DEVELOPING FREIGHT POLICY OPTIONS FOR A PERIPHERAL COUNTRY INEUROPE: THE CASE OF SCOTLAND

摘要

Drawing upon our study for the Scottish Government on freight policyrnoptions in 2006, this paper discusses the opportunities, constraints andrnkey issues that need to be tackled in freight transport in this peripheralrncountry of Europe.rnScotland depends critically on its external freight links for long term tradernand economic development. Within Scotland, both congestion in thernurbanised Central Belt and maintaining life-line connections to remote andrnrural areas and Islands are posing challenging issues for users, operatorsrnand policy makers.rnOur assessment is based on two complementary analyses. On the onernhand, a bottom-up approach was used, where views from a wide range ofrnproducers, consumers, operators, trade associations, campaigning groupsrnand public sector were assembled through a Delphi survey, interviews andrna series of freight policy workshops. This provided a clear picture of therncurrent freight and logistical system, and the trends in the next 5 years.rnOn the other hand, a top-down approach was adopted through appraisingrnlonger terms trends using trade and input-output data to estimate growth inrnexternal, trunk and local networks, and through examining emergingrntechnology elsewhere in railfreight and multimodal terminal design.rnThe analyses were used to support the development and sifting of policyrnoptions in five dimensions, which are i) enhancing businessrncompetitiveness, ii) reducing negative environmental impacts, iii)rnsupporting the development of the freight industry in Scotland, iv)rnmaintaining and improving accessibility to rural and remote areas, and v)rncoordinating with wider policies and industry initiatives.