Maritime Trade and Transport - HWWI

6.1.3 The forecast: No major shift in modal split expected
In view of both the environmental impact and the bottlenecks in road traffic which are
already obvious today, a change in modal split is more than desirable. Numerous experts have
been dealing with the question of whether and how it will be possible to divert traffic in the
coming decades – considering sustainability, cost, and capacity bottlenecks – from the road to
the rail and inland waterways. The following summary will provide an overview. The forecasts
that are available officially unfortunately only extend as far as 2015 or 2020; everything that
goes beyond this should be considered an orientation aid only.
The predictions of transport development in Europe that are most often quoted come
from the Basel-based Prognos Institute or, since the spin-off of its transport segment (2003) from
Progtrans AG. 62 They only go as far as 2015, however, that is, half of the period covered by our
forecast. Swiss transport experts expect an escalation in merchandise transport in all modes
for Europe (West) by 2015 of 42% (over 2002). Road traffic will persist at its share of approximately
80%. For inland waterway transport, no appreciable shifts in share (6%) are anticipated.
Rail traffic will, on the other hand, be able to increase its present market share of about
13.5% by one percentage point. In Eastern Europe, the railroads have traditionally played a
much larger role due to the greater role played by heavy industry and agriculture, which are
typically dependent on rail transport. In the next ten years, according to Progtrans, this is not
likely to change. With an increasing transport volume of high-value consumer and capital
goods, paired with declining production in primary industry, however, it can be assumed that
Eastern Europe will draw increasingly closer to the Western European modal split by the end
of our forecast period.
According to the Plan for Federal Transport Routes63 , merchandise transport in Germany
will grow by 64% – compared with 1997 – to 608 bn tkm by 2015. While merchandise transport
by road will continue to climb at an above-average rate after that date, rail and inland waterway
modes of transport are expected to show under-average growth rates. This means that
the modal split is likely to continue to change in favor of the road. Progtrans AG comes to
similar conclusions in its predictions for Germany.
62 See ProgTrans AG (2004).
63 See Bundesverkehrswegeplan (2003).
Merchandise movement in Germany by transport mode 2005–2015 in bn tkm
Fig. 13
116 Berenberg Bank · HWWI: Strategy 2030 · No. 4
2005 Share in % 2015 Share in % % 05–15
Road 380.0 72.5 484.9 73.0 27.61
Rail 81.6 15.6 102.3 15.4 25.37
Inland waterway 62.3 11.9 77.1 11.6 23.76
Total 523.9 100.00 664.3 100.00 26.80
Source: Progtrans AG.