National transport policies of the present and future EU member states inrelation to the Community transport objectives.

An important question for the countries that currently are in the accession process to the EU and for those that hope to access at a later stage, is to define transport policies which are in line with the policies of the Union. A monitoring study looked at the development of national transport policies in EU-15 and examined the impact of the policies on the transport objectives given in the White Paper. For each country, the elements of the national policy were identified, and compared with those of the EU White Paper. Analysis focused primarily on comparison of national and European outcomes. Where national outcomes support those of the EU, the specific outputs being used to deliver the outcomes were considered unimportant. However, where national outcomes do not support EU outcomes, a comparison at the level of the outputs becomes relevant. In addition, national progress on key outputs identified in the White Paper as being important to the achievement of intended outcomes, was examined. Most national policies are in line with EU White Paper objectives, but that there are large differences in the way the policies are implemented. Key areas of difference across member states include the commitment to infrastructure user charging; integration of transport with spatial (land-use) and environmental policy; and the role of private funding. Additionally, the considerable variation in the quantitative aspects of policy making across the EU-15 is discussed. Some national polices contain clearly quantified goals, while others include little or no quantification. In some cases, clearly quantified goals have been replaced by much vaguer statements. There are also large differences in the use of forecasts for policy formulation, with some policies including no forecasts at all. Apart from these results, the policies of those countries from the EU-15 that, like the current accession countries and most of the recent new members, had a relatively low GNP (and related transport infrastructure problems) when they joined the EU are highlighted. For the covering abstract please see ITRD E135207.