Combined Freight Transport

“Exempting initial and final road legs of CT services from weekend, night and public holiday driving bans increases the competitiveness of CT without additional costs for the Member States. With the mandatory CT support strategies and the 10% CT cost reduction obligation, the Commission for the first time has a means of exerting pressure on Member States to take concrete action for the European CT network, as they must fear infringement proceedings if they fail to implement them properly,” says cep lawyer Götz Reichert, who analysed the project with cep transport expert Martin Menner.

According to Menner, however, the required cost saving of 10% is too low to compensate for the competitive disadvantages of CT, especially as pure road freight transport benefits from more generous provisions for long lorries and payloads. In addition, the proof required to qualify as eligible CT is too cumbersome and impractical, as it requires the calculation of the external costs saved for each transport operation.

“Leaving the choice of support measures to the Member States would lead to a confusing patchwork that would make it more difficult to calculate and implement cross-border CT transport operations,” warns Menner. It would make more sense to define EU-wide measures that relate to the pricing of external effects in road freight transport and efficiency improvements in the CT system. Finally, “horizontal transhipment” should also be promoted, as it is well suited to non-craneable semi-trailers.