Public consultations

Consultation on Measures for a 'rail network giving priority to freight'

Interested parties are requested to give their opinion on the solutions presented before 5 August 2008 via the online questionnaire.

The questionnaire forms part of the impact assessment and public consultation that the European Commission, notably the Directorate General for Energy and Transport (DG TREN), are carrying out in the follow up of its Communication of 18 October 2007 entitled "Towards a rail network giving priority to freight".

In its Communication, the European Commission considers that two main elements should be developed to improve the quality of rail freight transport and ensure it has sufficient capacity: fair competition in the provision of all rail services and adequate Infrastructure capacity, in terms of path availability.

The services of the Commission have identified problems that rail freight is experiencing and has elaborated possible measures to address them in collaboration with a Strategic Group of experts.

They considered it necessary to improve the existing situation/practices through a better coordination between infrastructure managers and Member States as far as the management of the infrastructures and the ancillary services are concerned, as well as the priority given to freight.

To this end it is considered that a corridor approach, which first targets few strategic international axes, by implementing measures to improve operations, capacity, transparency of the information and non- discriminatory access should be pursued.

The questionnaire includes possible measures which could be incorporated into strengthened legislation at European level.