Today's traditional understanding of "travel" and "transport" is changing rapidly mainly by the evolution of the Information Society, which plays a vital role in almost all sectors of the economy, through the provision of new products and services. The sector of the economy where better access to timely and reliable information may have the most immediate impact on our daily lives is transportation: efficiency and safety gains from a better knowledge of how transport networks perform and how to manage them more effectively are proven; on-line travel and traffic information provide opportunities for new "added value service" businesses for the benefit of people and transport operators; tele-services will affect mobility; and finally all transport industries will benefit from the market demand for new products. In this paper the authors present the role of the European Union (EU), which is two fold: on one side to provide an appropriate regulatory framework to facilitate the development of these services, particularly through the participation of the private sector. One main issue is standardisation and interoperability of these services: industry needs standards to plan investments and bring the products to the market. The consumer needs standards to ensure safety, comfort and reliability at reasonable prices. Other issues cover liability, privacy and data protection, security, competition rules and public procurement principles, and the facilitation of partnerships between the public and private sectors in the collection of transport data, information services, and transport management. The second role of the European Union is to facilitate the provision of Trans-European services in the field of intelligent transport systems and to guarantee the continuity of such services into the urban area.
Abstract