ProRail
ProRail () is a government task organisation that takes care of maintenance and extensions of the national railway network infrastructure (not the metro or tram), of allocating rail capacity, and of traffic control. Prorail is a part of NS Railinfratrust, the Dutch railway infrastructure owner. It consists of the following infrastructure management organisations: The rail capacity supplied by ProRail is used by several public transport operators: Its Utrecht headquarters is in the former offices of Nederlandse Spoorwegen (known as "De Inktpot", "The Inkwell"), the largest brick building in the Netherlands. The building currently features a "UFO" on its facade resulting  from an art program in 2000. It was established on 1 January 2003 when three separate organisations responsible for rail infrastructure in the Netherlands were merged. Funding. Funding for ProRail is provided by a government subsidy, and a fee paid by the railway operators (called "infraheffing"). The government subsidy totalled around €2.5 billion from 2014–2017, and the "infraheffing" totalled approx. €200 million in 2006, the remaining income was listed as 'other'. The fee that the public transport operators have to pay for this is lower than the cost, but increasing. In 2003 it was €0.64 per train  km and €0.54 to €2.16 for stopping at a station. Performance oriented maintenance. Railways in the Netherlands are not maintained by ProRail itself. Instead, it is subcontracted to recognised maintenance contractors. The Dutch railway network is subdivided into 21 areas. For each area, all of the regular maintenance is contracted as one package, which is won by the contractor that submits the best offer. The contractor receives a fixed sum per month, and is fined in case of failure to meet the required performance. Contractors are incentivised to minimise cost, while ensuring good performance of the assets. This  is called prestatiegericht onderhoud (performance oriented maintenance). As of 2019, the recognised maintenance contractors are: