Huge bill to bring applicants’ transport networks up to scratch

Date: 15/06/2000

By Renée Cordes

ONCE the first group of applicant countries joins the EU, many of the invisible borders which have long separated them from the West will automatically disappear, at least on paper.

But it could take years, if not decades, to link the applicants' road and rail networks to those of the current Union member states in one well-functioning system. Virtually all the countries in central and eastern Europe bidding to join the EU face a huge bill to overcome generations of neglect which have laid the foundations for today's pothole-infested roads and trains which chug at painfully slow speeds along old tracks.

It is undeniably true that existing member states still have a long way to go to create a genuine single market in transport. They have yet, for example, to deal with the problems in the rail sector caused by different signalling systems and other technical specifications.

Neverthless, the candidate countries cannot afford to wait much longer to get their own houses in order. Critics warn that they will have to improve the efficiency of their transport systems immediately if they want to be competitive with their western counterparts when they join the Union.

"There is a potential time bomb there," said one. "Accession to the EU will lead to an explosion of wages in the public sector, making the railways unsustainable. It is a dire situation."

A recent European Commission report identified more than 100 areas in which railways in 13 enlargement countries need to be improved. It called, among other things, for the creation of autonomous railway safety and licensing authorities, and for firms in the region to separate infrastructure and train operations in the same way that companies in member states are already required to do. It also urged rail firms to develop long-term investment plans.

In total, the applicant states face a massive bill of at least €86 billion to bring all their transport networks up to EU standards, according to the Commission's own Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA).

The study, based on the results of two years of talks with the candidate countries, found that Poland's financial needs were greatest, because of its sheer size, with an estimated €36 billion required over the next 15 years. Improving the north-south Gdansk to Katowice railway alone is likely to cost nearly €5 billion, while two projects to upgrade roads will cost more than €3 billion each. Romania, the poorest relative in the family of applicants, faces a total bill of more than €10 billion.

Although the Commission has pledged financial support to upgrade transport networks in applicant countries, much of the funding will come from the private sector.