Road sector least happy with 'modal delay' wanted by Commission

摘要

Of all the modes of transport, the road sector reacted in the toughest way to the white paper on transport put forward by the European Commission, on 28 April. The document "fails to recognise road transport's irreplaceable role [...] and to provide incentives for its 'greener' future", says the International Road Transport Union (IRU). The main subject of their ire is the Commission's wish to see most of the freight over distances of over 300 kilometres transferred to rail and river modes of transport. There is nothing binding in that - it is a goal towards which the Commission wants to move thanks to a series of actions that would make the rail sector more competitive and efficient and therefore more attractive - but the road sector sees it as "a forced modal shift".