Mathieu Grosch –Group of the European People’s Party (Christian Democrats) Belgium– presented his draft report on the “Roadmap to a Single European Transport Area” to the European Parliament’s Transport Committee on 8 September 2011. The key proposals in the draft report on the Roadmap to a Single European Transport Area include a 50% reduction in the deaths and injuries on Europe’s roads clear targets for reducing CO2 emissions and the inclusion of the costs of noise and pollution in the prices of all modes of transport.
In his report Mr Grosch proposes targets to cut CO2 emissions by 20% in road transport and 30% in air transport and shipping by 2020. He also wants energy consumption and noise in the rail sector to fall by 20%.
The costs of pollution noise and congestion should be reflected in the price paid by the user (through the internalisation of the external costs of all forms of transport) and the revenue generated in this way could be used by Member States to fund priority schemes to eliminate the 25 known bottlenecks in the Trans-European Transport Networks (TEN-T projects). The Commission could increase its level of direct funding to at least 30% of total investments for funding plans and priority cross-border projects drawn up by Member States while drastically limiting the number of projects that receive funding says Mr Grosch.
For the S&D Group Czech MEP Olga Sehnalová called for the new targets to be based on a detailed analysis of the existing systems and together with Gesine Meissner (ALDE DE) opposed any new proposal on port services.
Michael Cramer (Greens DE) called for the introduction of a Europe-wide speed limit as a means of reducing both pollution and accidents on Europe’s roads.
Read the full article on the European Parliament website.
Link to original Article
http://www.ertico.com/european-parliament-draft-report-on-the-white-paper-on-transport/
Original Publication Date: Fri 16 Sep 2011
