Impact of the 2004 enlargement on the European transport market

Study on the impact of the 2004 enlargement of the European Union on the transport sector

This study evaluated the impact of the 2004 EU enlargement on the transport market, based on research, analyses of statistics, stakeholder meetings in Budapest and Riga and 14 case studies. Strengths and weaknesses of the enlargement process have been observed. The consortium, Rebelgroup Advisory (RGA), Transport & Mobility Leuven (TML) and COWI, came to the following conclusions:

• The EU enlargement process provided positive results like: a tremendous increase in trade and transport flows, a New member states (NMS) legal framework in line with the EU legislation, a dynamic road transport sector, an upgrade of the Cypriote and Maltese fleets,…
• The EU enlargement showed weaknesses like: too much focus on legislation while ignoring establishment of institutional and organizational structures, absence of development of national transport strategies, the remaining extremely vulnerable position of the railway transport sector,….
• Several lessons can be learnt from the EU enlargement process: put less focus on transposition of legislation and more on application of legislation, allow transitional periods for new EU applicants based on a transport review, give more assistance in the development of national transport strategies, … 

Click on the links below to find further conclusions and the complete report.

SEMINAR "TRANSPORT AND ENLARGEMENT", held on Wednesday June 27, Brussels.
In this seminar the Consortium organized a discussion on the draft results.

reports

Final report can be downloaded: final report - annex 1 - annex 2.

period

2007

funded by

European Commission, FP6

researchers

Bruno Van Zeebroeck, Olga Ivanova

partners

RebelGroup (project coordinator), COWI

contact

Griet De Ceuster

+32 16 31.77.30