A recent reunion of VP Siim Kallas with the representatives of the railway sector for defining the strategic lines of European actions in the transport area has had as starting point the natural question on the role played by society in rail transport over the next decades. A question which provokes a whole series of exciting approaches from those who really want the railway system to bring its true contribution to the development of sustainable society.
Unfortunately, despite the figures highlighted in various statistics and scientific research studies on the performances of different modes – which place railways in the top of transport technologies to be used in order to reduce the environmental impact and daily stress – at the moment, the railways rank last in the fight for image. The different problems inherited by the current railway undertakings from the old organisations have erased the railways from the list of the public’s choices. The low percent of the railway transport modal share (almost 10% for passenger transport and 18% for freight) proves the real position of this transport mode in contemporary society.
When you also see analyses conducted in behalf of organisations with serious global importance (for example, the World Bank) which criticise the high proportion of railways in some countries, seen as a reminiscence of communist times – to simply motivate a certain path towards restructuring – you realise that the fight of the railway sector for gaining the public’s sympathy is not an easy one.
In this context and lacking severe legislation that would force the shift of volumes from road and air transport to railways – legislation that I hope, for the sake of our society, not to be drafted, one cannot dream about a shift or balance of the reports between modes in the predictable future. Although the objectives announced by European, national and local authorities, next to the large economic players support the search for a way to build an environmentally friendly and less congested society, real actions are only headed towards palliatives of the present way of living. It has already passed more than a decade since the European authorities have demanded the balance of the investment budgets for roads and railways. And still, not even at the level of unionist funds, without detailing national realities, we cannot talk about a better report than that of 1 EUR to railways for 2 EUR to roads.
Everybody is now fascinated by the electric engine for automotive vehicles, as measure for reducing pollution, without discussing and financing the expansion of railway electric traction networks; without talking about the other pollution forms generated by the electric automotive vehicles (the tyre – asphalt contact); without talking about the problem of traffic congestion that will not be eliminated and so on. The European draft budget continues to include more measures that can be financed in the road sector than in the railway sector, with the excuse of improving the traffic safety. Why doesn’t anyone say that traffic will be safe once the shift to public transport modes is implemented?
Will rail in 20 years’ time be a marginal or major mode of transport? Probably marginal, as long as the real interest is against rail transport.
by Stefan Roseanu
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