Structural Reform in the Rail Industry In a competition roundtable focused on separation of rail track ownership from that of train operations accumulating evidence is examined that suggests the value of structural separation in the railways sector may be less than previously thought. Integration may yield benefits for a number of reasons including externalities between train operations and rail maintenance and difficulties in overseeing traffic in an environment with delays and imperfect information for the train dispatcher. The potential value of separation may differ between passenger operations and freight operations. While passenger operations often require subsidies and in a separated regime are often provided via competition for the market (concessions) freight operations offer more potential for beneficial vertical separation. For international traffic between moderate sized countries the ability to operate across borders may be limited by a number of factors including language and technical specifications which need to be addressed in order to broaden the potential for international rail based freight. This Roundtable on Structural Reform in the Rail Industry was held in 2005 in the Working Party on Regulation of the Competition Committee.