By reference to international links only in Western Europe the author considers problems of infrastructure capacity. Transport demand is found to be proportional to demand for goods and gross national product. The inevitable occurrence of peaks in traffic are described and the financing of transport modes compared. Infrastructure capacity is defined and the effects of saturation listed, in particular effects on economic activity. Short term responses to saturation include improving the use of available capacity by segregating speeds or by reducing the difference between them and the assigning of capacity on the basis of economic priority. The author investigates pricing control which will offer financial criteria on which to make a choice and which is seen as less authoritarian. Competition between road and rail is considered with the Brenner motorway and railway being used as an example. Criteria for investing in capacity are investigated but found to be only applicable to railway infrastructures and motorway bridges and tunnels where tolls are charged. With the Single European Market the author foresees an increase in economic activity and bottlenecks and suggests that tolls should be introduced for the use of all inter-city motorways and other large structures i.e., bridges and tunnels.
Abstract