CJEU criticisably supports taxi monopoly in State aid case on use of London's bus lanes (C-518/13)

The Court of Justice of the EU has ruled in Eventech, C-518/13, EU:C:2015:9 and has broadly followed AG Wahl's approach to the case (criticised here) to determine that "The practice of permitting, in order to establish a safe and efficient transport system, Black Cabs to use bus lanes on public roads during the hours when the traffic restrictions relating to those lanes are operational, while prohibiting minicabs from using those lanes, except in order to pick up and set down passengers who have pre-booked such vehicles, does not appear, though it is for the referring court to determine, to be such as to involve a commitment of State resources or to confer on Black Cabs a selective economic advantage for the purpose of Article 107(1) TFEU."

The Eventech Judgment is criticisable for the same reasons identified in view of the AG Opinion (see here) and, in my view, constitutes a bad precendent in the treatment of access to (quasi?) essential facilities under public property. The analysis of the economic exploitation of the bus lanes is particularly weak, as it completely avoids the clear issue that black cabs do use that infrastructure in order to develop an economic activity--which, consequently, creates important issues of free access to public goods that the CJEU has simply disregarded. It can just be lamented that the CJEU did not identify the logical traps that affected the AG Opinion and deviated from them. Maybe, at least, the case can be used as yet another clear indication of the need to involve economists in the decision-making process of the CJEU [for some exploratory thoughts, see A Sanchez Graells, The Importance of Assessing the Economic Impact of the Case Law of the Court of Justice of the European Union: Some Exploratory Thoughts (April 18, 2013)].