Over 20 measures have been published by the European Commission to strengthen transport links.

The European Commission has published a new Neighbourhood Transport Action Plan to strengthen transport links with neighbouring regions to the east and south of the EU. The plan proposes more than 20 concrete measures, in the short and longer-term, to make transport connections smoother, safer and more reliable. At the same time it will deepen market integration to the advantage of both the EU and its neighbouring regions. The plan was presented on 7 July, 2011, by Vice President Siim Kallas, responsible for Transport, and Stefan Füle, Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighbourhood policy.

Vice President Kallas said: "Freedom of movement is something we all tend to take for granted in Europe, but it shouldn't stop at the border. Today if we are serious about a relationship with our neighbours we need to provide the infrastructure which is essential for flows of goods and people across borders and cut away the bureaucracy and bottlenecks."

Commissioner Füle said: "In the new and ambitious European Neighbourhood Policy launched on 25 May of this year, we offer a deeper economic integration to our neighbours in the East and South. This action plan proposes the concrete transport measures that we aim to put in place for the benefit of citizens and companies both in the neighbourhood and in Europe.''

Key measures for connecting the transport systems of the EU and its neighbours include:

• Extending the EU's internal aviation market and Single European Sky to neighbouring regions;
• Joining up the Trans-European Transport Network with infrastructure of the EU's neighbours through priority transport projects;
• Making better use of rail freight potential by opening markets and by alleviating technical barriers such as differences in rail gauge sizes;
• Streamlining the implementation of regional transport cooperation, by establishing an Eastern Partnership Transport Panel to oversee cooperation with neighbours to the east;
• Making sea transport with the neighbouring countries more efficient, including in the longer-term, through their inclusion in the “Blue Belt” of free maritime movement in and around Europe;
• Helping neighbouring countries to improve road safety.

The Commission's plan will next be presented to the Council and the European Parliament. In October 2011, the new Eastern Partnership Transport Panel which will oversee the implementation of the measures to the East, will be launched at a ministerial conference organised under the Polish EU Presidency.

For more information visit: http://ec.europa.eu/transport.