INNOVATIVE ORGANIZATIONAL SOLUTIONS FOR SERVICE OPERATIONS AT BORDER RAILWAY STATIONS

Abstract

Each railway border crossing implies the presence of several interested parties performing different functions. In general, interested parties can be classified into three groups: railway infrastructure managers, railway carriers and authorized government bodies The complexity of the functioning of railway border crossings, in addition to the large number of participants, is affected by the lack of cooperation between the regulatory agencies of neighboring countries, different regulations regarding the necessary processes and procedures for completing formalities, ineffective exchange of information between railway participants and state authorities and the lack of mutual recognition of controls carried out by railway participants or competent authorities of one country in another, or related institutions. The paper presents modern organizational (so-called "soft") measures aimed at eliminating or reducing the impact of bottlenecks in the transportation of passengers and goods in international rail traffic that can be implemented in the short and medium term with a high effect and are generally considered non-investment or low-investment measures. The case study was done on the example of the railway border station Subotica, which is considered the most critical point and bottleneck in railway traffic between Serbia and Hungary.