Abstract
Supply and demand adjustment policy for railway service had been aborted and Railway Business Act had been also amended in 2000. These changes have made new entry into railway business easier while only a prior notification enables railway discontinuous instead of rigid permission for the withdrawal. This policy abolition aims improvements of railway service level under open competition, on the other hand local rail service have declined in the countryside.
In this paper, transition of getting into or pulling out of railway businesses have been researched with comparative study before-and-after the abolition and effects of the policy change have been cleared. As a result, it was found that many railways operated by major private companies or joint ventures of local governments and private businesses became just dead tracks without any rolling stocks after the policy turnaround.
