|
Again you deliberately distort the focus to support your conclusion. Most people who use the Hume between Goulburn and Yass are not travelling from Goulburn to Yass - they are passing through both of these places. In honesty, what do you think the monopoly value of the Yass to Goulburn section of the Hume is? ... In the long term, what do you think the effect of a private owner charging a monopoly fee would be?
I do not accept that I have distorted anything - deliberately or otherwise. The fact that most people who drive between Goulburn and Yass do so as part of a longer journey has little effect on the analysis. The fact is that most of them are vehicles going from Sydney to Melbourne or vice-versa, a trip for which no route comes close to the Hume in terms of directness and road quality. Compared to Highway 1, the Hume is 200km and at least 3-4 hours shorter. Between them lie the Great Dividing Range including the Snowy Mountains. Routes through Canberra add significant time and are on narower, lower safety roads. Links that lie north/west of the Hume, such as the Olympic Way, are also lower quality and far longer. There are some more viable backroad alternatives to the Chiltern(or Albury)-Gundagai stretch of the Hume, but these roads are longer, slower and of lower quality. For most drivers there is no realistic alternative routes between Gundagai to virtually the outskirts of Sydney - which can be attacked only from Wollongong or the Hume or, far to the north, Katoomba. Accordingly, although I will not attempt to provide a figure for the monopoly value of the Yass-Goulburn stretch, suffice it to say that it would be difficult, without building a new road along the route, for an alternative road provider to bring much pricing pressure to bear on it. Accordingly, my expecation of what the long run effect of a private owner of that stretch charging a monopoly fee would be is ongoing monopoly pricing and/or a wasteful duplication of infrastructure.
|