Public transport in cross-border regions

Study on “Providing public transport in cross-border regions. Mapping of existing services and related legal obstacles”

In the EU it is widely acknowledged that border and cross-border regions need particular attention. About 30% of the EU population live in regions close to internal border. Despite the single market, cross-border activities still face bottlenecks hampering businesses and citizens.

Cross-border transport is one central means to facilitate cross-border activities. Despite the importance of cross-border public transport to link regions across borders, to date, no European-wide and comprehensive inventory of cross-border public transport (CBPT) services exists. Thus, even the actual number of services is impossible to estimate.

In view of this role of CBPT, this study:

• provides a comprehensive inventory of existing CBPT services along the internal borders of the European Economic Area and a sound and profound analysis thereof;
• develops an inventory of obstacles to the implementation of CBPT and further analyse them and possible solutions;
• identifies best practices with relevant case studies and develop a toolbox to support planners and implementers.

Within the project TRT is responsible for:

• the analysis of cross-border rail transport services;
• the development of a web viewer to map existing services for all transport modes;
• the analysis of 3 case studies on the business models of cross-border public transport services.