EN

Brussels, 22.06.2006

SEC(2006) 768

COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT

Impact Assessment of the Communication “Keep Europe Moving”

Sustainable mobility for our continent.

Mid-term review of the European Commission’s 2001 Transport White Paper

{COM(2006) 314 final}

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY (...)4

2. PROCEDURAL ISSUES AND CONSULTATION OF INTERESTED PARTIES (...)7

2.1 Procedural issues (...)7

2.2 External expertise (...)7

2.3 Consultation of interested parties (...)8

2.3.1 Public consultation (...)8

2.3.2 Member State consultation (...)11

2.3.3 UK Presidency’s Member State consultation (...)12

2.3.4 Stakeholder conference (...)12

2.3.5 Energy and Transport Forum consultation (...)13

2.3.6 Conclusions of the Member States’ Joint Expert Group on Transport and Environment (...)14

3. PROBLEM DEFINITION (...)16

3.1 Transport and mobility in Europe (...)16

3.1.1 Importance of transport sector in EU economy (...)16

3.1.2 Transport demand developments (...)17

3.1.3 Projections for future (...)19

3.1.4 Impacts of transport (...)21

3.2 Transport modes (...)23

3.3 Changes in the transport policy context (...)27

3.4 Changes in the general political context (...)30

3.5. Upcoming problems for EU transport (...)32

4. DEFINING THE OBJECTIVES (...)32

4.1. Future policy objectives (...)33

5. DEVELOPING THE MAIN POLICY OPTIONS (...)35

5.1 The White Paper adopted in 2001 (...)35

5.2. Impacts of 2001 White Paper (...)37

5.3 Assessing the direction of future action (...)40

6. ANALYSING THE IMPACTS OF POLICY OPTIONS AND COMPARING THEM (...)42

7. PRESENTING THE NEXT APPROACH: TOWARDS A COOPERATIVE TRANSPORT POLICY (...)46

ANNEX 1 (...)48

ANNEX 2: (...)65

ANNEX 3: (...)92

COMMISSION STAFF WORKING DOCUMENT

Impact Assessment of the Communication on the European Transport Policy“Keep Europe Moving”

1. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Purpose of the document

This document concerns the main orientations for EU transport policy for the coming years. It also aims to meet the obligation of making a mid-term assessment of the Commission 2001 White Paper on European Transport Policy. It therefore contains an evaluation of the current political and transport situation, its impacts on transport policy and recommendations for future action. This document explains the mains steps that have been undertaken to prepare options for future transport policy and explains the proposed policy line.

Impact Assessment procedure

In 2005 the Commission completed four studies to analyse the transport policy development implementation for the 2001 WP mid-term review and to provide background material for the future policy orientations. The main study (ASSESS) supported by the Commission Inter-service Steering Group supplied a full set of economic, social and environmental data. This study, complemented by other studies and other information has served to analyse the possible options for the future transport policy orientations.

Among the sources of information were the wide consultations that the Commission has held to define its proposal for the future policy lines. These consultations include the consultation of the Member States, a stakeholder conference and a big Internet consultation. All these consultations have provided a valuable insight into the current transport market situation as well as information concerning the expectations and constraints on the future policy lines.

Problem definition

EU transport policy has for a long time concentrated on providing the mobility for the economy, businesses and people, in an efficient and sustainable way. Creating an internal European transport market has been a target, focusing also on sustainable development and solving the environmental problems related to increasing transport demand. Rising levels of congestion, pollution and CO2 emissions and lack of safety, notably in road transport, have been the main problems addressed in recent years.

A prolonged period of sluggish economic growth and job creation in Europe , terrorist attacks, geopolitical tensions, and high oil prices, and increased globalisation among other developments, have shown the need to focus efforts on economic growth and job creation, notably to make a success of the enlargement of the Union.

The change in the general political context calls for a reorientation of the European transport policy towards these objectives, building on what has already been achieved. The renewed Lisbon strategy and Sustainable Development Strategy have set the scene for the transport sector.

Objectives for future

The future EU transport policy needs to provide the mobility needed for economic growth and social welfare while, in parallel, tackling the negative effects that increasing transport activity causes. The future transport policy needs to build on the achievements of the earlier policies as defined in the White Papers of 1992 and 2001, when responding to the new challenges. The analysis shows that policy orientation should best focus on: (1) offering a high level of mobility to people and businesses throughout Europe; (2) protect the environment, employment, the citizen and the passenger; (3) innovate to support mobility and protection by increasing efficiency and sustainability of the transport sector; (4) and strengthening the role of EU at the international level.

Options for the future policy orientations

Any future policy orientation for the Common Transport Policy should take into account past and current developments in this field. The assessment of the 2001 White Paper measures and the predicted impacts are taken as a starting point.

A first approach entails the continuation and implementation of the current actions already approved by the Institutions. Thus, as a result of the legislation of the past few years, a reasonable option would be to ensure the implementation of the measures agreed and those in the pipeline and not to propose new actions, a so-called “do nothing more option”. The “current” option includes the completion of the internal market and its external projection, the implementation of the TENs, Marco Polo and the new Eurovignette Directive, the completion of the Single Sky, the establishment of an integrated maritime market, and the adoption and implementation of road safety and maritime security policies as running today.

A “deepening” option strengthening the main lines of the 2001 White Paper, especially regarding its objective of achieving targets for modal shift. In addition to the measures included in the current option, the deepening option would generalise measures based on road charging, including the external costs, to reinforce the modal shift from road to alternative modes. It would also comprise earmarking of charging revenues for new transport infrastructure, notably in rail.

Thirdly, a “widening” option seeks to tackle the new challenges identified, and seeks to complement the existing measures to tackle the old problems. Hence, it proposes a more comprehensive way and to make better use of the transport system to support economic growth. It entails a more diversified strategy that exploits the technological and organizational means. It is an approach based on maximizing each mode’s own sustainability and efficiency, starting with the modes with the greatest role in transport activity. This widening approach, in addition to the measures in the current option, would include fields like a European maritime area, innovation and ITS, energy efficiency, urban transport, security, as well as intelligent logistics and enhanced airport capacities. This approach would also comprise of the stimulation of current policy lines in TEN policy, road safety and analyses of smart charging systems.

Impacts of the policy options and their comparison

The analysed three policy options have much in common, as they all build on the achievements of earlier policies. An assessment of a whole EU level transport policy is not possible in a detailed way as many measures also will be decided at a later phase. This impact assessment has analysed the main policy packages which belong to all the options and has drawn general conclusions from these. The annexed fiches describe the economic, social, environmental impacts of all policy packages, adding their impacts on the new Member States and describing the possibilities of the Union to intervene in this sector.

As a summary, it could be concluded that the current option has generally positive impacts on most policy targets, mobility, protection, innovation and international connections. Environmental impacts are encouraging though some problems would still prevail. In addition, a major shortcoming of the current option is that it would fail to meet the new challenges of security and energy efficiency. Congestion and safety would also need more attention.

The deepening option has similar impacts as the current one in most policy objective fields. It would achieve better environmental protection results but it would risk decreasing mobility and generally negative economic impacts. On the other hand, the charging measures should provide new funds to infrastructure investments.

The widening option would provide positive economic impacts, increased competition but also co-modality between transport modes. Environmental results could be comparable to those of the current option or even better, thanks to an active use of innovative technologies. Innovation and security targets score high in the widening option; other citizen related items should be at least at the level of the current option. The main risk of the widening option is the weak Union competence in many policy fields where new activities are proposed. The collaborative approach would therefore demand engagement from many stakeholders.

Proposed policy line

The proposed approach considers the continuation of the permanent objectives of the Common Transport Policy but based on broader range of policy tools on top of the implementation of the current measures, based on the policy option called widening detailed above.

The overall contents of the transport policy could be presented in the following main fields of actions : (1) ensuring the well functioning of the internal market; (2) safe, secure services to citizens comprising activities in working conditions, passenger rights, safety in all modes; urban transport and security at large (3) energy use, notably to promote energy efficiency and alternative fuels; (4) infrastructure to ensure efficient use of infrastructure and new construction as needed, (5) innovation and new technologies to solve congestion, to cut emissions, to improve transport efficiency and logistics throughout the supply chains (6) mastering globalisation.

Around all these main field of actions several possible policies and measures have been identified. The specific decision on each of these measures would be subject to separate impact assessment.

Finally, the policy design and its implementation should need to be continuously fine-tuned on the basis of public consultation and in-depth assessments. A road map of measures could be established and regularly updated. The road map would comprise all possible tools and measures, from legal measures to promotion.

2. PROCEDURAL ISSUES AND CONSULTATION OF INTERESTED PARTIES

2.1 Procedural issues

EU transport policy requires regular follow-up and assessment to ensure that it is in line with the more general policy orientations and also to ensure that it meets these objectives. Transport policy has been the subject of periodic assessments often in the form of White Papers. The latest White Paper dates from the year 2001 and has been the main policy orientation since then. The 2001 White Paper also included an obligation to undertake a mid-term review.

The Communication – Keep Europe Moving – aims to analyse the transport policy drivers for the coming years and propose new orientations for EU transport policy. In parallel, it seeks to fulfil the obligation to provide an assessment for the above-mentioned mid-term review.

These new policy orientations are evaluated here at the level of policy packages, with the understanding that all future measures will be the subject of specific, individual impact assessments following the Commission’s guidelines.

2.2 External expertise

During 2004 and 2005 the Commission services completed four studies to analyse the transport policy development and its implementation for the 2001 WP mid-term review and to provide background material for the future policy orientations. The main study (ASSESS), supported by the Commission Inter-service Steering Group, supplied a full set of economic, social and environmental data. This study, complemented by other studies and other information, has served to analyse possible options for the future transport policy orientations.

The ASSESS project, which is summarised in this report, was created to provide technical support to the Commission Services for this mid-term assessment. In particular, the ASSESS project has assembled comprehensive information at the European level to carry out an assessment of the achievements to date, the possible policy implementation scenarios to the year 2010, and the longer term prospects to the year 2020.

These scenarios have been analysed with a set of models, of which the core one was the SCENES transport model. The SCENES output then was processed into TREMOVE (vehicle stock, emissions, fuel consumption and government revenues), CGE (regional welfare), SLAM (logistics), a noise model, the SWOV road safety model and a macro-economic model and the ASTRA model on macro-economic impacts [1].

2.3 Consultation of interested parties

2.3.1 Public consultation

The Commission services’s public consultation concerning the review of the 2001 Transport White Paper took place via the Internet from 28 October to 31 December 2005. It was based on a presentation of recent transport developments and a questionnaire related to the 2001 White Paper measures and their impacts [2].

This consultation has been a success in terms of the number of contributions received and the quality of the comments.

187 contributions have been received, totalling more than 1650 pages.

These contributions come from various associations (at international, European and national level) representing all transport sectors (air, maritime, inland waterways, road, rail, urban transport, logistics and intermodality), from employees and users’ associations, from business and industry, from environmental associations, from local, regional and national authorities, from local associations, from research organisations, universities and consultants, and from citizens, as shown in the following table. They provided the European Commission services with very valuable information on transport issues and sectors. The main critical issues for the stakeholders and their main priorities for the future are detailed below.

Box 1

Contributing categories | Number of contributions |

Modal organisations: | |

Air | 8 |

MaritimeInland waterways | 117 |

Road | 23 |

Rail | 13 |

Logistics & intermodality | 12 |

Urban transport | 8 |

Users | 4 |

Industry and business | 24 |

Environmental NGOs | 7 |

Authorities: | |

National | 3 |

Regional | 19 |

Local | 3 |

Local and regional associations | 13 |

Employees associations | 2 |

Research – universities - consultants | 20 |

Citizens | 11 |

TOTAL | 188 |

General comments

Generally, there is support to move market integration forward and to pursue economic growth as well as sustainable mobility. Mobility as a support to economic growth and employment appears important to most contributors. Transport is seen as a cost to the economy that needs to be minimised. At the same time, it is evident that Europeans consider efficient transport services to be part of their everyday life on which they want to rely. Mobility in urban areas is not only related to public transport (bus, tram, metro) but also to the development of transport modes such as walking and cycling.

Various stakeholders in the different sub-sectors have indicated the need to improve the functioning of the market. In the railways sector, the infrastructure managers suggest effective regulatory bodies and full separation between infrastructure managers and operators. The railway companies recommend to further develop framework contracts between infrastructure managers and operators (e.g. for securing the allocation of capacity). In the maritime sector, ship owners, shippers and maritime ports call for progress in the area of port policy to increase efficiency. Inland waterway operators call for further integration of their activities in the internal market, inter alia by removing administrative barriers. For the aviation sector, it is important to take further action to promote better competition.

Stakeholders, including authorities, expressed serious concerns regarding logistics. These related mainly to the necessity to place logistics at the centre of the EU’s strategy and to focus on the entire transport chain and logistics - rather than single modes - in order to create efficient transport corridors. There were also suggestions for improving the efficiency of the European logistics chains, e.g. to update the rules regarding the weights and dimension of trucks and to introduce new modular concepts for road vehicles, to harmonise containers to promote combined transport, and to support the development of important logistics platforms.

The development of transport infrastructure remains an important issue for many stakeholders including regional authorities from peripheral regions (road, rail, ports, inland waterways, airports). In particular, there were some suggestions concerning the development of airport capacity at hubs and the implementation of dedicated rail networks for freight. The development of financial instruments (PPPs, loans, EIB, etc) to support and to foster investment in new infrastructure is also a major concern. Stakeholders also emphasised the need to make progress in the field of infrastructure charging. Generally, the revised Eurovignette directive was considered to be a step in the right direction but further initiatives may be needed to ensure that prices better reflect real transport costs.

The need to reinforce the social dimension of transport was also underlined. This was indicated by various stakeholders, not only the employees’ associations. In particular, they mentioned the need to harmonise the conditions of competition, to ensure compliance with labour and working conditions and to ensure proper sanctions for non-compliance with EU legislation.

The protection of citizens emerges as an important topic for many contributors, in relation to pollution, safety and security issues. Concerning pollution, there is a recognition of the efforts made by the road vehicles industry, but efforts should continue. On safety, associations want a more urgent and robust approach by the EU on transport safety. Efforts should be reinforced including enhanced safety in vehicles and infrastructures as well as EU maximum speed limits and better Europe-wide enforcement of legislation. Security should now be an integral part of the Common Transport Policy. For the disabled association, the critical issues are related to better accessibility and usability of the public transport systems in the EU. They suggest mandatory requirements on accessibility to rail infrastructure and a fully accessible travel chain to be examined from a holistic perspective.

Various regions have expressed their concerns about their peripheral and remote situation. The variety of challenges in the transport sector caused by regional differences in Europe is accentuated by the enlargement of the European Union. It indicates that the regional perspective at the European level should be reinforced. It is important to avoid general EU transport solutions and measures that contribute to increased transport costs and reduced competitiveness of industries in the peripheral and remote areas in Europe. These regions have indicated the need to ensure EU financial instruments to address this situation, and to foster regional and local projects including road, rail, airports, short sea shipping and motorways of the sea. Some regional and local stakeholders called for more efforts in sensitive areas such as mountains and urban zones.

The need for greater innovation and R&D is also an important issue mentioned; in relation not only to road vehicles and safety, but also to other issues including efficient intermodal transport, urban transport systems, inland waterways infrastructure and vessels. The need for further use of ITS technology in transport has been stressed by stakeholders as a way to increase the reliability of logistic chains.

Stakeholders indicated that globalisation and growth in global trade call for new actions for the development of international transport. They suggested the reinforcement of the EU’s presence in international organisations dealing with aviation, maritime and rivers issues. For inland waterways, some proposed bringing the existing river conventions into the EU framework. In general, they indicated that the development of infrastructure (TEN-T) as well as efficient border crossing between EU and neighbouring countries is necessary to ensure smooth traffic flows.

The need for better regulation and for the promotion of alternative instruments (exchange of best practises, etc) has been mentioned by various stakeholders (aviation, maritime, road). Various stakeholders also expressed the need for further Community harmonisation at technical, social and fiscal level. They stressed the need to implement the existing legislation. The consultation of stakeholders and their involvement is also an important issue for most of the contributors.

2.3.2 Member State consultation

A consultation meeting with Member States took place on 13 July 2005. While there was no specific consensus, the following views had a relatively large number of supporters:

– Many new and peripheral Member States do not identify congestion as a major problem for them but are more concerned about accessibility.

– Difficulties in the road transport sector and the increase in competition in international road freight transport. Hauliers operate with very small margins. In spite of the fragmented industrial structure prevailing in most countries, a trend is starting to emerge towards bigger companies.

– The transport activity of railways is mixed, with some countries gaining traffic and others losing it. The need is felt to ensure that legislation in the railways sector is properly implemented. The financial situation of railway companies is stable in some countries (mostly EU-15) and weak in others (mostly new Member States).

– Traditional aviation flag carriers are in a stable financial situation in spite of the invasion of low cost carriers, which also stimulates the regional airports.

– Several new Member States have identified substantial needs in terms of road infrastructure, for which they are confident that EU funds will be made available. A number of countries believe that their TEN priorities will be achieved in time.

– A minimum level of consensus was reached on only a few new actions, namely to strengthen financial support to innovation and to new technologies like the use of telematics, Galileo, Vessel Traffic Management and Information Systems (VTMIS), eSafety and SESAR.

– Concerning road safety, several countries favoured more structured exchanges of best practices, education, and road rescue services, while others called for new intelligent technologies in vehicles and limiting excessive speed and driving under the influence of alcohol.

2.3.3 UK Presidency’s Member State consultation

The UK Presidency also organized an Internet consultation between EU Transport Ministries on the mid-term review of the Transport White Paper. This consultation took place in September 2005. All MS and candidate countries (BG and RO) participated.

The Commission (Mr Barrot) gave a contribution and indicated the major changes since the adoption of the WP: oil prices, low economic growth, enlargement and security.

The UK Presidency (Mr Alistair Darling, Secretary of State for Transport) summarised the various interventions in a closing statement. The statement focused on five main issues: sustainable development, growth and jobs, enlargement, road safety and citizen’s Europe (globalisation). The UK Presidency also mentioned the importance of geographical conditions (peripheral/territorial dimension) for future transport policy development.

2.3.4 Stakeholder conference

Stakeholder conference of 1st December 2005: The objective of the conference was to assemble the stakeholders at one and the same event, to take stock of the evaluation exercise of the White Paper and to collect their contributions in order to take them into account when preparing the review. A broad range of representative associations, about sixty, participated in this conference including sectoral organisations of the various modes and aspects of transport, user and consumer associations, and trade unions. Representatives from other Commission departments also took part in the event.

All stakeholders agree that transport is a major element for the future, for competitiveness and for exchanges between citizens. It appeared that the various activities that have begun as a result of the White Paper on transport have progressed well but are not yet completed.

The vast majority of stakeholders agree that decoupling global growth from the growth of transport must not be sought. It seemed obvious that the negative effects of transport on the environment and road accidents must be decoupled from the growth of the transport sector.

The various modes of transport should converge and be complementary. In this spirit, stakeholders agreed that within the trans-European networks, the railway, inland waterway and the maritime infrastructures should be employed more.

There must also be investments. The Financial Perspectives should devote a significant budget to trans-European networks, not far from the Commission’s 2004 proposals for a tripling of spending, i.e., about 20 billion €.

In summary, a few examples of stakeholders’ messages were as follows:

· Road transport: In social terms, the rules governing access to the profession should be more clearly specified (social dimension). As regards infrastructure, the network needs to be completed.

· Railways: The Commission must monitor and ensure compliance with the implementation of the rules that are adopted. The results of pilot projects with dedicated specialised corridors must be taken into account. The standardisation of the markets is ongoing (certification, approval, and training). However, the railways sector still has a lot of work to do to adapt to all the demands made of it.

· Air transport: There is recognition of the Commission’s global responsibility in international organisations. There are airport capacity problems.

· Maritime transport: There is also recognition of the role of the European Union and of the Commission as global actors in the international organisations, without, however, neglecting the Member States’ expertise. However, if we wish to have a Community maritime area, the development of all port activities must gradually be better identified. On this subject, a Green Paper on ports policy would be welcomed because the situation of ports is evolving rapidly and traffic is growing as part of globalisation.

· Inland waterways transport: inland waterways should be brought into the Union’s regulatory framework to a larger extent. There is a demand for a European agency in this area. There is also a need for a coordinator.

· Logistics/intermodality: There are three keys to efficient logistics: the time factor (respecting the timetables), efficient transhipments between modes of transport, and training.

· Urban transport: A balance needs to be achieved between the calls for subsidiarity and the demands on the Commission to try to stimulate reflection on the best modes of urban transport; but stakeholders must be the driving force in this. The problem of transport in urban areas is now a major challenge for society and it is normal that the EU is involved while respecting subsidiarity and the role of the cities.

It was recognised that all modes of transport should gradually improve their respect of users’ right and in particular for users with mobility difficulties or who are the weakest.

There must be a social dimension in transport. However, there are many difficulties; the social dialogue is not the same in all the sectors, but it must make progress in certain areas.

It was also underlined that it is fundamental to continue working in partnership in a spirit of dialogue with each sector but most of all with a common European interest so that the European transport policy continues developing.

2.3.5 Energy and Transport Forum consultation

The Energy and Transport Forum [3] produced an Opinion. The Forum supported the political direction that the Commission had sought to follow, but it was disappointed with progress, both at the EU as well as at Member State level.

However, the Forum noted that circumstances had changed since the White Paper was published, and agreed that this must be reflected in new or changed policies, and in much greater success in implementing them.

The challenges now are to devise and implement policies which can accommodate the ever-changing demand of European trade and from the public for mobility. In pursuit of the objective of a Europe which is competitive on the world market, but complying with environmental and social targets and providing freedom of movement, the Forum listed a summary of the actions it recommended the Commission to pursue:

· Develop legislation on passenger rights in surface transport.

· Ensure TEN-T expenditure is consistent with the White Paper policies.

· Move quickly and consistently towards a pricing structure for transport in which the users pay the full costs, internal and external, of the movement of goods or passengers and, at least until this is achieved, enable revenue or tolls from the use of roads to be used in assisting with the financing of railways or waterways on TEN routes.

· Provide market conditions and infrastructure in order to encourage the use of railways, including taking enforcement action as necessary. Implement a new railway package to require total separation of rail infrastructure from train operations, improve quality of rail freight by implementing the publication of a EU-wide system of performance monitoring.

· Set up a mechanism for evaluating EU airport capacity and enhance EU and Member States’ regulatory roles on airports. Develop a comprehensive EU external aviation policy. Introduce a more prescriptive scheme for reducing carbon emissions from air transport that will move towards that sector paying the full external and internal costs that it generates.

· Increase significantly the EU road safety programme and resources, particularly to meet the additional needs of the EU.

· Review the "services of general economic interest" status of urban transport, on the one hand from a social inclusion point of view and on the other hand as a significant issue in the development of a competitive environment in granting licences to operators. Urban transport is also a very significant factor in improving air quality by reducing mass transportation by private vehicles and traffic congestion in urban areas.

· Develop an overall strategy for security across all modes, and determine who pays, ensuring that this does not introduce distortion of the market between modes. Develop proposals for a European insurance scheme for security-related risks.

2.3.6 Conclusions of the Member States’ Joint Expert Group on Transport and Environment

Some members of the Joint Expert Group [4] considered that the relevant kind of decoupling was that which could be achieved by reducing the adverse effects of transport operations on the environment rather than decoupling between transport volume and GDP. However, addressing overall transport demand is also important because of the link between volume and environmental impacts. Transport provides added value for other sectors, e.g. industry and retailing. Therefore, those sectors have to take their fair share as well in reducing the need for transport. Another point of interest is the unexpected and counterproductive effects of other EU policies (e.g. fiscal and regional policies) on decoupling. The aim should be an integrated cross-sectoral approach. Finally, some Member States mentioned their difficulties with designing grant schemes aiming at decoupling compatible with the Community guidelines for state aid. Therefore, there is a need for revision of the state aid guidelines.

In relation to modal shift, the group pointed out that all modes of transport have to improve their environmental performance, acknowledging the different levels of efforts made in the past and the different degrees of improvement required. Also the different situation in different regions and the different infrastructure requirements have to be taken into account. Even though modal shift is not in all circumstances an efficient way to improve the environment, it is nevertheless important from the point of view of congestion. One option to improve the environmental performance of transport might be the introduction of sector-specific goals. One has to differentiate between Old and New Member States. Maintaining a modal share for rail transport of 35% in the candidate countries in 2010 will not be achieved by all new Member States. In order to achieve modal shift, funding is necessary, e.g. Marco Polo, but such funding must be conditional on actual improvements, particularly regarding environmental performance. It is important that maritime projects are eligible under Marco Polo. Non-motorized modes of transport (cycling, walking) and public transport have to be taken into account, especially in cities, as an alternative to car use.

There was broad support for charging as a way to reduce external environmental costs, congestion and safety, covering all modes of transport. A point of interest in this context is the public support for pricing. An EU pricing scheme should take into account the subsidiarity principle and the different needs of Member States (central – peripheral). Harmonisation of urban pricing schemes was suggested. A harmonised system for the identification of vehicles will reduce the costs of charging. The extension of emission trading to include transport should be studied.

Cleaner technology and consumer behaviour/awareness are very relevant issues but they were not extensively dealt with in the White Paper. Points that were raised: driving behaviour and in-car instruments, the fact that cars are getting bigger and less environmentally friendly, noise (e.g. silent tyres), chip-tuning, road safety and dependence on oil. The relationship between safety and eco-driving was underlined. Alternative fuels should be promoted more actively.

There was broad support for more EU action on urban transport and recognition that many urban transport problems are in fact common across Europe, not only because of the environmental problems in urban areas but also because of congestion and safety. However, the subsidiarity principle has to be the basis for cooperation, also within Member States. In order to reduce the need for the use of cars, there have to be alternatives (e.g. public transport, non-motorized transport).

3. PROBLEM DEFINITION

3.1 Transport and mobility in Europe

3.1.1 Importance of transport sector in EU economy

A description of the Union’s transport system will help establishing a diagnostic of its main problems and opportunities. Transport is an important sector in the European economy. With all its related sectors it is estimated to cover up to 7 % of EU GDP. It employs in total over 10 million people (transport services, equipment and infrastructure).

The contribution of transport to added value for EU-15 in 1999 is shown in Table [5].

Table 1: Contribution of transport services and equipment to GDP

| Total | Inland Trans. | WaterTrans | AirTrans | Support act. | Motor vehicles | Ships,Boats | AircraftSpacecraft | Railroad equipment |

EU-15 | 6.55 | 2.35 | 0.20 | 0.47 | 1.39 | 1.45 | 0.16 | 0.41 | 0.12 |

Source: EU Productivity and Competitiveness study: an industry perspective.

To the above figures could be added the contribution of transport civil engineering which belongs to the construction sector (added value 5.76%) and the transport services that firms in all sectors provide for themselves (i.e. with their own trucks and other vehicles) and which appear under the added value contributions of those sectors.

The EU is the first world exporter of transport equipment and the second importer after the United States. This sector of activity has at EU-25 level a structural trade surplus which was about 55 billion euros in 2003. In 2003 transport equipment accounted for 16% of the exports of the Union and 9% of its imports. The Union holds 16% of the world car market and 26% of the aircraft world market.

According to the European Automobile Industry Report 2005, the European car manufacturing sector invests 5% of its turnover, i.e., more than € 19 billion per year into RTD and claims to have the biggest share in overall RTD spending in Europe (24%). The aeronautics sector spends more than € 9 billion per year, which amounts to 15% of its turnover.

Civil engineering industries also rely heavily on transport infrastructure procurement. The Union invests almost 1% of its GDP in transport infrastructure. This has fallen in recent years and for EU-15 the figure is now 0.8% of GDP. Over the last decade, it reached a peak early in the 90’s at 1.2%, levelled off around 1.05% late in the 90’s before falling below 1%. The 10 Member States new have shown a drastic increase in transport fixed capital formation since the mid-90’s to reach more than 1.2% of GDP in the year 2000.

Europe is the biggest tourist destination in the world, but it is also the leading point of origin of tourist travel to the rest of the world. Transport market opening and better infrastructure have improved accessibility to tourist destinations. In 2004 expenditure on tourism in the 25 EU countries was 223 billion €.

The transport sector is a dynamic sector from an economic point of view, which has managed to attain rapid productivity growth. Annual labour productivity in the transport services sector has grown much more than in the rest of the economy, although often less than in the transport sector of the USA, shown for comparison.

Table 2: Total annual labour productivity growth

| 1979-90 | 1990-95 | 1995-01 |

Transport EU-15 | 2.8 | 3.8 | 2.3 |

Total economy EU-15 | 2.2 | 2.3 | 1.7 |

Transport USA | 3.9 | 2.2 | 2.6 |

Source: EU Productivity and Competitiveness study: an industry perspective.

Productivity gains were highest in the first half of the 1990’s. Transport services show better results than transport equipment production: their gains in productivity are consistently higher than in the USA. Unfortunately, for the construction of transport equipment the situation is practically the opposite. In the EU-15, air transport services recorded the higher productivity gains, followed by water transport. Inland transport shows also important gains although it is not possible to know the relative contribution of road and rail. The strong productivity advantage in EU air transport services over the USA ceased after 1995.Table 3: Transport annual labour productivity growth by sectors

| EU-15 |

| 1979-90 | 1990-95 | 1995-01 |

Inland Transport. | 2.6 | 3.0 | 2.4 |

Water Transport. | 3.1 | 5.7 | 2.6 |

Air Transport. | 3.4 | 9.5 | 3.6 |

Support Activities | 3.2 | 3.7 | 1.5 |

Motor vehicles | 4.0 | 3.3 | 0.5 |

Ships and boats | 6.1 | 1.3 | 0.8 |

Aircraft, spacecraft | 4.7 | 2.8 | 0.5 |

Railroad equipment | 3.8 | 4.1 | 1.0 |

Source: EU Productivity and Competitiveness study: an industry perspective.

3.1.2 Transport demand developments

World trade is an essential driver for transport. Even if the Union has grown less than other world areas, it has to some extent participated in the expansion of world trade with both extra-EU-25 exports and imports growing at over 9% in 2004 after three years of slow or negative growth. Meanwhile world trade grew by 5% in 2003, 9% in 2004 and 6.5% in 2005.

EU enlargement has had a big impact on all the drivers of transport demand. Overall transport growth at EU-25 level between 1998 [6] and 2004 has been of 18% for freight and 11% for passengers.

The growth in rail freight transport activity (+6%) between 1998 and 2004 is one third of that for road freight transport activity (+19%) in EU-15. In NMS-10 it has declined (-3.5%), but less than might have been expected from past trends. In passenger transport, most modes have grown slower than passenger car transport and much less than aviation. For EU-15, railways grew somewhat less than private car traffic while tram and metro transport grew more than the private car. Passenger car transport is growing at twice the rate in EU-10 as in EU-15. The most important driver of changes in passenger transport in the NMS is the new demand generated by private car ownership. The following tables describe the recent trends in transport growth:

Table 4: Overall transport activity growth per year

EU-25 % pa | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 |

GDP | 3.6 | 1.8 | 1.2 | 1.2 | 2.4 |

Freight | 4.4 | 1.8 | 1.5 | 1.2 | 5.1 |

Passengers | 2.3 | 1.5 | 1.4 | 0.9 | 1.7 |

Table 5: Freight total growth

Growth1998-2004 | Road | Rail | IWW | Pipelines | Sea | Total |

EU-15 | 19.00 | 6.0 | 3.4 | 2.6 | 21.6 | 17.8 |

EU-10 | 40.4 | -3.5 | -15.8 | 15.0 | 21.7 | 19.9 |

EU-25 | 21.5 | 2.7 | 2.7 | 6.0 | 21.6 | 18.1 |

Table 6: Passenger transport total growth

Growth % 1998-2003 | Passenger cars | Powered 2 wheelers | Bus & coach | Railway | Tram and metro | Air | Total |

EU-15 | 8.7 | 11.4 | 3.3 | 6.7 | 11.1 | 21.0 | 8.7 |

EU-10 | 18.5 | 3.7 | -3.7 | -3.3 | 1.7 | 29.4 | 12.0 |

EU-25 | 9.5 | 10.9 | 2.2 | 5.4 | 8.8 | 21.4 | 9.0 |

3.1.3 Projections for future

According to the forecasts produced by the ASSESS study (Annex 3), the overall freight demand growth for inland modes (i.e. road, rail and inland waterway) when measured in tonne-kilometres is likely to be near 24% for the period 2000-2010, and about 50% for 2000-2020.

Instead of the previous expectations regarding growth in demand (50% growth of road freight transport between 1998 and 2010 for EU-15, the most recent estimates foresee 26% for 2000-2010, and about 55% for 2000-2020 (EU-25). This is due, among other things, to low economic growth, high oil prices and the first effects of the social and pricing measures on road transport.

Short sea shipping demand, when measured in total tonnes received at the ports, is likely to grow by 16 and 36% respectively for 2010 and 2020 and when measured in tonnes km it will grow by 24% and 59% [7]. Rail tonne-km growth is set to be between nearly 8% for 2000-2010, and about 13% for 2000-2020.

For passenger transport the growth figures would be 17% (2010) and 35% (2020). The figures for private car transport are 17% and 36%. Passenger rail gets better results than freight railways thanks to High Speed Trains (HSTs) and commuter lines: it will grow 11% by 2010 and 19% by 2020.

Passenger aviation is the mode that grows the most, growing by half between 2000 and 2010 (51%) and doubling by 2020 (+108%). The following table summarises the key trends foreseen as a baseline:

Box 2

Most likely 2000-2020 transport activity growth in EU-25 |

- GDP - Overall freight transport- Overall passenger transport- Road freight transport- Rail freight transport- Short Sea Shipping- Private car- Rail passenger transport- Air transport | 52%50%35%55%13%59%36%19%108% |

There is a predominance of road transport which is shared with short sea shipping in the case of freight and which is absolute in the case of passenger transport in respect of the private car. This will continue during the coming years and up to 2020, as both the following charts show.

Chart 1

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Chart 2

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3.1.4 Impacts of transport

Transport produces external effects that have an impact on most of the population, notably in urban areas. The total social cost of road provision and use (excluding vehicle operating costs) amounts on average to some 4% of GDP in Western Europe. The social costs are divided as follows: infrastructure costs 1.5%, congestion around 1%, external costs of accidents 0.5%, air pollution 0.6%, noise 0.3% and global warming 0.2% [8].

Concerning environment protection, major improvements have already taken place. As showed by the following graph, the overall levels of emissions from transport have been cut by between 30% and 70% since 1990. This trend is all the more remarkable in that in the meantime, traffic has been growing continuously. The overall level of air pollutants has decreased in the last few years thanks to various programmes such as Auto-oil, EURO standards and CAFE.

Chart 3

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Conversely, CO2 emissions from transport grew between 1998 and 2003 by 6.4%. However, CO2 emissions from transport have grown much less than transport activity.

While emissions of key pollutants have been reduced drastically over the last 15 years (Chart 3), the growth in CO2 emissions is still a major challenge, as shown in the following forecasts (Chart 4):

Chart 4

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The other environmental impacts of transport include land use for infrastructures, noise around transport corridors mainly relate to aviation and road traffic.

Fighting congestion remains a big challenge facing us. The current level of congestion is estimated to cost, mostly in lost time, an amount similar to about 1% of GDP. Congestion is mostly an urban problem although it also takes its toll in some congested interurban corridors. At the same time it should be noted that congestion is getting worse in and around those metropolitan areas and corridors.

Transport safety has been a permanent target for EU policies. Safety issues are important in all modes but the road sector accounts for most fatalities (41600 in 2005). The 2001 White Paper proposed a reduction of 50% in the number of road fatalities. This objective was endorsed by Council and Parliament. However, the rhythm of reduction is not rapid enough, as the number of fatalities has only been reduced by 20% in 4 years which means that unless there is an improvement the objective will not be reached.

Chart 5

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3.2 Transport modes

The transport industry is not a homogenous economic sector but composed of modal industries that are in different economic situation and often competing with each other. The following paragraphs highlight the most recent economic developments in the main transport modes.

Road sector

Due to the flexibility of its technology and infrastructure, road transport is the only motorized mode being able to provide door-to-door services, and – as compared to rail, inland waterways or short-sea shipping – largely unconstrained by the difficult European topography or the dispersed settlement structure. It can provide flexible services regarding departure time and destination, and it is the fastest transport mode for distances up to about 500 km. Thus it is not surprising that this mode remains highly attractive, despite its weaknesses, such as its high toll as regards accidents and fatalities, and the pressure it exerts on the environment

The road transport of freight and of passengers employs 4.2 million people. In EU-25, it accounts for 72.6% of the inland freight transport and 83.2% of inland passengers transport.

Competition in the road freight sector is strong partly due to the fact that entry costs in the sector are low. Strong competition gives rise to narrow profit margins which can cause some firms to bypass social and environmental rules. In recent years, competition has increased sharply and caused price deterioration. Despite the increase in the productivity of the road transport sector in general, the companies’ profits have continued to decrease, sometimes not even reaching 1% of the turnover. The sector continues to be highly fragmented although some consolidation is occurring.

At the level of EU15, the overall turnover increased by 50% between 1995 and 2001. Labour costs show great differences between about 6000 € a year in the new Member States and almost 30000 € a year in EU15 (unweighted averages in both cases).

With 77% of passenger transport activity, transport by private car keeps its advantages over other modes. Some limited levelling of car transport activity measured in passenger-kilometre has taken place in EU15 in recent years. The reasons often quoted for this stabilisation include the saturation of the vehicle fleet in the richest countries, weak demographic growth and increasing congestion. Nevertheless, the appetite for private car ownership is high in the new Member States where the stock of the vehicles increases by 2.5% a year. The fleet of private cars in EU-10 in the 1990s increased at double the rate of that of EU15. Since then, growth has slowed down but remains still remarkably higher than in the EU15.

Between 1995 and 2004, road passenger traffic grew by 17% and freight traffic by 35%. In spite of this increase in traffic, technological progress was such that road transport air pollution fell in volume over the period 1990-2002 by between 30 and 70% depending on the types of pollutants. Road transport is expected to continue to absorb a large part of the expected freight demand growth.

Railways

With respect to freight transport, European railways have strengths where heavy or dangerous bulk products have to be transported over long distances and where time and speed is less relevant as a quality criterion. Thus this mode could be most competitive between major agglomerations in Europe and on distances beyond 500 km or so, and where the necessary door-to-door service can be provided by a well-integrated intermodal transport chain. With respect to passenger transport, a significant market exists for high-speed rail links connecting major European agglomerations, and for providing commuter services for bigger agglomerations. The major weakness of this mode – lack of door-to-door infrastructure, inflexibility, difficulty to deal with mountainous topographies, capacity constraints and environmental pressures such as noise emissions – could be partially overcome by strengthening competition, efficiency and technological progress.

The market opening process is ongoing, but the impact of the restructuring of the sector is already visible and the number of employees in the rail sector has been noticeably reduced while labour productivity increased. Generally the financial situation of the majority of the rail companies is rather bad, due in part to the heavy social contributions inherited from the past which hangs over their production costs.

Rail freight traffic has remained more or less stable over the last years with a growth of 6% between 1995 and 2004. In the United Kingdom and in Germany where the market was opened up in 1995, the growth of rail freight during this period was respectively + 70% and of + 24% in 2004 in relation to 1995. In France over the same period rail freight achieved a negative result (-6%); and in Poland the negative result achieved was much bigger (-30%).

Some passenger transport services are subject to a certain amount of competition, either directly in open access systems or, more generally, by means of public service contract award of exclusive rights after call for tenders. Rail’s market share for passenger transport is 5.8%.

Aviation sector

Its speed over longer distances as well as the absence of the necessity to heavily invest in expensive infrastructure networks (except airports) are the trump cards of air transport. Its weakness is the constraint imposed by weight considerations, security concerns as well as noise emissions around airports and – as for most other modes – its lack of door-to-door service capabilities. Thus, passenger transport and the transport of light and high-value freight over longer distances will remain the predominant natural market segments for air transport also in the longer run. If embedded into an integrated transport concept, this market segment is expected to show dynamic growth over the coming years. The aviation sector needs also to face its increasing environmental impacts, notably regarding greenhouse gas emissions and noise around airports.

After a few profitable years, the European airlines have had decreasing annual incomes, a tendency which worsened after the attacks of 11 September 2001. During the following years the airlines had to face the consequences of terrorist threats, the SARS crisis, the war in Iraq and the significant increase in oil prices. The number of passengers transported by plane practically did not increase between 2000 and 2003. However, over the long term, the growth of traffic is very dynamic: the number of passengers on internal Community flights grew at an average annual rate of 4.9% over the period 1995-2003, with passenger traffic growing by 5.8% in 2005.

In recent years, the sector has diversified deeply. The European aviation scene changed remarkably when the low-cost airlines started to gain market shares. Today, these companies cover more than 20% of air transport within the EU. Their market share has been increasing by around 6% in recent years. Moreover, the low-cost airline companies stimulated the growth of certain airports, including in less developed regions.

Maritime sector

Maritime transport is the cheapest form of transport in value and in energy terms per tonne km given the large volumes of freight a ship can carry. It is also the slowest of the transport modes, its increase in speed being particularly expensive. It uses the sea as a natural infrastructure which in Europe often offers routings shorter than their inland alternatives where there is plenty of free capacity. However, it requires sea ports whose infrastructure can be expensive to build (e.g. deep draught wharves) or to maintain (e.g. dredging). The lack of a tight control over ships’ routings has obliged to keep administrative and customs controls at ports, which is one of the weaknesses of intra-EU Short Sea Shipping (SSS) transport. Apart from some large factories which have their own port access, sea transport requires the collaboration of other modes to provide a door-to-door service. The environmental performance of ships, notably in respect of conventional air pollutants and oil spills, is also poor.

The European Union is very dependent on maritime transport. Nearly 90% of its external trade and more than 40% of its internal trade goes by sea; on the whole nearly 2 billion tonnes of freight are loaded and unloaded in EU ports each year. Maritime companies belonging to European Union nationals control nearly 40% of the world fleet (i.e. including out-flagging).

The trend towards larger ships, mostly container-carriers, will also require ports to expand their infrastructure and deepen their channels to remain competitive, their hinterland access will also have to be enhanced.

The major part of European maritime transport is SSS. However, the strong expected increase in ocean traffic due to globalisation (almost three times increase between 2000 and 2020) will also have an influence on internal EU feeder traffic.

Short sea shipping represents approximately half of the whole volume of the goods transported by sea in EU15 or approximately 1 billion tonnes. The average growth rate is 2.2% a year. The market share of containers and carriers accounts for 23%. Driven by the high rate of growth in international traffic, the European shipping companies are in a healthy financial situation.

The ports’ current financial situation is good overall but competition issues both inside and between the ports is becoming increasingly sensitive. The ports of Hamburg, Bremen, Wilhelmshaven, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Ghent, Zeebrugge, Dunkirk and Le Havre show average growth in activity of 7.4% in 2003-2004 with the most rapid growth corresponding to Wilhelmshaven (13.9%) and Antwerp (12.7%). Container traffic in Hamburg is growing annually at 14%, exceeding the growth at European level (9%).

Inland waterways

It is a cheap but slow mode of transport which has plenty of free capacity available, although it normally does not provide door-to-door service. Its environmental performance is good in terms of CO2 emissions but poor in terms of conventional pollution. The construction or capacity enhancement of inland waterways is also likely to disrupt sensitive ecosystems.

The share of inland waterways in freight transport is 3.4 % overall, but in certain corridors and regions it can exceed 40%.Inland waterway traffic has experienced a comparatively positive development in recent years, despite a slight fall during the dry summer of 2003. This sector is essentially based on SMEs. The sector has in recent years shown the signs of a new-found dynamism. High traffic growth rates were observed between 1995 and 2004: almost 50% in Belgium and 30% in France. A two-figure increase a year on certain routes can be observed in the transport of containers. There are in addition important capacity reserves on certain main waterways like the Danube.

Urban public transport

Urban public transport is a sector which offers a wide variety of situations both in respect of infrastructure and of services. Its strengths, besides its impressive safety record, lies in its potential to significantly reduce congestion in large agglomerations, to reduce driving stress and to limit and reduce local pollution. However, its weakness is the lack of door-to-door service capabilities combined with the need to serve more hop-on and hop-off stops than required by individual users and significant waiting times, hence the time-consuming character of public transport systems. Security concerns have increased also in urban transport. While some of these weaknesses could be overcome by increasing the frequency and density of services, by a better integration of other transport modes and by accelerated technological progress, competition with private passenger cars which are becoming cleaner and safer, will remain fierce, namely in less congested, less populated areas.

The market share of urban public transport in the transport of passengers has declined over the long term but it seems now to have stabilised around 9% in recent years. However, it continues to worsen in the new Member States.

The annual turnover of the sector, comprising buses, underground railways or urban rail services, is estimated at 150 billion €. The rail product suppliers state that the urban, suburban and regional rail systems account for approximately 50% of their annual overall turnover (including all rail supplies except for infrastructure).

The majority of the Member States have introduced competition into their urban and regional bus transport markets. Approximately 25% of the services by bus and urban rail (i.e. underground railway, light underground railway and tram) are subject to a certain amount of competition. In the 1990’s, the commercial activity of the bus and urban rail companies in 24 large and medium-sized cities in the EU15 fell on average from 0.7% in the cities without competition, increased on average by 1.8% in the cities with regulated competition and fell on average by 3.1% in the cities with deregulated services.

3.3 Changes in the transport policy context

A number of changes have occurred during the past few years that have an important bearing to the European transport policy. This situation has to be taken into account and provides grounds for redesigning the Common Transport Policy.

GDP growth has been lower than the 3% hoped-for when the White Paper was drawn up. The Union’s rate of growth during the last five years has been just below 2% (1.8% as an yearly average over 2000-2005), lower for example than the 3% reached on average by the USA. The world rate of growth, which is important for assessing foreign demand, has been about 4%. If the Union carries out the reforms required under the Lisbon Strategy, it will be able to keep its current potential growth rate of about 2.25%, otherwise under the pressure of an ageing society the rate could fall to 1.25% in 2040.

The enlargement from EU-15 to EU-25 has added a new dimension to European transport problems. The size of the Union has expanded by almost a quarter with enlargement. Trade and cultural integration will increase traffic. For the moment enlargement has similar effects to the earlier enlargement to Spain and Portugal, with rates in cross-border traffic with the new Member States growing at 10% per year. It must be said, though, that trade integration already started during the 90’s. However, the new Member States represent 20% of the population of the present 15 Member States, but only 5% of their GDP which reflects the weight of the new Member States in terms of transport activity.

The new Member States rely on a much more transport-intensive economy than the rest of the Union with a high number of tonne-kilometres per euro of GDP (five times higher than in EU15). It was expected that in the new Member States there would be a reduction in the transport intensity of economic growth. However, the years 1999-2003 have proven that the expected reduction did not materialise (see table 7 below).

Table 7: Relationships between inland freight transport and GDP in EU-25 in the years 1999-2003

| 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 |

Tonne-km of rail and road transport per euro GDP |

EU25 | 0.24 | 0.24 | 0.23 | 0.24 | 0.24 |

EU15 | 0.21 | 0.21 | 0.20 | 0.21 | 0.20 |

NMS10 | 1.07 | 1.06 | 1.02 | 1.03 | 1.05 |

Sources: ASSESS (Annex XIX) UG, calculated on the basis of Eurostat data (as of October 2005) and Energy & Transport in Figures 2004.

This is in part the result from intensified foreign trade and transport liberalisation. Given the large differences in labour cost and income levels between new and old Member States, changes in the sites of production (attracting industry) and freight traffic growth (exporting and importing) can be observed [9].

The enlargement has greatly increased the heterogeneity of the EU transport systems. It will have several consequences, and it comes with both opportunities and certain threats for different modes of transport:

- rapidly rising transport demand which is due to economic growth rates about twice as high as in the rest of the Union;

- larger differences between the countries in the existing infrastructure, the vehicle fleets, the environmental and safety performance of the modes, and labour costs;

- deteriorating public transport services and oversized railway companies;

- economic integration of the new Member States and their low cost levels attracts many European firms;

- increased transport demand due to stronger economic growth in the new Member States and increased market integration in the EU;

- longer distances of intra-EU transport flows and changed geography.

This should lead to, inter alia:

- new demands for infrastructure development (notably of roads, if the likely convergence of transport demand patterns is to develop as expected) and upgrading;

- stronger competition, notably in road freight transport, which may strengthen the need for competition policies;

- stronger needs to reduce the negative impacts of transport;

- more favourable conditions for rail, since it is more competitive for long-distance freight transport, as well as for maritime transport.

Globalisation will put increasing pressure on the Union’s ports and airports on which most of international trade and exchanges are based. The expansion of world trade is a long term trend, even though it has accelerated over the past 15 years. Also, geographic patterns have shifted, with a growing share of emerging markets (Asia in particular) in trade flows. These trends are not new, although they may deserve more attention than given in the initial White Paper. However, their implications for the EU transport system and EU policies (e.g. regarding modal developments or logistics) concern notably:

– increased transport demand;

– longer distances, which is a priori a favourable factor for maritime and air transport;

– shifts in the geographical distribution of flows;

– concentration of flows due to increased integration and specialisation of transport as well as logistics services.

Table 8: EU internal and external trade

EU-15 Export Growth % | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 |

EU-15 | 2.4 | 0.6 | -0.1 | 6.6 |

Extra EU-25 | 4.0 | 0.2 | -2.8 | 9.2 |

New MS | 7.9 | 5.7 | 4.4 | 9.0 |

EU-15 Import Growth % | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 |

EU-15 | 1.1 | 0.5 | 1.0 | 7.6 |

Extra EU-25 | -1.6 | -3.8 | -2.0 | 10.4 |

New MS | 12.9 | 6.0 | 9.1 | 6.5 |

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The European economy in general, and the transport sector in particular, has had to face the rise of oil prices from 20 to over 70 dollars a barrel as a consequence of geopolitical tensions and increased demand. This raises the importance of energy issues for the economy and for the transport sector as transport represents 31% of total final energy demand and relies almost exclusively on oil (98%). According to the most expert estimations, the high oil prices are of a permanent nature and the future EU transport policy will have to adapt to this situation.

According to a recent study [10], the effects of oil rises on transport are different according to the modes. Due to the absence of taxation and low processing and distribution costs, the variation in the price of crude oil directly affects the fuel prices for inland waterway transport, short sea shipping and aviation. In these sectors, a doubling of the crude oil of price will result in a doubling of fuel costs. In road transport due to taxes and to fuel processing and distribution costs only up to 40% of the price of fuel is related to the costs of crude oil. Thus a doubling of the crude oil price will result in 40% higher fuel costs. As to electric rail, electricity prices tend to be almost insensitive to the short run increases in the price of crude oil, but in the longer run a doubling of the crude oil price may reflect in 15% higher prices of electricity.

Energy costs are only a part of total transport costs. Thus, even if fuel costs are sensitive to oil prices, this effect may be dampened by other cost elements. In spite of high increases in fuel prices, and to a much lesser extent on labour prices, road and aviation transport costs have increased quite moderately while the profitability in truck fleet exploitation has worsened in many countries:

– In Dutch domestic road transport the increase in transport costs in the period 1994-2004 is just below 50%, whereas prices have increased by around 25% in the same period.

– The same holds for French road hauliers who have faced an increase of transport costs of 17% in the period 2000-2005, and an increase of only 5% in their transport price over the same period.

– In Spain the profitability in truck fleet exploitation has worsened, especially with the increase in the fuel prices, while freight prices have remained stable since 2000 or even dropped in many traffic relations.

In aviation, European network majors have managed to cut the unit cost of flight operations (which include fuel costs) by 9% in the past 3 years, despite the 63% rise in the price of fuel oil in that period. Distribution and back-office unit costs have been slashed by 24%, due to technologies such as e-ticketing and on-line booking. The one major area where costs are practically not falling is the costs of using airports. In the absence of effective economic regulation, the lack of competition in this sheltered supply markets means there is still insufficient pressure for efficiency improvements.

Since the terrorist attacks of 11 September, the issue of transport security - and in particular, increased air transport security - has moved to the top of the political agenda. The issue became even more burning after the Madrid and London attacks, both targeted on public transport. But the aviation industry is by no means the only transport sector which is concerned by security threats. All sectors and modes need to reinforce security measures and re-examine how passenger and freight security can be assured. Attention has to be focused on the entire transport chain and its points of vulnerability. This new dimension of security calls for an investigation of ways to combine efficiency and security improvements in the transport system.

3.4 Changes in the general political context

A renewed Lisbon strategy

The Lisbon strategy was renewed in 2005 in order to support the economic growth Europe needs. It puts strong emphasis on:

– the need for innovation and research and development, increasing public and private investment in research,

– the creation of a business climate that encourages businesses to start up and grow by cutting red-tape and simplifying legislation,

– creating more employment and helping people find jobs by improving their mobility between jobs (and possibly their physical mobility too),

– and using to use energy efficiently.

Transport policy has to be aligned on all these general objectives for the European Union: transport services underpin economic growth and job creation, as transport is demand driven, taking due consideration of sustainable development goals.

A reviewed Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS II)

Sustainable Development is a fundamental objective of the European Union. It is an overarching concept which underpins all Union policies, actions and strategies and requires economic, environmental and social policies to be designed and implemented in a mutually reinforcing way.

The review of the Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS II), launched in 2001, has been started in 2005 with a first report providing an assessment of the progress made since 2001 and outlining a number of future orientations. These initial orientations have been further confirmed and developed in a second Communication on the review of the Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS) by the end of 2005.

The main message of the review is that it is necessary to improve prosperity, solidarity and security in order to deliver a better quality of life. In line with the Lisbon strategy, it underlines the need for growth and more jobs, a cleaner and healthier environment. It states also the need for a more cohesive society where prosperity and opportunity are shared across the European Union and beyond. There is also a need for more innovation, research and education. The review underlines that EU future prosperity and quality of life will depend on the capacity and commitment to change production and consumption patterns and to decouple economic growth from environmental degradation.

For transport, the most relevant message is that the availability of affordable transport has been beneficial; but that it has been accompanied by negative aspects such as congestion, health impacts and environmental degradation.

The SDS II has focused on the following key actions for transport:

· to consider alternatives to road transport, including by developing the Trans-European Networks and intermodal links for freight logistics, to allow goods to shift easily between road, rail, and water transport;

· to continue examining the use of infrastructure charging in the EU;

· to improve the environmental performance of cars by promoting clean and energy efficient vehicles, new vehicle standards, and increasing the use of biofuels; to differentiate taxes on passenger cars according to CO2 emissions.

In support of the sustainable development, several thematic strategies and action plans have been adopted across a wide range of areas, in particular on environmental issues. Often they include specific targets and milestones.

The 6th Environmental Action Programme was adopted in 2002. It outlined the priorities for action on the environment for the next 10 years. It called for the preparation of seven thematic strategies on various issues. The most relevant ones for transport policy are those related to air pollution (pollutants emission standards), the urban environment (urban transport plans), the marine environment (oil transport) and the sustainable use of resources (energy consumption in transport, support of green modes of transport), all adopted in 2005 and early 2006.

Finally, the Commission has recently launched a public consultation on the ways to establish a truly integrated Maritime Policy which will release untapped potential in terms of growth and jobs while strengthening the protection of the marine environment [11].

3.5. Upcoming problems for EU transport

The previous chapters have indicated that there are major challenges for the future European transport policy: the growing demand from citizens and from the whole economy has to be met in a sustainable way. While the globalisation of economies increases trade flows and transport throughout the world, EU has now a full continent to cover and to provide transport services to all corners of the enlarged Union. The Union members have different situations in their transport growth, infrastructure and existing industries. The congestion paralyses the big metropolitan areas, at the same time when some EU regions in peripheries are lacking access to transport services. Building new infrastructure is only a partial answer for many reasons: lack of financing and environmental and other limitations to new infrastructure investments.

The negative impacts of transport call also attention. The transport sector has received good results in cutting down many negative environmental impacts like polluting emissions. Some sectors still need to be tackled while the main problems remain in the increasing green house gas emissions, notably CO2. The other environmental challenges include land take and fragmentation as well as noise.

The environmental impacts of transport are closely linked to its dependence on fossil fuels, oil in practice. The persistent high oil prices demand action and energy efficiency and other measures to limit oil dependency are looked for. Initiatives such as those announced in the Green Paper on energy efficiency need to be pursued with urgency at the different public and private levels involved [12]. At the same time, experience from earlier oil hikes show that the transport sector has very low elasticities and the changes are very slow. People do not change their behaviour easily, often it is limited by every day life’s practicalities of housing, work and services that are needed.

There is a continuous need to improve safety in all transport modes but even more so in road transport, the sector that has the most fatalities. Security is a new, increasing challenge for transport policy, also throughout the modes but notably in public transport.

4. DEFINING THE OBJECTIVES

The Common Transport Policy has a long history determined by the Treaties, from the attainment of the internal market without national discriminations to the creation of the trans-European networks. Though the transport sector has a strong international dimension, the main EU interest is in intra-EU transport to facilitate trade within the internal market and to avoid creating distortions within it. The Union has major powers for developing the internal market in transport. All transport policy proposals are decided by qualified majority, except for taxation measures which are decided by unanimity. As regards trans-European networks the Commission’s financing proposals have to be approved by the Member States, who are responsible for the planning and construction of projects. The Union has shared competence in the field of safety and only limited competence in the field of urban transport.

Since 1992 the Common Transport Policy has aimed to create a framework for sustainable mobility. The 1992 White Paper aimed at sustainable mobility by the reinforcement and proper functioning of internal market; development of coherent, integrated transport systems for the whole Community using best technologies; development of infrastructure to reduce disparities between regions; sustainable development, notably respecting the environment and reducing CO2; promoting safety; improving social items; developing relations with third countries.

In 2001, a new phase in the Common Transport Policy was reached with the adoption of a new White Paper.

The White Paper identified as major difficulties the following issues: the imbalance in the development of the different modes, congestion on the main overland routes and in cities, as well as in airspace, and the major impact transport is having on the environment and on citizen’s health. Accordingly, the White Paper proposed policies to adjust the balance between the different modes of transport, in particular for the transportation of goods, stressed the need to do away with bottlenecks in the trans-European networks, it proposed the objective of reducing the number of fatalities by 50%, it showed the need for an effective policy on charging and it argued that the Community should strengthen its position in international organizations.

Considerable progress has been made through a number of initiatives and decisions adopted by the Council and the Parliament.

4.1. Future policy objectives

The future transport policy needs to build on the achievements of the earlier policies when responding to the new challenges. The EU transport systems have to:

– offer a high level of mobility to people and businesses throughout the Union. The availability of affordable and high-quality transport solutions contributions vitally to realising the free flow of people, goods and services, to improving social and economic cohesion, and to ensuring the competitiveness of European industry. Effective infrastructures are an essential element of providing efficient mobility;

– protect the environment, employment, the citizen and the passenger. Both in the environmental and social areas great advances have been made since 1992 but they remain an integral part of mobility policy; proper enforcement of EU rules is necessary and the environmental and social effects of globalisation need to be addressed. EU policy also protects European citizens as users and providers of transport services both as consumers and in terms of their safety and, more recently, security;

– innovate in support of the first two aims of mobility and protection by increasing the efficiency and sustainability of the growing transport sector. EU policy develops and brings to market tomorrow’s innovative solutions that are energy efficient or use alternative energy sources or support mature large intelligent transport projects, such as Galileo;

– connect internationally, projecting the Union’s policies to reinforce mobility, protection and innovation, by ensuring that the increasing role of the Union to set world standards and as a world leader in transport industries, equipment and services is even better recognised.

Developing and improving economic and resource efficiency is the key objective for the Lisbon strategy. Increased economic efficiency will enable a reduction in transport costs and in resource use. Freed resources, e.g. in terms of working time and energy savings, may thus be put to better use in other sectors of the economy or in improved transport services. More and/or better mobility will foster the productivity of the European economy and the Union’s global competitiveness. The more detailed objectives include:

· Activating and attain better functioning of the internal market in all transport modes

· Improved utilisation of existing networks and optimised financing of new infrastructures.

· Fighting congestion and increasing accessibility

· Developing charging policies

Protection of the population and taking better care of their needs, including the environment around them, will improve safety conditions – e.g. reducing road fatalities towards the 50% target - enhanced preparedness for security threats and contribute to a reduction in the negative impacts of the transport sector on the environment. They will also contribute to territorial cohesion by providing better accessibility to the periphery and better accessibility to means of transport in general (e.g. for disabled people). The more detailed objectives include:

· Protecting the environment and minimising harmful impacts, including greenhouse gas emissions

· Full integration of social dimensions into the transport sectors;

· Developing European urban transport schemes;

· Actively promoting security in all transport modes;

· Enhanced promotion of safety, especially road safety;

· Ensuring adequate protection of user rights.

Improvements in the”efficiency” and “protection” objectives will be facilitated by the use of new technologies, notably the promotion of research and innovation as the third objective of transport policy. A transport sector with a high penetration of ICT technologies will be a major contribution to the competitiveness of the Union. The more detailed objectives could include:

· to support innovation and RTD;

· to increase synergies between modes and better logistics in all transport systems;

· to exploit new, advanced technologies;

· to increase energy efficiency in all transport modes.

Finally, the role of the EU on the global stage is an overarching policy objective that has its place also in the transport sector, notably to ensure EU interests concerning the other three objectives. This objective is characterized by:

· Raising the profile of the EU in the international transport-related organisations;

· Applying the European policy lines to the global market as well, notably regarding social and environmental objectives.

European transport policy is just a sub-set, even if an important one, of the many policies that have an influence on the transport system. Member States, regions and local authorities also develop their own policies. Therefore, it is clear that to meet the ambitious objectives of EU policies, the collaboration and combined efforts of all decision-making levels are needed.

5. DEVELOPING THE MAIN POLICY OPTIONS

5.1 The White Paper adopted in 2001

The 2001 White Paper predicted very high road traffic growth (50% between 1998 and 2010). It also highlighted that at the same time some other, less polluting and safer modes of transport have large unused capacities and either are growing less than road transport or are being marginalised, as it is the case with freight railways. These problems are likely to worsen as traffic tends to grow in line with economic growth, in particular freight transport, thus the White Paper identified decoupling between transport and GDP as one of its main success indicators.

The paper put some concrete quantitative objectives completed by additional qualitative objectives:

· decoupling between transport growth and GDP growth

· modal shift coming back to the 1998 modal split for EU-15 and keeping a weight for rail freight traffic of 35% for the (at the time future) new Member States.

· road safety should be improved by reducing by 50% the number of fatalities.

From a legislative point of view, the 2001 White Paper action programme has been a success. Major proposals were approved and are being put into practice. Among the measures adopted the following can be highlighted:

– the long-time awaited opening-up of rail freight transport to competition has become a reality for international operators and will be open for national markets too in 2007. There has been a slow implementation of the 1st and 2nd railway packages due to a lack of political will. However, the most advanced Member State experiences show that the decline of railways can be halted and reversed, although it is clear that the objective of coming back to the 1998 modal split objective will not be met;

– the recently upgraded social conditions of road transport will be better enforced thanks to the introduction of the digital tachograph;

– the coordination and harmonisation of the main air traffic management systems has been greatly improved with the approval of the European Single Sky legislation which will put an end to the fragmentation of European skies;

– passenger rights in aviation have been strengthened;

– the new Eurovignette Directive allows the setting of distance-based prices for road infrastructure use that avoid punitive charges to international trade and that can be channelled to the financing of infrastructure;

– the EU has redefined its TEN priority projects and decided to concentrate on 30 priority projects; the common planning of the main trans-European infrastructure corridors allows for benefiting the most from infrastructure building decisions taken in other capitals. In this respect the success of the emerging European High Speed Rail network is being replicated by the coordination shown in building the corridors that criss-cross the new Member States;

– the promotion of intermodal transport and logistics with the Marco Polo programme has given rise to many successful innovative projects;

– the EU has also shown its capacity to develop large-scale industrial programmes such as Galileo, ERTMS and SESAR;

– the Union now has a clear and ambitious objective regarding road safety: a 50% reduction in road fatalities. This objective has been adopted by the Council, the European Parliament and by many Member States. Some Member States have shown that it is possible to obtain good results in road safety campaigns;

– the energy taxation system has provided a buffer to the high oil price increases and has favoured quick dieselisation and, therefore, energy savings;

– the legal framework in maritime safety has been substantially strengthened.

It has to be acknowledged that in spite of very high oil prices, the European transport system has worked very well and absorbed a large part of these effects thanks to the productivity increases due to greatly enhanced competition.

Some of the measures proposed in the 2001 White Paper have not been proposed or adopted. Some measures have had to be discontinued because they were seen as interfering with market mechanisms or because much more technical work was required in particular given the heterogeneity of the new enlarged Union:

– Harmonize minimum clauses in contracts governing road transport activity notably in case of a fuel price rise;

– Approve a Directive laying down the terms of compensation in the event of delays or failure to meet service obligations (which could make transport more expensive);

– Propose a new Community framework for the development of the profession of freight integrator;

– Harmonise the conditions relating to weekend bans for lorries

– Propose uniform taxation for commercial road transport [13];

– Freedom of access to port services;

– Include a common methodology for setting price levels which incorporate external costs and which will specify the conditions for fair competition between modes.

Infrastructure charging still lacks coherence both from the modal and intermodal points of view, even if the revision of the Eurovignette directive in the road sector is a positive step regarding the objective of prices reflecting transport costs. Some market imperfections have not been removed such as administrative barriers in the rail and maritime sectors. The airport sector is still not prepared for the expected growth in traffic even if the Single Sky policy will improve substantially air traffic management.

5.2. Impacts of 2001 White Paper

As it is shown in table 4, decoupling of transport growth from economic growth is a reality for passenger transport in most of the years, while it is far for being the case for freight transport.

Concerning modal shift within EU-15, the objective is not being reached, although the decline of rail transport has been halted in absolute terms and the main increases recorded correspond to short-sea shipping and not to road transport.

Concerning the indicative objective for NMS, the 35% target for rail freight within inland transport is not reached either as in 2004 the rail freight modal share was already 32%, against 40% in 1998. There were no objectives for passenger transport for the, at the time, enlargement countries.

Modelling shows that the White Paper emphasis on modal balance as a prerequisite for sustainable transport could be attained by a combination of measures among which the most powerful would be the widespread imposition of user charges to all road users both freight and private vehicles, supported by the accelerated construction of the TEN priority projects.

However, the benefits to be expected from modal shift are in any case limited as an increase by 50% of rail freight traffic would only reduce road freight traffic by 10%.

Table 9: Degree of attainment of the 1998 modal split objective for EU-15 freight

Modal share % over tonne-kilometres | | | | |

EU-15 | Road | Rail | IWW | Pipelines | Sea transport | Total |

1998 | 43,4 | 8,5 | 4,3 | 3,0 | 40,7 | 100,0 |

2004 | 43,9 | 7,6 | 3,8 | 2,6 | 42,1 | 100,0 |

Table 10: Degree of attainment of the 1998 modal split objective for EU-15 passenger transport

EU-15 Modal share % over passenger-kilometres | | | |

EU-25 | Car | Public transport | Rail | Air transport | Total |

1998 | 78.3 | 9.0 | 5.8 | 6.9 | 100.0 |

2004 | 77.9 | 8.6 | 5.7 | 7.8 | 100.0 |

In passenger transport the main development has been the growth in aviation traffic which has increased its modal share by almost 1%, while public transport and, to a lower extent, rail continue to lose ground in terms of modal share.

On the basis of the 2001 White Paper measures approved and implemented so far, or which look likely to be implemented before 2010, the ASSESS study predicts that these measures are likely to reverse the decline of rail freight, which nonetheless will continue to lose market share. Short sea shipping and inland waterways traffic will grow more than without these measures. On the other hand, road freight transport activity will grow a little less than without them. The effects of these policies in respect of passenger transport are small. Thus, the current White Paper implementation process will generate some extra growth in passenger rail transport while denting the otherwise moderate growth in private car transport and having minimal negative impact on the strong growth predicted for aviation.

According to recent estimations, congestion (measured using average trip times as an indicator) experienced by road freight would increase by almost 10% in 2010 and by 20% in 2020 in the scenario without the WP. The full implementation of the WP would reduce this figure by 4 % in 2010 and by 5 % in 2020.

Although it is impossible to attribute price and productivity developments to certain previous policy measures it should be expected that market opening will lead to lower prices and higher productivity everything else being equal. Indeed, prices in the transport sectors have normally closely followed general inflation in recent years [14]. There has also been a slight convergence in prices of transport (which includes road and air). The impact of market opening has been strong on rail freight prices, although much smaller for urban and air transport. Rail transport prices are estimated to be around 20-25% lower than they would have been without liberalisation [15].

For rail transport, the results of regulatory changes are mixed: in rail freight, according to the CE study, market opening has led to a 47% increase in productivity, whereas in passenger rail transport productivity has declined by nearly 7%. Here again productivity improvements take time to materialise. In air transport full liberalisation would increase the load factor by 13%.

There were some 41 600 road fatalities in 2005, which means a 17.5% reduction over four years, but this is insufficient to reach the target to halve the road deaths by 2010 as under current trends there would be 32 500 fatalities in 2010 instead of 25 000. Significant differences remain between Member States, which in the case of the number of fatalities per million inhabitants range from 1 to 3 and in the case of the number of fatalities per million private cars range from 1 to 5.

Concerning CO2 emissions, their growth will experience a substantial slowdown, although they will keep on growing with a 15% increase between 2000 and 2020. A strong improvement in road passenger transport is expected, mainly resulting from vast improvements in car efficiency which - according to the ASSESS study assumptions will improve by 28% between 2000 and 2020, due to the agreement with car manufacturers, to dieselisation [16], and to the introduction of biofuels and hybrids. This increase in car energy efficiency almost compensates the expected increase in passenger car transport activity of 36%. However, light and heavy duty road freight vehicles will see their energy efficiency improved only by 11% between 2000 and 2020 while their traffic will increase by 55%. Still, private cars make up for 70% of road energy consumption. Rail will improve its performance thanks to electrification, although from a whole life-cycle view the reduction in power of nuclear origin may soften this trend. Aviation will gain from the European Single Sky and also from some energy efficiency gains.

Table 11: Transport CO2 emissions past and foreseen

EU-25In 000 tonnes | Road | Rail | Aviation | Inland navigation | Total |

1995 | 725408 | 10126 | 99889 | 21081 | 856504 |

2000 | 811922 | 9157 | 134324 | 16463 | 971866 |

2003 | 843592 | 8135 | 132409 | 17333 | 1001469 |

2003/1995 % Increase | 16.3 | -19.7 | 32.6 | -17.8 | 16.9 |

2020 | 915357 | 891 | 180155 | 19070 | 1115474 |

2000/2020% Increase | 13.0 | -90.3 | 34.1 | 15.4 | 15.0 |

Sources Eurostat. Primes for 2020.

According to ASSESS, the White Paper has little effect on sustainability (CO2, air pollutants) unless much stronger measures are taken which in turn cut down mobility. Energy demand and CO2 emissions are expected to remain relatively stable between 2000 and 2020 (+8%). There is little difference between the scenarios of most likely implementation of the White Paper [17] (+7%) and others in which the White Paper is fully implemented (+ 7%) or is even reinforced (+1%) with full charging for infrastructure use, as the effects in energy efficiency improvements of the very large transport modes (road and private car transport) dilute the positive effects of modal shift. Moreover, it should be recalled that the most effective environmental actions of the EU, notably effectiveness in reducing CO2 and pollutant emissions from road vehicles, are outside explicit White Paper measures (e.g. measures affecting vehicle technology as the Euro-standards and the ACEA agreement) and constitute the common background for all the scenarios.

5.3 Assessing the direction of future action

Transport flows and systems are very much demand-driven. Transport demand is very dependent on economic development and personal mobility. All citizens and industries are decision-makers but, in addition, transport demand also depends to a large extent on policy decisions in other policy sectors, like urban planning and environmental protection. In addition, it should be noted that the transport industry is a not a homogenous economic sector but more a set of competing branches that have sometimes conflicting views and interests. Some of these industries also have a strong heritage from the past, for instance having been state-owned monopolies. The changes in the transport structures, industries and infrastructures are slow. They take time and often require large investment.

The EU transport policy objectives are of a more permanent nature. The main policies as defined in the White Paper of 1992 and 2001 are well advanced. A wide variety of measures to meet the objectives of the Treaties and the general policy orientations contained in the Lisbon Strategy and in the Sustainable Development Strategy are either established, or in their implementation or preparation phase.

The Common Transport Policy is by now relatively well developed for all modes of transport. While adjustments remain, most important improvements are no longer only in hands of politicians but in the hands of market decision-makers. Given that the acquis and its principles are well established, there are no excluding comprehensive overall alternatives for action at EU level.

At the same time we need to recognise that the EU transport policy has new challenges and new targets to be met, as described in the preceding chapters of this document. Also, the Community policy context has to adapt itself to the political reality and provide solutions that give added value.

The preceding chapter has presented the expected results and impacts of the 2001 White Paper. The future orientations continue on these achievements but, naturally, all policy options will have a lot in common. The new, not yet introduced measures may re-direct the line and change the orientations with time.

Based on these reflections, three policy orientations may be discussed which all have a common core, the established policies and measures, but differ in relation to the future activities, either concentrating to consolidate the current policy ambitions, or to insist to meet the original 2001 White Paper targets by the measures foreseen at that moment or, thirdly, accommodating the activities to the new policy context. Accordingly, three policy concepts could be presented:

1. Current

The past years have been a period of active transport legislation. So, an option for the future is to concentrate now in implementation of the current policies as already approved by the Institutions.

First of all it is imperative to achieve the objectives of ongoing policies such as the completion of the internal market and its external projection, the implementation of the TENs, intermodality, and the new Eurovignette Directive, the completion of the Single Sky.

The concrete policy measures could comprise rail market completion by removing technical and operational barriers to international rail traffic; market reviews (also including state aid aspects) in other transport modes as well and adjusting measures as needed to ensure a well functioning internal market; completion of passenger rights in all transport modes; completion of social legislation in road transport; TEN planning and investments in the frame of the existing financing resources; support to intermodality and the Marco Polo programme; security measures in all transport modes, notably implementing maritime security Directives and a “black list” in maritime and a