Seamless borders? The transfer effect of cross-border travel in Europe

Abstract

European long-distance rail is fragmented into national-oriented networks, creating impedance for international travellers. This study analyses cross-border impedance across Europe via transfer counts, using open General Transport Feed Specification (GTFS) data to construct a P-space graph of the European network. We introduce the maximal reach and country adjacency degree concepts to present the rail network structure in terms of concentric neighbouring relations between countries. We then characterised the countries in terms of connectivity to urban population, and number of transfers between country pairs. Our results reveal a clear core-periphery structure, where Western and Central European countries achieve high connectivity within 1–2 transfers, while peripheral countries require additional transfers. Directional heterogeneity is evident at borders, characterised by clusters of well-connected countries and poor core-periphery links. On average, transfer counts have a 1:1 relation with number of borders traversed, and high impedance locations generally agree with previous studies on cross-border travel speeds.