Safety measures for coastal shipping services
Ensuring safety is one of the most basic tasks in the area of transportation. Even after the elimination of the supply-demand regulation, safety regulations will remain in place in the following areas: (1) Safety inspections of transportation equipment, such as boarding / disembarking equipment, and the general safety of maritime traffic. (2) Setting and reporting of operation management rules and designation of operation managers. (3) Requirement to comply with safety orders and to conclude insurance contracts. (4) On-board and safety inspections as required to ensure safety. Water taxies and domestic roll-on roll-off (RORO) vessels, currently outside Marine Transportation Law, are expected to be required to take safety measures if they are deemed to engage repeatedly in fee-charging passenger transportation services.
Fare system for passenger ferries
The fare system for passenger ferries should make it possible for business operators to set fares independently and flexibly. For this purpose, government involvement in the system should be eliminated as much as possible. However, lack of regulation may lead to some businesses charging unjustly discriminative fares to specific passengers, or dramatically increase fares for routes operated as a monopoly. At the same time, some companies may set predatory fares to force competitors out of the market, bringing about a disadvantage to service users in the long run. It is therefore desirable, after the supply-demand regulation is eliminated, that business operators be required to report any fare changes in advance. The authorities should be allowed to issue corrective instructions, but only if the reported fare is believed to be severely detrimental to the interests of users.
