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EU pushes transportation

"It is high time we take the crucial decisions which will commit our future for the next 20 years."

Loyola de Palacio, EU Transport Commissioner

EU ministers pledged Saturday to accelerate a flagging program of trans-continental transport links, increasingly crucial as the EU prepares to expand next year.

Ministers of the 15-member EU and 12 neighboring countries formalized the agreement in a Naples Charter, inviting the European Commission to work rapidly on presenting a new list of priority projects.

Five members -- France, Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain -- signed a separate accord on regional cooperation to develop short-haul Mediterranean "super-sea lanes" for freight traffic.

"The common aim is to find a way of completely integrating merchant shipping into the trans-European transport network," a statement said after the five signed a common declaration in the southern Italian city.

Coastal merchant shipping would have to play its part in coping with the effects of freight transport expected throughout the present decade, especially in reducing goods truck congestion on overland routes through the Alps and Pyrenees Mountains.

Efforts would focus on "quality, in particular the availability of frequent, reliable maritime links which are economically balanced in relation to the volume of expected traffic, together with individual customs and security services."

The accent would also be on financial cooperation between the public and private sectors, it said.

A ship using the future "super-seaways" proposed by the EU ministers would have the status of an infrastructure, and therefore be able to draw on mixed financial resources, according to a joint declaration by the five.

The EU Commission, which has lamented lack of progress on previous commitments to boost major road, rail and shipping links -- welcomed the declaration on accelerating transport links -- although it wants to see the money to go with it.

"This charter highlights the need for an important commitment [to develop] the Transeuropean Transport network, which is a major condition of European competitiveness," said Transport Commissioner Loyola de Palacio.

"It is high time we take the crucial decisions which will commit our future for the next 20 years," she added.

Italy, divided from other parts of Europe by the Alps, has made investment in transport links a key priority of its EU presidency which started on July 1.

But with budget belts tightened across Europe amid the economic slowdown, funding for such projects is the key challenge.

A recent report by experts led by former European competition commissioner Karel Van Miert identified 18 projets which it said should be launched by 2010 and completed by 2020, at an estimated cost of 235 billion euros (US$270 billion).

Investment in EU transportation projects has slowed considerably in recent years due to the general slump of European economies and only three major projects identified in earlier studies have been completed.

Among priorities are a trans-alpine rail link between Lyon in France and the Italian city of Turin, a high-speed rail line in southwest France and a bridge over the Strait of Messina between Sicily and the Italian mainland.
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