Access to Secondary HSR Stations in the Urban Periphery: A Generalised Cost-Based Assessment

Investments in high-speed rail (HSR) development contribute to reducing regional disparities and improving territorial cohesion. When studying the efficacy of HSR investments, the travel time (and effort) spent on getting to and from the HSR station is crucial. In large urban areas there may be more than one station, and a peripheral station may complement the central stations and become a powerful vector for development. The rationale of this paper revolves around the possibility of applying a methodology based on generalised cost (GC) functions to study the advantages of new HSR-related projects in different locations. With this aim, we evaluate a real example in Seville (Spain) to determine whether the improvement in metropolitan accessibility to HSR services justifies the implementation of a new peripheral station, using a methodology to assess the territorial accessibility based on GC functions and modal travel times obtained with GIS methods, followed by an economic assessment based on a cost-benefit analysis. The paper ends with the main conclusions and a discussion of the methodology applied, the reductions in generalised costs resulting from the new station, the relevance of the case study, the limitations of the approach and further research stemming from this study.