Marios Miltiadou, Ph.D. Transport Engineer

Socrates Basbas, Associate Professor, Ph.D. Transport Engineer George Mintsis, Professor, Ph.D. Transport Engineer

Christos Taxiltaris, Professor, Ph.D. Transport Engineer

Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Faculty of Rural and Surveying Engineering, Dept. of Transportation and Hydraulic Engineering, Greece

1. Introduction

2. Pan-European Transport Strategy in SEE: Planning and prioritising projects

3. Pan-European Road Corridor X development

4. Conclusions – Discussion

• Aim: – Presentation of a case of implementation of the European Transport Strategy in

SEE, with the development of Pan-European Road Corridor X (PECX).

• Content: – First part: dedicated to the transport strategy for infrastructure development

planning in SEE, and especially to the principles for priority project definition and promotion and the methodologies followed by the various planning exercises elaborated.

– Second part: dedicated to PECX development since the year 2000, with detailed reference to the initial plans for each section of the corridor and the respective actual progress made, accompanied with the results of the regional exercises for Road PECX projects.

– Final conclusions: formulated after the comparison of the actual progress with the infrastructure investments criteria set and the results of the planning exercises, using also the experience from the involvement in the process of motorway projects financing on Road PECX.

• Pan-European Transport Conferences of Crete (1994) and Helsinki (1997) defined for the non-EU European territories:

• 10 Pan-European Corridors (PECs) • 4 Areas (PETRAs)

• “Grid” of PECs in the SEE region: • PECs IV (North-Southeast) • V (West-East) • VII (the Danube Inland Waterway) • VIII (West-East) • IX (North-East) • X (Northwest-Southeast)

• Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) planning exercise: Based on the PECs, coordination of the infrastructure investment plans of the acceding countries with those of the EU member states, in view of the extension of the TEN-T to the enlarged EU.

• Gap on the European map Need for further planning to cover the

countries of the WB participating in the Stabilisation and Association Process.

• SEE Strategic Network definition in 2001, on the basis of the already established PECs.

• Two strategic studies elaborated in 2002 – 2003: • the Transport Infrastructure

Regional Study (TIRS) • the Regional Balkans Infrastructure

Study (REBIS)

• Definition of the SEE Core Transport Network (nowadays called “SEE Comprehensive Network”).

• Proposal for revision of PECs: 5 Priority Axes

• On the basis of MoU between EC and the WB countries (2004): – Development of the SEE Core Network – Negotiation for extension of the Acquis Communautaire in WB and establishment

of Treaty for a “Transport Community in SEE”

South Eastern Axis: • Mainly network of the

existing PECs • Some PECs parts excluded

(Branches B of PEC V and D of PEC X, plus PECs IV and IX, which are now parts of the TEN-T)

• Current revision of TEN-T (2011 Proposal – 1/2): – Transformation of the existing

patchwork of European roads, railways, airports and canals into a unified TEN-T.

– Dual layer TEN-T: “Comprehensive” and “Core”.

– “Core TEN-T”: to improve connections between different modes of transport and provide adequate connections to neighbouring countries, ensuring geographical coverage

• Investments and dimensioning of projects should correspond to the expected

in the next decade level of demand. • Motorway construction for roads with AADT higher than 20.000 PCUs/day

(UNECE). • For road safety and networks’ consecutiveness completion of missing links

of existing motorway axes, even though the criterion of least daily traffic is not absolutely met.

• For railway projects: doubling of tracks and upgrading for speeds higher than 160km/h presuppose demand higher than 100 trains/day.

• To achieve the optimum efficiency of transport infrastructure towards regional

development, special attention should be paid to: • The improvement of the connection of isolated, insular or remote regions

with the Pan-European Transport Networks; • Intermodality and sustainability; and • The connection of ports and airports to the hinterland.

• Strategic planning at Pan-European level: definition of the most urgent and with international impact projects. • EC TEN-T guidelines (1996): the processing for the formulation of

project proposals for financing focused in three terms: “projects of common interest”, “bottlenecks” and “missing links.

• UNECE and ECMT (1993-1994): worked on the methodology for defining common criteria for the identifying bottlenecks and missing links.

• TEN-Naxis (2007) and TEN-CONNECT (2009): worked also on the definition of the term “bottleneck”.

• HCM and the UIC guidelines were respectively the basic tools for road and railway infrastructure capacity assessment.

• Each of the strategic exercises elaborated for the transport infrastructure development in SEE included methodologies for prioritising the projects with major importance for the region.

• Usually weighted MCA used (TIRS, REBIS, UNECE TEM/TER, SEETO consultants).

• MCA methodologies: apparently valuable in the process of the SEE transport network development.

• There are though, criteria which are more or less linked to the political component of a project, i.e. the national priorities, but also the overall EU transport strategy (PECs).

• Pan-European Corridor X is running through the South East Europe region.

• It is the backbone of: - the SEE Core Network - the SEE Priority Axis for

the extension of the major trans-European transport axes to the neighbouring countries and regions

ROAD Corridor X (Main Axis and branches): 2.300km

In year 2000: 54% motorways (two or more lanes per direction) • Since the year 2000, substantial investments have taken place,

whilst large scale investments (with secured financing) are on-going in Serbia and underway in F.Y.R.O.M.

In year 2011: 78% motorways (89% of the Main Axis length). • Completed motorway construction works in the period 2000-

2011 corresponds to 24% of the Corridor’s total length.

Problematic sections along Road PECX: Characteristics, planned (in year 2000), MCAs results and actual development by 2011

• The recommendations of planning and prioritisation exercises have deviations from the actual investments made.

• Many sections had been suggested to be rehabilitated, based mainly on the demand criterion, but there are cases of promoting motorway construction on PECX against the low demand forecasts and socioeconomic indicators.

• Apart from the mature projects for motorway construction on the north-western parts of PECX in Slovenia and Croatia (Main Axis and Branch A), the only motorway projects prioritised by the regional studies were the construction of the Belgrade bypass and a Serbian part of Branch B. In the meantime, the construction of the Belgrade bypass restarted and between Novi Sad – Belgrade was finished. The attempt for concession of the rest of the Serbian Branch B was unsuccessful and the motorway construction was completed recently as public work.

• The rest of the motorway projects realised or under construction are examples of projects that have been promoted without the demand justifying the investments (e.g. V.Kopanica – Zupanja – Lipovac in Croatia, Tabanovce – Kumanovo in F.Y.R.O.M. with AADT of around 2.600PCUs/day in year 2000 and 8.000PCUs/day in 2010). Finally one of the motorway projects recently put under construction is on Branch C, where from Nis to Dimitrovgrad a very difficult construction is on-going to satisfy a demand that in 2010 fluctuated between 5.700 to 7.300 PCUs/day.

Study Serbian project F.Y.R.O.M. project Feasibility Study of construction in one stage 6,7% 6,5%

Feasibility Study of staged construction (stage 2 after 25 years) 6,9% 7,5% Cost Benefit Analysis - 4,5%

Cases of motorway projects promotion for implementation

Results of Feasibility Studies and Cost Benefit Analyses (EIRR) of the projects

• Transformation of the existing PECX parts from Leskovac to Presevo on the Main Axis in Serbia to a motorway.

• Transformation of the existing PECX parts between Demir Kapija and Gevgelija (near the Greek border) in F.Y.R.O.M. to a motorway

• Both projects are being realised, taking into account the regional geopolitics, the potential of the increase of movements of persons or exchanges of goods and generally the expected high, but non quantifiable, benefits from the PECX completion for the socioeconomic and regional development.

• The progress of Road PECX implementation during the last decade, in the framework of the Pan-European Transport Strategy, is remarkable.

• According to the recorded development and the projects underway, the Road PECX will be developed a bit later than target year set for the PECs implementation (2015).

• Assessing the application of the European Transport Strategy guidelines in the case of PECX motorway projects, it can be concluded that: • The projects realised generally meet the principal set by the strategy to invest on

the improvement of the existing infrastructures. • The MCA methodologies of the strategic exercises used criteria were more or less

linked to the political component of projects, i.e. the national priorities but also the overall EU transport strategy (PECs).

• Projects on the PECs in the region had been prioritised, firstly because they belonged to PECs, secondly because they were already prioritised by the national governments (as parts of the PECs and thus with higher financing potential) and finally because the demand in the region is concentrated on these PECs. In other words, they met by default the criteria of functionality and coherence of the network, the regional importance and the importance for international transport.

• The actual traffic volumes along PECX, and even more on the SEE regional network, are much lower.

• Despite this, a lot of motorway projects along PECs, with socioeconomic, but mainly geopolitical importance have been implemented.

• It can be said that the guidelines to build a regional infrastructure, and mainly to ensure the consecutiveness of the network with the elimination of missing links, indeed had been taken into account when appraising motorway project proposals.

• This applies especially for projects at the southern and eastern parts of the Corridor, where demand is way below to support such decisions.

• Decision makers consider, not only the local impact of individual projects, but also the regional one, as well as the general condition (geopolitical, economic etc.) in each of the countries of the Corridor.

• Thus, the success in the development of Road PECX was due a) to the promotion and implementation of the project as a whole being priority of the EU Policies and b) due to the increase of the maturity of many single projects along the Corridor.

• This presupposed the coordinated efforts of the countries, the stabilization of the situation in the region and the general turn of the climate concerning the relations of the SEE countries with the international environment, institutions and organizations.

• Pan-European Corridor X would be in position soon, under the precondition of elimination of border crossing obstacles that still exist, to serve efficiently the national, regional and international flows of goods and passengers from/to EU, the countries of the Corridor, Turkey and further to the East, given the fact that PECX provides the main connections of the Southeast Europe Network with the TEN-T Core Network and it will eventually become part of it after the accession of the WB countries in the EU.

Marios Miltiadou, Ph.D. Transport Engineer

Socrates Basbas, Associate Professor, Ph.D. Transport Engineer George Mintsis, Professor, Ph.D. Transport Engineer

Christos Taxiltaris, Professor, Ph.D. Transport Engineer

for more information please contact Dr. Marios D. Miltiadou Tel: +30 2310 996126, Fax: +30 2310 996030 Email: mmiltiadou@auth.gr