the European Commission’s Directorate General for Energy and Transport, which funded the BEST project. All participants in the BEST and BOB projects are thanked for their invaluable contributions to identify lessons on sustainable transport benchmarking, which made the writing of this paper possible. The authors are grateful for comments from two anonymous reviewers and to the Editors helpful advice. Comments to an earlier version of this paper received from participants at the 10th World Conference on Transport Research, Istanbul, Turkey, July 2004, are also appreciated. The authors remain solely responsible for all interpretations and any remaining errors in the paper.

Notes

1. The three BOB pilot projects addressed passenger rail (performance and institutions); airport ground accessibility; and professional road transport safety.

2. All BEST and BOB material including conference presentations, reports and conclusions have been published on the BEST website (http://www.bestransport.org).

3. Examples include quality criteria defined for public passenger service (European Standard EN 13816) and Service Performance Indicators of freight transport as defined by the European Shippers Council (ESC) (for references, see OGM, 2003).

4. For example, the Transport and Environment indicator system TERM of the European Environment Agency (EEA, 2000) (see the sixth section).

5. This was identified as a significant problem at the BEST Conference 5, ‘The Application of Benchmarking in Transport Policy’, Brussels, Belgium, June 2002.

6. The main aim of the TERM system is to support the European policy process known as the ‘Cardiff Strategy’, which aims to ensure the integration of environmental and sustainable development concerns into the various EU sector policies. So far, TERM indicator reports have come out in 2000, 2001, 2002 and 2004.

7. A consultative committee created by the European Commission, composed of representatives from energy and transport organisations. http://www.eu.int/comm/dgs/energy_transport/forum/index_en.htm.