| Summary: | The major objective of this work consists on the analysis of the operational performance of european urban rail transport networks, mainly those known as metro system. This analysis was performed using a production function, not being enclosed in this study a costs analysis. Firstly, to establish this metro production function, data on diverse capital and labour variables was collected, as well as variables characterising the social-economic context of the urban areas where these metro systems operate. After that, in order to get indicators which accurately describe the general environment of the different systems, relationship among cross-section data observations was made. These parameters serve, simultaneously, to allow to direct comparisons among companies and to establish trends among different rail urban transport types (heavy vs. light metros) and systems forms (radial, mixed or extended networks). The analysis of the production was focused on the estimate of the inputs elasticities of the optimal production function, as well as on the efficiency and effectiveness levels of each company used in the analysis. For such, the stochastic production frontier model was carried out through the use of Limdep software. Being the production effectiveness very influenced by the urban areas social-economic environment on which metro operates, regressing the effectiveness results on external and internal company variables, the influence of these external effects on effectiveness was evaluated. Finally, a chapter is dedicated to the Porto metro system. In this chapter, using previous Porto metro efficiency and effectiveness results, two analyses were made, the first establishing the relationship between these perform results and the network infrastructure time development and a second one comparison of Porto metro results and those of some european metro light systems.
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