Regional infrastructure for railway freight transport - revitalised
All across CE area rail freight transport dramatically lost market shares. To reverse this negative trend huge investment programs are under way with a focus on main corridors. Complementary to this initiative REIF aims at increasing the modal share of rail freight transport through mitigation measures for the regional rail feeder system. In particular, REIF is tackling relevant challenges related to lacking connectivity at regional level. In this purpose, REIF is developing and applying tools to analyze regional potentials for rail freight transport, identifying infrastructural bottlenecks, and effective measures for either preserving vulnerable connections or even redeveloping closed tracks. Pilot actions test novel approaches to overcome different discontinuities of the regional rail network in the participating regions.  Furthermore, the different conditions for triggering the activation of new rail services, ranging from organizational aspects to the need of ensuring a “critical mass” of traffic demand, are investigated. This will result in regional action plans defining priorities and potential policy measures. Partners will derive regional strategies from project findings to be integrated into regional policy instruments. Regional capacity building workshops will train a pool of regional administrations’ staff so as to sustain knowledge about the policy field in the institutions. This multifaceted effort is meant to concretely change the current situation by establishing regional policy instruments and permanent coordination mechanisms among public and private market players. REIF’s innovative approach is leveraging on enhanced coordination and governance within and between regional contexts. REIF is keen on addressing the transnational dimension. Based on a Transferability Plan, the CE-wide scope is the object of the efforts meant to generalize lessons learned and ensure further replicability to the novel governance approach brought in by REIF.