ProRail

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ProRail
Type	Government agency
Founded	2003
Headquarters	Utrecht, The Netherlands
Industry	Rail Transport
Products	Rail Infrastructure Management, Railway Capacity Allocation, Traffic Control
Revenue	▲ € 1.260 billion (2006)
Operating income	▲€ 31 million (2006)
Net income	€ 0 (2006)
Employees	2,651 (2006)
Website	http://www.prorail.nl

The headquarters of ProRail, de Inktpot, with the UFO

In the Netherlands, 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 railtrack owner).

It consists of the following inframanagement organisations:

Railinfrabeheer (Rail Infrastructure Management, RIB)
Railned (railway capacity allocation) (planning more than 52 hours before the day of the train service)
Railverkeersleiding (Traffic Control) (planning from 52 hours before the day of the train service)

The rail capacity supplied by ProRail is used by several public transport operators:

the main one Nederlandse Spoorwegen (NS),
the smaller ones Arriva, Syntus and Connexxion,
one that mainly operates in Germany, DB Regionalbahn Westfalen,

as well as cargo operators, notably Railion.

[edit] Funding

Funding for ProRail is provided by a government subsidy, and a fee paid by the railway operators (called infraheffing). The government subsidy totaled approx. €1 billion in 2006, 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.