Within the framework of analysing the trend of road accessibility, the report deals with the impacts of economic decline accompanying transition from a planned economy to a market economy on the traffic. Despite a continuous growth in passenger car ownership and road transport performance, the underfinanced road network with an unfavourable structure and poor condition is also a cause of the extremely great regional differences in the road accessibility as measured by driving hours. The ongoing development of the road network based on a 15-year long-term programme approved by a government decree also contributes to achieve an improvement in accessibility. The report describes and analyses in detail attempts made to attract road users (motorway toll) and foreign private capital (concessions) to cover road network development costs. The introduction of motorway tolls which cover investment costs has encountered serious social resistance and deterred a lot of potential users from using toll motorways. In recent years, a concession motorway company has gone bankrupt and on two motorways direct toll collection has been replaced by a vignette system. Major efforts have been made to reduce motorway tolls and unify the tolling system. All these costs are, however, paid ultimately by the taxpayers, i.e. road users (including foreign ones) for the moment bear only a small portion of motorway development costs. Due to difficulties arisen, the recent years have seen a slowdown in the pace of motorway network construction now exclusively financed through budgetary funds and loans raised with government guarantee. Finally, the report discusses the development and practical application of methods of establishing a dialogue (including consultation and participation) with the population in the course of preparation and implementation of the road network development. Public information bureaux set up by the institution responsible for network development are extremely useful in providing information to people living in the particular region and resolving misunderstandings, while contributing effectively to a considerable reduction in the duration of preparation. Communication impact assessments carried out so far serve as a good basis for the ongoing improvement of methods of dialogue with the population as well as for legal regulation now in preparation. For the covering abstract see ITRD E135448.
Abstract