The European Commission has proposed a total of €421 million in investment to support projects promoting sustainable, multimodal infrastructure development.
69 key mobility initiatives will receive funding, made available through the Connecting Europe Facility mechanism which supports the development and upgrade of infrastructure across the EU. Allocation of the funding, deployed in line with the goals of the Europe on the Move transport modernisation agenda, will focus on projects facilitating widespread digitalisation, promoting safety on the road for both drivers and pedestrians; and building multimodal connections between transport options.
The greatest proportion of the sustainable infrastructure investment (€109 million) will be directed to projects offering multimodal logistics platforms, which enable the moving of freight between different forms of transport. The next largest allocation (€80.2 million) will go towards projects working towards the deployment of Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) on the EU’s roads; while the third highest proportion (€71.4 million) will be directed towards projects promoting innovation and development of new technologies in the transport sector.
Projects receiving sustainable infrastructure investment include:
- A multimodal smart ticketing scheme in Lisbon, set to integrate across different media and forms of transport;
- A new rail wagon design aimed at streamlining the ongoing switch between track gauges, to be deployed across Member States, primarily in Spain; and
- A platform to test and implement Intelligent Transport Systems across 18 Member States, contributing to the C-Roads intelligent transport deployment platform.
EU Commissioner for Transport Violeta Bulc said: “We are delivering on the EU’s connectivity objectives. These projects, on strategic sections of Europe’s transport network, will help the transition towards safe, smart, inclusive and sustainable mobility. We expect our funding to trigger €1.3 billion in total investment in the EU economy.”
Once the Commission has adopted a formal decision on its sustainable infrastructure investment proposals, the Innovation and Networks Executive Agency will distribute grants for the individual projects by July 2019.
