The development of a single European railway area is every day more debated topic on the European institutions which are drawing up measures trying to be actively involved in the matter. The White Paper on Transport, “Roadmap to a single European railway area – Towards a competitive and resource efficient transport system” remains the reference point for the development of a single transport system.
The Committee on Regional Dev-elopment has recently analysed (on 19 September) the draft opinion on the new White Paper on Transport, while the draft project will be adopted by the TRAN Committee on November 22, 2011 at first reading. The project also expects the EP’s vote in 2012.
In September, the Committee on Transport and Tourism also set the main objectives related to the draft report on the White Paper.
Underlining the fact that a single, integrated and efficient transport system “should be the main concern of the transport policy”, MEP Mathieu Grosch proposes cutting by 20% road transport emissions and by 30% naval and air transport emissions by 2020, as well as reducing rail energy consumption and noise by 20%.
However, the development of a single European transport area poses many problems since “the development of the European transport system is unbalanced throughout the EU. The single market needs a modern, multimodal and non-polluting pan-European transport system. The development of the single European transport system needs adequate financial resources and firm commitments”, believes the Vice Chair of the TRAN Committee, Adriana Țicău.
CER also shares the opinion of a notable gap in the transport system showing that “the different level of infrastructure financing in the EU questioned EU’s objective on the development of a single European transport area”. The severe under-financing of railway infrastructure in the last decades has become one of the main concerns of the European transport policy. “Railway traffic is increasing, but the availability of investments continues to drop”, shows CER in a press release.
The EC has wisely identified the market segments that will dominate the future of transports (railway passenger transport on medium distances and long-distance freight transport), “but to meet these objectives, the railway sector should provide quality services at competitive prices. However, these services cannot be deli-vered without a competitive infrastructure which is mostly the result of historical under-financing”, points out CER.
40% increase in cargo volumes
The European region will face problems in terms of freight and passenger transport capacity, as cargo volumes are expected to increase by 40% in the period 2005-2030, shows TRAN’s report. Consequently, it is absolutely imperative to apply solutions which could be identified in the co-modality concept. “In my opinion, bearing in mind capacity problems, operators should not compete but to complete each other in providing an efficient co-modality”, believes the European rapporteur Mathieu Grosch. Under the report, the co-modality should be the key of the future transport policy. As for freight transport, the EC’s proposal according to which 30% of the road freight transport on distances of over 300 km/h should be shifted to other means of transport, such as railway or naval transport, by 2030, this percentage has to exceed 50% by 2050.
Share on:
