South East Transport Axis
Together with the projects SoNorA, BATCo, SCANDRIA North and SEETAC (Central Europe, Baltic Sea, SEE Programme), SETA is aiming on the analysis and development of the transport corridors from Scandinavia to South-East Europe. Competitive Accessibility of regions is one of the most important preconditions for their economic growth and development (as the project SIC! has shown). Fluent transport of passengers and goods are the crucial preconditions of the competitive accessibility of regions. The low level of regional, transnational and seaport accessibility within South East Europe region especially in railway transport drag behind the transportation demand and therefore limit the regional (economic) development potentials. While the share of railway transport in the region is poor, the emission of greenhouse gas from private cars and lorries is still increasing. The main objectives of SETA project are the improvement of accessibility to provide the economic development of the regions within the project area, and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by a competitive railway transport quality. In SETA project the transport requirements of the regions will be determined; a transport network analysis will show current transport conditions (bottlenecks), short/medium/long term solutions will be developed. After an assessment in terms of socio-economic, financial and environmental impacts the realisability of these solutions will be evaluated. Finally recommendations for implementation based on the evaluation results and the experiences of pilot projects (with special focus on financing options) will be given. The Platform of Regions (PoR) will provide a forum for information exchange among the representatives of the target groups on different levels during the project implementation phase. This forum will furthermore foster cooperation between the relevant actors in the field of transport network development beyond project implementation.