Case study report: Tyrol suburban railway (S-Bahn Tirol) Line S3 Innsbruck (Austria) – Brenner / Brennero’ (Italy)

This case study report presents the business model for the cross-border local rail passenger transport service of the Tyrol suburban railway on its line S3, operated between the city of Innsbruck (Austria) and the border railway station Brenner / Brennero (Italy).  

It explores the business model of this service, including its governance arrangements, operational provisions to develop the service and address demand, and its territorial scope. This particular service has a simple governance model, as it only goes to the first station on the Italian side (i.e. Brenner / Brennero). The service has resulted in various positive effects on local and cross-border connectivity due to high service frequency and effective coordination of timetables for the suburban and regional connecting trains. Teh report then addresses obstacles that the service faces, predominantly recognising that there is an absence of major obstacles for the set-up and ongoing operation of this service, mainly due to the very short cross-border section. The concluding section reflects upon the lessons learnt from this case study. 

This case study report is part of a series of 31 case studies developed in the framework of the study ‘Providing public transport in cross-border regions – Mapping of existing services and legal obstacles’, completed by Spatial Foresight in cooperation with TCP international, TRT trasporti e territorio and EureConsult for the European Commission’s DG REGIO.