CORDIS Archive

The Task Force Transport Intermodality has been created in 1995 with a view to developing a consistent intermodal RTD effort at a European level. Its core mandate is to add value through the improved co-ordination of existing and planned research activities. In addition, it is to highlight priorities for future research needs and to promote high-profile demonstration projects. In a broader sense, the Task Force is to reflect on how to move from a modal thinking about transport to thinking of transport as an integrated door to door operation. While doing so, the Task Force is to provide a focal point for the wide range of stakeholders who have an interest in intermodal transport.

Since the Task Force’s creation in 1995, an effective and continuous co-operation has developed between all Commission services concerned. The services met regularly in the context of the Task Force Inter-Service Group, whose members include the representatives from relevant research programmes as well as policy-makers.

The Task Force has fostered a common understanding of the problems and challenges involved in developing intermodal transport in Europe. The resulting Diagnosis Report , dated 1 March 1996, highlights the modal imbalance of the EU’s transport system and identifies the obstacles that prevent the development of user-oriented door-to-door intermodal transport services. The report confirmed the need to focus future RTD activities on six priority themes which are of major interest for the improvement of intermodal transport in the Union:

• Transfer point efficiency;
• Intermodal network efficiency;
• Information and communication technologies;
• Improvement of transport means and transport equipment;
• Market conditions;
• Training and market-oriented strategies.

The Task Force has made an inventory of all past and on-going intermodal-related RTD projects at the EU level as well as some projects at Member State level. The Inventory Report, dated 28 February 1996, also gives an overview of the allocated resources. One of the conclusions from the Inventory Report was that a gap exists between research and the implementation of its results. Innovations are only finding their way into the market at a slow pace.

The Inventory Report constitutes the starting point for a further co-ordination of the different intermodal transport-related activities in order to increase the effect of the employed financial resources and to guarantee a more consistent impact on the market of the results obtained. Additional resources are required to ensure the necessary critical mass and to achieve tangible results.

After consultation of some 200 technical experts in six working panels, the Task Force has drafted a Final Report, dated 27 September 1996. The Final Report defines the required RTD actions in view of achieving balanced solutions for the development and improvement of intermodal freight and passenger transport. The aim is to define a coherent intermodal RTD strategy which comprises the identification of new intermodal research projects and to propose demonstration projects able to present the technical and commercial advantages of intermodal transport for operators, users and authorities.

The Final Report defines six priority RTD actions:

• Intermodal Freight Terminal 2000+;
• Intermodal Freight Network 2000+;
• Transport Town 2000+;
• Intermodal Traveller 2000+;
• Passenger Interchange 2000+;
• Research studies and support activities.

To create synergy between research activities, the Task Force has identified 52 on-going RTD projects across the various research programmes and has clustered them in function of themes of common interest to the participating projects. At a clustering meeting on 17 March 1997, the project representatives discussed the issues of user requirements and door-to-door chain control.

The first clustering meeting demonstrated the large scope for co-operation between RTD projects, in terms of sharing research results, exchanging scarce data and possibly organising dissemination activities. The meeting also produced a clearer insight into the relationship between different projects which deal with similar issues.

Informal clusters of projects which have a common interest are now continuing to work together, with the possibility of getting support from the Task Force when requested. The next general clustering meeting will take place in early 1998.

Subject to a formal decision by the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament, the Task Force plans to allocate in the course of 1997 a possible supplementary budget to co-finance RTD projects which demonstrate the competitiveness and attractiveness of intermodal freight and intermodal passenger transport.

As a further example of increased co-ordination among research programmes, the projects retained from this supplementary call for proposals will be jointly financed and managed by DGVII and DGXIII. The Task Force has defined five tasks for projects that integrate elements of transport organisation, telematics and new technologies:

• Demonstration of attractiveness and competitiveness of intermodal freight transport on short and medium distances;
• Demonstration of new concepts for the distribution of goods in metropolitan areas at pre- end end-phases of an intermodal transport leg;
• Demonstration of new concepts and technologies for improving inter-urban intermodal passenger transport in a door-to-door chain;
• Demonstration of new concepts and technologies for improving intermodal passenger transport within urban centres;
• Horizontal and supportive tasks to promote functional integration and service interoperability between transport modes.

The input from the Task Force has also enabled the Commission services to draft a Communication to the Council of Ministers and the European Parliament on Intermodal Freight Transport, which was adopted by the Commission on 28 May 1997. The Communication advocates an intermodal transport system which encourages co-operation between modes and favours competition between operators. It puts forward an action programme to integrate the different modes so as to enable an efficient and cost-effective use of the transport system through seamless, customer-oriented door-to-door services.

The work of the Task Force was accompanied by extensive consultation involving approximately two hundred relevant actors in the field, including industry, operators, users, local authorities, international organisations and other interested parties. The two major fora in which the interests concerned have expressed themselves are a High Level Group and a Steering Committee.

The High Level Group, chaired by Commissioner Kinnock, groups key representatives of the European transport sector (industry, operators, users and other interested parties). The High Level Group meeting of 29 September 1995 supported the Commission’s initiative for creating the Task Force and endorsed the proposed action plan. At the second meeting of 20 May 1996, the "captains of industry" reviewed the progress of the Task Force’s work and presented their views on the promotion of intermodal transport. The Task Force consulted an an ad-hoc configuration of the High Level Group on 24 March 1997 on six open questions related to intermodal transport policies.

In the Steering Committee, more than 30 international organisations interested in the development of intermodal transport are represented. The Steering Committee has been informed about the Task Force’s progress during meetings at more or less regular intervals. It has acted as a sounding board for the Task Force and has given valuable directions for its further work.