PLANNING FOR A SUSTAINABLE EUROPE? - TU Berlin

PLANNING FOR A SUSTAINABLE EUROPE?
A CASE STUDY OF EU TRANSPORT INFRASTRUCTURE INVESTMENT
POLICY IN THE CONTEXT OF EASTERN ENLARGEMENT
by
DEIKE PETERS
A Dissertation submitted to the
Graduate School-New Brunswick
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
Graduate Program in Urban Planning and Policy Development
written under the direction of
Prof. Susan S. Fainstein
and approved by
[Signature Susan S. Fainstein]
[Signature Joanna Regulska]_
[Signature Robert W. Lake]__
[Signature John Pucher]_____
New Brunswick, New Jersey
January, 2003

2003
DEIKE PETERS
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION
Planning for a Sustainable Europe?
A Case Study of EU Transport Infrastructure Policy
in the Context of Eastern Enlargement
by DEIKE PETERS
Dissertation Director:
Professor Susan S. Fainstein
The study investigates the underlying rationalities of transport sector decisionmaking
in Europe. The research seeks to explain discrepancies between the sustainability
objectives expressed in EU Commission documents and the reality of EU-led transport
sector investments. The study also shows how key defining concepts and justifications
are adapted and/or modified in the specific context of EU pre-accession funding for
Central Eastern Europe. The investigation is framed by six propositions which assume
that sustainability remains an ill-defined concept; that ecological modernization is the
dominant discourse in EU decision-making; that EU transport infrastructure investments
are dominated by conflicting storylines; that decision-making is additionally complicated
through varying decisional powers and challenges of multi-location politics; and that
ecological modernization discourses tend to underestimate the local impacts of transport
infrastructures.
ii

A key conceptual innovation is provided by the notion of discursive frameworks.
By distinguishing the five discursive frameworks of ecological modernization, reflexive
modernization, communicative rationality, political economy and renunciation, the study
develops a fivefold typology of sustainable policy-making in Europe. The dominant
ecological modernization perspective is a modernist model of development that is
relatively successful in integrating a variety of environmental concerns into its
framework, but that nevertheless privileges competitiveness and economic growth over
alternative development goals. In the case of pan-European transport infrastructures,
such a growth-oriented perspective translates into a predominance of industry-favored
investment storylines of missing links and bottlenecks over alternative storylines of
spatial cohesion and polycentric development.
However, while the European Round
Table of Industrialists greatly influenced the development of the EU’s Trans-European
Networks in the mid-1990s, decisions over the TEN extensions into Central Eastern
Europe were much less dominated by multi-national corporate interests.
The central summary insight of the study is the contextual discourse dilemma:
planning and policy-making in modern capitalist democracies is dependent on developing
universally applicable, integrative guiding visions such as sustainability to guide
decision-making, yet these concepts only become useful tools for decision-makers if they
are operationalized into concrete agendas which in turn translate into particular
investment choices at the local level. Conversely, general discourses devoid of any
applicability to local contexts are unlikely to gain widespread support.
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
My thanks are due to the many people and institutions who have supported me in
this multi-year, transatlantic endeavor. Rutgers’ Bloustein School of Planning and Public
Policy provided a first-rate academic home base and much appreciated financial support
for research and travel. Additional financial resources were provided through a Lincoln
Land Dissertation Fellowship, a Fannie Mae AESOP Ph.D. travel grant and
miscellaneous support from the Technical University of Berlin. The Salzburg Seminar
provided a marvelous start into my research summer in 2000 and the German Academic
Exchange Service (DAAD) provided a short-term Ph.D. grant during the final stages in
2002. Susan Fainstein has truly been the best dissertation chair imaginable, and Bob
Lake, John Pucher and Joanna Regulska all supplied useful advice at different stages of
the dissertation. Ann Markusen, Don Krueckeberg and many of my fellow students in
the urban planning program also provided excellent input during the formative stages of
my research. Studying for theory exams with Laura, Marla and David was great fun and
immensely enriched my perspective on urban and regional theory in general. Towards
the end, Frank Fischer shared his own latest work for additional inspiration and provided
welcome encouragement. Lynn Astorga provided crucial administrative and logistical
support. At the legendary 1999 AESOP Ph.D. workshop in Norway, John Forester, Alex
Fubini, Heather Campbell, Barry Needham, Aril Holt-Jensen and the rest of the Finse
gang all helped me think through some initial conceptual problems – and have been an
awesome peer group ever since. More generally, the annual AESOP and ACSP
conferences have become invaluable forums for sharing my research and for learning
from other planning academics. A special thanks goes to the members of the
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Transnational Spatial Planning Track, in particular to Tim Richardson and Ole Jensen,
who provided useful papers and literature leads, and to Andreas Faludi, who provided
very encouraging comments on several parts of my work. I am also deeply indebted to
the many people in Brussels, Warsaw, Budapest and elsewhere who took time out of their
busy days to discuss their work with me. Having worked for ITDP, one of the world’s
most successful sustainable transport advocacy organizations, for five years prior to
doing my field research meant that many of the people I interviewed were already known
to me as professional colleagues whose work I deeply respect and admire. Walter Hook
deserves a very special thanks, both as the best boss imaginable and as a great friend.
Since I left New York, the house at 544 Bergen has always been a wonderful home away
from home for me. Thanks also to all the other folks who supplied bed & breakfast &
entertainment during my many research trips – especially Magda in Brussels and Ferenc
in Budapest. Finally, I owe a big thanks to my friends and colleagues here in Berlin for
safely getting me through the more excruciating, final stages of the dissertation process. I
am grateful to Max Welch Guerra for getting me to Berlin in the first place, and to Uwe
Altrock, Jochen Hanisch, Simon Güntner, Sandra Huning, Jule Martinius, Harald
Bodenschatz, Uwe-Jens Walther, Markus Hesse and many other university colleagues for
much appreciated moral support and advice during the last two years. Thanks also to the
Stammtisch and other dear friends who made sure that there was a fun-filled life outside
the dissertation, to my family who always fully supported me even if that meant not
seeing me nearly as much as they would have liked to in the last few years, and finally, to
Charlie, whose love, support and late-night special caro coffees made all the difference in
the end.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Abstract
Acknowledgements
List of Tables
List of Pictures
List of Figures
ii
iv
ix
ix
x
1 Introduction 1
1.1 In Search of a Sustainable Transport Policy for the New Europe 2
1.2 Transport Infrastructure Investments Illustrate Key Dilemmas of Planning 4
1.3 Situating the Study within the Existing Social Science Literature 6
1.4 Some Preliminary Remarks on the Research Design and the
Case Study Method 12
1.5 The Unit(s) of Analysis 14
1.6 Personal Motivations for Choosing European Transport Policy as an
Area of Inquiry 18
1.7 Initial Considerations: “Rhetoric vs. Reality” or “Realrationalität”? 20
1.8 From General Research Questions to an Inquiry Structured Around Six
Key Propositions 25
1.9 Methods and Data Sources Used 33
Part One: Theory-Building –
Five Discursive Frameworks for a “Sustainable Europe”
2 Transport, Development and Sustainability: First Approximations 40
2.1 Introduction 41
2.2 Transport and Economic Development 41
2.3 “Sustainable Development” 57
2.4 “Sustainable Transport” 66
2.5 Sustainable Development and Sustainable Transport:
Two Ill-Defined Concepts? 72
3 Introducing the Notion of Discursive Frameworks 73
3.1 Introduction: The Notion of a Dominant Discourse 74
3.2 From Three Definitions of Sustainability to Five Discursive Frameworks 77
3.3 Modernity and Modernization: Some (Meta-)Theoretical Considerations 79
3.4 The Notion of Discursive Frameworks 93
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4 Ecological Modernization and Its Alternatives: Five Discursive
Frameworks for Sustainable EU Transport Policy 105
4.1 Introduction 106
4.2 Ecological Modernization: The Dominant Discursive Framework 109
4.3 Reflexive Modernization 123
4.4 Communicative Rationality 136
4.5 Political Economy 146
4.6 Renunciation 159
4.7 Addendum: The “Institutionalist” Focus on EU Space and Governance 170
4.8 Concluding Remarks 173
Part Two: Rhetoric –
EU Discourses on Transport Policy and Transport Infrastructure Investments
5 EU Discourses on Sustainable Development and Sustainable Transport 175
5.1 Introduction 176
5.2 EU Discourses on Sustainable Development 178
5.3 EU Discourses on Sustainable Transport 194
5.4 EU Discourses on Sustainable Urban Development 208
5.5 The EU’s Research Frameworks: Funding for the Eco-modernist Agenda 213
5.6 Conclusions and Open Questions 216
6 Three Leitbilder and Four Spatial Storylines for EU Transport
Infrastructure Investments 219
6.1 Introduction 220
6.3 Three Overarching Leitbilder for EU Decision-Making 221
6.2 Four Spatial Storylines For EU Transport Infrastructure Investments 231
6.4 Conclusions: The Challenge of Prioritizing Investments 265
Part Three: Realities –
EU Transport Infrastructure Decision-Making
in the Context of Eastern Enlargement
7 EU Transport Infrastructure Plans for CEE: From 10 “Priority
Corridors” to a “Backbone Network” for an Enlarged Union 271
7.1 Introduction 272
7.2 EU Plans and Programs for CEE Transport Infrastructures: Overview 276
7.3 From the E-Routes to the Pan-European Transport Corridors 278
7.4 The Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) for CEE 285
7.5 The Environmental Scoping Exercise on the Warsaw – Budapest Corridor 301
7.6 Epilogue: The Proposed Hungarian Amendments to the TINA Network 305
vii

7.7 Conclusions and Consequences 308
8 EU Accession-Related Transport Funding for Poland & Hungary 313
8.1 Introduction 314
8.2 EU and IFI Transport Sector Assistance to Poland & Hungary Pre-ISPA 318
8.3 A Precursor to Cohesion Funding? Overview of ISPA Priorities 324
8.4 EU ISPA Transport Funding for Poland 330
8.5 EU ISPA Transport Funding for Hungary 342
8.6 Concluding Remarks on the EU’s ISPA Transport Program 357
9 Local Dimensions of Sustainability: A Case Study of the Budapest Ring
Road M0 362
9.1 Introduction: The Significance of the M0 Case Study 363
9.2 Description of the M0 Including a Chronology of International Funding 364
9.3 Arguments For and Against the M0 Ring Road: A Typology 370
9.4 Local and International Protests Against the Northern Section of the M0 375
9.5 Risk-Rational Concerns: Is Brussels Financing Urban Sprawl in Budapest? 381
9.6 Conclusions 397
Part Four:
Conclusions & Appendices
10 The Dilemmas of Planning for a Sustainable Europe 401
10.1 Planning, Sustainability and the Contextual Discourse Dilemma 402
10.2 Summary of Previous Chapter Contents and Conclusions 405
10.3 Cross-Cutting Conclusions on “Sustainable” Decision-Making 414
10.4 Suggestions for Better Transport Decision-Making in Europe 426
10.5 Outlook: Suggestions for Further Research 433
Annexes, Glossary, Bibliography, & Curriculum Vita 435
Annex A1 Overview of IFI Lending to Poland and Hungary until 2001 436
Annex A2 List of Key Contacts 441
Annex A3 List of Relevant Conferences, Seminars and Writings 446
Annotated Glossary of Terms, Acronyms and Abbreviations 449
Bibliography 455
Curriculum Vita 483
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LIST OF TABLES
Tables
Page
1.1 The Three Levels of EU Decision-Making 12
1.2 How the Six Propositions Relate to the Overall Structure of the Study 30
2.1. The “Rio Cluster” of UN Summits, Conferences, and Conventions 60
2.2 The OECD’s Sustainable Transport Principles 71
3.1 Five Discursive Frameworks for Sustainable Policy-Making 77
4.1 Five Discursive Frameworks for Transport Planning & Policy-Making 108
4.2 Comparing Instrumental and Communicative Rationality 145
4.3 “Brown” Agenda versus “Green” Agenda Environmental Policy 149
4.4 The Eight Points of Deep Ecology 161
5.1 Key EU Statements on Sustainability, Transport & Spatial Development 177
5.2 Transport-relevant Research funded under the EU Fifth Framework Program 215
6.1 Overview of EU Transport Infrastructure Investment Storylines 236
7.1 Key Initiatives Related to EU Transport-Infrastructure Investments in CEE 278
8.1 Per Country Allocation for ISPA Transport Grants 325
8.2 Overview of ISPA Transport Grants to Poland 339
8.3 The Széchenyi Plan’s Railway Modernization Program 348
8.4 The Széchenyi Plan’s Expressway Construction Program 349
8.5 Overview of ISPA Transport Grants to Hungary 355
9.1 Main Arguments for & Objections against the M0 Ring Road Plans 374
10.1 A Two-Dimensional ‘Who-Benefits?’ - Matrix for the M0 Case Study 431
A.1 EIB Transport Loans to Poland (1990-2001) 436
A.2 EIB Transport Loans to Hungary (1990-2001) 437
A.3 EBRD and IBRD Transport Loans to Poland (1990-2001) 438
A.4 EBRD and IBRD Transport Loans in Hungary (1989-2001) 439
LIST OF PICTURES
Pictures
Page
9.1 Construction of the Northern Section of the M0 Ring Road with the
Káposztásmegzer II Housing Estate in the Background 377
9.2 Big Box Retail along the M1/7 & M0 Highways in Budaörs: IKEA & Auchan 390
9.3 New Single-family Homes in the Environmentally Sensitive Hills of Budaörs 390
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LIST OF FIGURES
Figures
Page
1.1 Key Stakeholders in Pan-European Transport Policy-Making 16
1.2 European Policy-Making as Interpreted as Multi-Level Governance 17
1.3 European Policy-Making as Interpreted as Multi-Location Politics 17
2.1 The EU and the Nordic Countries Compared 53
2.2 The Three Dimensions of Sustainable Development 66
4.1 Environmental Costs/Risks of Transport as presented by the EEA 136
6.1 Transport Grants within the EU-15 by Mode 230
6.2 Cohesion Fund Transport Grants by Country and Mode (1993-1997) 230
6.3 The Blue Banana I: An Image Ingrained 249
6.4 Blue Banana Maps Focusing on Peripheral Regions & Urban Linkages 249
6.5 The Blue Banana versus a European Bunch of Grapes 250
6.6 Missing Links I: The ERT Vision (1984) 256
6.7 Missing Links III: The EU TEN Priority Projects (1994) 256
6.8 Missing Links III: The ECMT Version (1986) 259
7.1 The Pan-European Transport Network with the 10 Helsinki Corridors 280
7.2 Pan-European Transport Corridor IV – Road Sector 284
7.3 Pan-European Transport Corridor IV – Rail Sector 284
7.4 TINA Road Network 288
7.5 TINA Rail Network 289
7.6 TINA Network Poland 290
7.7 TINA Network Hungary 291
7.8 EU Data on Transport Infrastructure Investment as Percentage of GDP 297
7.9 Proposed Hungarian TINA Road, Port and Airport Amendments 307
7.10 Proposed Hungarian TINA Rail Amendments 307
7.11 Hungary’s Motorway Investment Plan 2000-2010 308
7.12 Share of international road freight traffic measured in ton-kilometers 310
7.13 National Goods by Distance Traveled in the EU and CEE 310
8.1 PHARE Funds for Hungary and Poland per Sector 1990-97 (in MECU) 323
8.2 EU Transport Grants to CEEC pre-ISPA (Phare 1990-97, LISF 1998-99) 324
8.3 The Rise of Road-Based Freight Transport in Hungary (1980-1994) 343
9.1 The Budapest Ring Road M0 365
9.2 New construction of warehouse/logistic facilities along the M0, M1, M7 391
9.4 Location of the seven largest warehousing centers in the Budapest area 391
9.5-6 Auchan Hypermarket next to the EIB- & Phare-funded Section of the M0 392
9.7 Residential Suburbanization in the Budapest Agglomeration (1900-2005) 393
9.8 The Density Pattern of the City of Budapest 394
9.8 Budapest’s “Strategic Zones” acc. to its Urban Development Strategy 396
A.1 TINA Needs 2000-2015 vs. IFI TINA Network Loans 1990-2000 440
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1
Printed Thursday, October 31, 2002
Last Revised on September 15, 2002
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
1.1 In Search of a Sustainable Transport Policy for the New Europe .................................2
1.2 Transport Infrastructure Investments Illustrate Key Dilemmas of Planning................4
1.3 Situating the Study within the Existing Social Science Literature ................................6
1.4 Some Preliminary Remarks on the Research Design and the Case Study Method...12
1.5 The Unit(s) of Analysis....................................................................................................14
1.6 Personal Motivations for Choosing the Area of Inquiry ..............................................18
1.7 Initial Considerations: “Rhetoric versus Reality” or “Realrationalität”? ..................20
1.8 From a Set of General Research Questions to Six Key Propositions..........................25
1.8.1 The Ill-Defined Concept Proposition.........................................................................26
1.8.2 The Dominant Discourse Proposition........................................................................26
1.8.3 The Conflicting Storylines Proposition .....................................................................28
1.8.4 The Decisional Power Proposition.............................................................................29
1.8.5 The Challenges of Multi-Location Politics Proposition...........................................29
1.8.6 The Local Impacts Proposition...................................................................................31
1.8.7 Summarizing the Organization of the Study.............................................................31
1.9 Methods and Data Sources Used ....................................................................................33
1.9.1 Document Review .......................................................................................................35
1.9.2 Interviews......................................................................................................................36
1.9.3 General Statistical Data ...............................................................................................37

2
1.1 In Search of a Sustainable Transport Policy for the New Europe
What changes must now occur, in our way of looking at things, in our notions! Even
the elementary concepts of time and space have begun to vacillate. Space is killed by
the railways. I feel as if the mountains and forests of all countries were advancing on
Paris. Even now, I can smell the German linden trees, the North Sea's breakers are
rolling against my door.
Heinrich Heine's “Tremendous Foreboding” in response to the opening of the Paris-
Rouen rail link in 1854 (cited in Harvey 1996)
The history of modern societies can be read as a history of their acceleration.
J. Steiner (cited in Spiekermann and Wegener 1994)
The advent of the European Union and the breakup of the Soviet Union in the
1990s have brought profound new challenges to all levels of planning and policy making
across the European continent. The European Union is now under enormous pressure to
uphold its self-proclaimed goals of “harmonious, balanced development, sustainable
growth, economic and social cohesion, improved quality of life and solidarity between
member states” 1 while at the same time preparing ten Central and Eastern European
(CEE) transition countries for accession.
One of the key issues within this challenge of creating an ever-expanding
“Sustainable Europe” is the upgrading, expansion and optimization of transport
infrastructures. John Ross (1998:xii) found transport to be “an unusually fertile, though
often overlooked, subject in the firmament of European studies.” The stakes for investing
in the “right” kinds of transport and land use systems are especially high in the transition
countries, where systemic changes are the most dramatic, motorization rates the highest,
infrastructure needs the greatest, and where EU accession funds and other international
funding are most likely to make a critical difference in sustainability outcomes.

3
In today’s globalized world, many of the most important decisions for planning and
policy-making are no longer taken at the national or at the local level, but involve several
nations at once. In many ways, the formation of the EU itself can be read as a response
to global competition. When it comes to influencing policy and planning decisions in the
key areas of concern in this study, i.e. transport infrastructures and urban/regional
development, the EU has continually expanded its reach, quite in contrast to its selfimposed
principle of subsidiarity. Although transport did not really become an area of
high EU politics until the early 90s, developments since the passing of the Maastricht
Treaty have been dramatic, concerning both initiatives under the auspices of the
Directorate General for Transport (now Transport and Energy) as well as transportrelated
funding under the auspices of the Directorate General for Regional Development.
Additionally, since the passing of the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP)
in 1997, one must now also consider the EU a de facto spatial planning institution.
Buunk (1999) recently convincingly argued that the EU Trans-European Transport
Network (TENs) can be considered “the first spatial concept in European policies.” Any
attempt to direct transport-infrastructure investments at a supra-national Pan-European
level, while certainly qualifying as a spatial planning exercise (also see below), is
certainly a much more complicated task than “traditional” urban or regional planning, for
several obvious reasons:
First of all, not one, but many (state-like) actors are involved: the European Union
and individual nation-states. Among the latter, crucial differences are likely to exist
between member states and applicant countries. With plans and policies being
international in scope, they necessarily have to transgress national boundaries, physical as
1 Article 2 of the 1992 Maastricht Treaty on European Union

4
well as ideological ones. Serious geopolitical interests are likely to shape the process,
depending on the different power relationships among the various actors involved. Given
the vast geographical scope and sheer magnitude of the issue, it is also much less clear
who “the public” is in this case. Concrete locational conflicts and ownership struggles
over particular stretches of land are unlikely to influence the decision-making process in
Brussels much, although they might certainly come to the fore at the individual project
level.
1.2 Transport Infrastructure Investments Illustrate Key Dilemmas of Planning
A human right, a human pleasure, an economic resource and a servant of economic
activity: transport is many things to all people.
European Commission, Directorate General for Transport1994:1
The decision to choose transport infrastructure decision-making as the key focus
of this investigation was not a random one, but followed a strong conviction on my part
that struggles over transport infrastructure investment decisions best illustrate the central
dilemma of public policy and planning in modern capitalist democracies. That is:
planners and policy makers, and ”state agents” more generally are always caught between
two central and often contradictory objectives. On one hand, they administer
infrastructure systems and services for the “public good,” thereby providing the so-called
“legitimation functions” of the modern welfare state (Offe and Keane 1984). On the
other hand, they facilitate and support the activities of private sector agents in order to
advance capitalist development objectives. In the Anglophone planning literature, this
central contradiction was perhaps best summarized by Foglesong who is worth quoting at
length here:

5
Following Offe’s analysis, it can be postulated that capitalism is caught in a search for
a decision process, a method of policy-making than can produce decisions
corresponding with capital’s political and economic interests. Politically, this decision
process must be capable of insulating state decision making from the claims and
considerations of the numerically larger class of noncapitalists, a task made difficult
by the formally democratic character of the state. Economically, this decision process
must be capable of producing decisions that facilitate the accumulation and circulation
of capital (for example, promoting the reproduction of labor power and coordinating
the buildup of local infrastructure), a function that the market fails to perform and that
capitalists do not (necessarily) know how to perform. Both of these problems are
captured in the concept of the capitalist-democracy contradiction.
(Foglesong 1996:174-5)
Of course, Foglesong’s excellent study was written from the particular perspective
of structural Marxism, as applied to the US, which makes it problematic not only in the
sense that the analysis is limited to the specific context of US urban planning in the 19 th
and 20 th centuries, but also in that the key question of agency often slips from his view.
Fogelsong’s arguments often seem overly deterministic, giving planners and policymakers
too much credit for anticipating the needs of capital and actually being able to
implement plans accordingly. His analysis nevertheless remains relevant to the challenge
of planning and funding a European-wide transport infrastructure system.
To be sure, transport infrastructure decision-making can never be analyzed in
isolation. Any thorough investigation of the European Union’s ability to formulate a
transport agenda that is consistent with its own Maastricht promise of sustainable
development will also need to consider the relationship of transport policies and plans to
other EU policy-making areas, notably in the areas of environment, regional
development, spatial planning and enlargement.

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1.3 Situating the Study within the Existing Social Science Literature
Changes in planning and policy discourse are not always congruent with changes
in policies and development trends (see e.g. Filion’s 1999 local case study on Toronto).
Nevertheless, “the argumentative turn in policy analysis and planning” (Fischer and
Forester 1993) continues relatively unchallenged. Over the past three decades, all social
scientists, no matter whether they are considered to be working in a modernist (e.g.
Habermasian), post-modernist (e.g. Foucauldian), or anti-modernist (e.g. Deep Ecology)
framework, have learned to pay greater attention to discourses and rhetoric. 2 As Fainstein
(2000:451) recently summarized for the academic discipline of planning:
The past decade has witnessed a reinvigoration of theoretical discussion within the
discipline of planning. Inspired by postmodernist cultural critique and by the move
among philosophers away from logical positivism toward a substantive concern with
ethics and public policy, planning theorists have reframed their debates over methods
and programs to encompass issues of discourse and inclusiveness.
The parallel existence of different “discourses” - or rather, as I clarify in my
theory chapters: of different “discursive frameworks” - all display varying levels of
optimism with regard to the merits and prospects of rational decision-making. This
indicates that the social sciences are fundamentally in need of redefining themselves.
Especially when it comes to environmental questions, traditional disciplinary distinctions
are easily blurred. Twenty years ago, most social scientists concerned about the macro
issues of (sustainable) development and globalization probably would have been content
to self-describe themselves as economists, political scientists, geographers or perhaps
2 Greater attention to discourse and language is typically seen as a postmodern phenomenon. Yet it can equally well
be interpreted as a decidedly modernist trait. In the Condition of Postmodernity, David Harvey reminds us that in
facing the practical dilemmas of implementing the modernist project, “modernism, from its very beginning,
therefore, became preoccupied with language, with finding some special mode of representation of eternal truths”
(Harvey 1989:20).

7
sociologists. Today, there is a cacophony of voices from departments of public policy
and administration; urban, regional, and rural sociology; industrial ecology; economic
and human geography, environmental psychology, cultural philosophy, international
political economy; urban and spatial planning, etc, all of them contributing to the
theorization of concepts such as development, modernization and globalization in their
own way, and all of them employing the term sustainability in very different ways.
Interdisciplinary concepts such as sustainability demonstrate the confines of writing
within dominant the body of discourse of certain social science disciplines. Bob Jessop
and Ngai-Ling Sum (2001:89) recently summarized the dilemma as follows:
Neither co-author identifies with a single discipline. … We are not alone in refusing
disciplinary boundaries and decrying some of their effects. Indeed, among the most
exciting recent intellectual developments in the social sciences is the increasing
commitment to transcending these boundaries to understand better the complex
interconnections within and across the natural and social worlds. … [We witness] the
gradual decomposition and/or continuing crisis of orthodox disciplines [and] the rise
of new transdisciplinary fields of study and a commitment to post-disciplinarity. This
[among other factors] is reflected in the growing critical interest in the history of the
social sciences, their grounding in Enlightenment thought, their links to state
formation in Europe and the USA, as well as to capitalist economic development and
their differential articulation of modernity.
This is indeed an exciting development and not necessarily a problem in and of
itself. Interestingly, for the sub-discipline of political economy, Jessop and Sum
ascertain a growing influence “of intellectual figures with no clear disciplinary identity
whose work is influential across many disciplines” (p.90). 3
Regardless of this emerging
interdisciplinary, or perhaps indeed post-disciplinary dialogue, at present, the great
variation in the ideological (and also methodological) approaches in the social sciences
3 Interestingly, they list not only figures such as Michel Foucault, Anthony Giddens or Jürgen Habermas,
but also scholars with a distinctly urban focus in their work, such as David Harvey, Manuel Castells and

8
makes it much more difficult to draw up consistent and clearly delimited research
projects, especially when they are to contain the term “sustainability”. We also have to
keep in mind the important distinction between natural science and social science
research and the methodological challenges each faces.
Although the scale of this study is Pan-European and moves far beyond the local
and the urban to include regional, national, and international perspectives on decisionmaking,
the analytic tools employed and the intellectual roots that inspire the writing
come from an urban theory tradition. That is: The questions that motivated me to study
the European Union are largely the same that motivate urban theorists to study urban
governments. The central issue is how to analyze and interpret the ever-present contrast
between decision-makers rhetoric of the benign and universally beneficial impact of their
policies and plans and the reality of winners and losers that those decisions always entail.
To take but one example: in his chapter “How to study urban political power,” New York
political scientist John Mollenkopf (1996:264) asks the question “How can we develop a
vocabulary for analyzing politics and state action that reconciles the political system’s
independent impact on social outcomes with its observed systemic bias in favor of
capital?” In the answer he gives, he stresses “three interrelated levels”: a) how economic
and social conditions shape the state’s capacity to act, b) how the ‘rules of the game’ of
politics shape competition among interests and actors to construct a dominant political
coalition and c) how economic and social change and political competition shape interest
mobilization. These levels are just as relevant for studying EU power and decisionmaking
as they are for studying US urban politics. In particular, the approach taken in
Saskia Sassen. Most commonly, those authors are simply identified as “social theorists” (see e.g. Murphy
2000:1).

9
this dissertation owes much to (urban) regime theory. 4
The de facto multi-level
governance character of EU decision-making of course makes it difficult to identify
governing coalitions (a key focus of regime theory analyses), and this is in fact not the
exclusive aim of my study. Nevertheless, I take many lessons from regime theory
scholars. I draw particular inspiration from the groundedness of regime theory analyses,
which employ detailed examination of process and outcomes within particular locales.
Thus, in their efforts to tease out the particular way in which “complexity and
fragmentation limit the capacity of the state as an agency of authority or control” (Stoker
1995), regime scholars have presented rich local case studies, thereby helping to elevate
this formerly often underappreciated method of scientific inquiry into higher academic
esteem. I likewise view the case study approach as the most appropriate way to approach
my inquiry (also see below).
In the end, the larger theoretical perspective of this dissertation is informed by a
political economy 5 approach concerned with long-term environmental sustainability and
social equity objectives. My general conception of the European Union is as a supra-
4 Regime theory emerged out of the U.S. context in the 1980s as a new approach to study urban political power that
helped analysts to move beyond existing divides between pluralist approaches that see decision-making power and
influence largely as fragmented and decentralized on the one hand and elitist and/or structuralist approaches that see
them as being dominated by a select group on the other hand. The two had increasingly been constructed as polar
opposites within urban political theory. Regime theory, however, as Stoker (1995:55) notes,
emphasizes the interdependence of governmental and non-governmental forces in meeting economic
and social challenges[,] focuses attention upon the problem of cooperation and coordination between
governmental and non-governmental actors. … It directs attention away from a narrow focus on power
as an issue of social control towards an understanding of power expressed through social production.
In this sense, my study can be read as an attempt to take certain insights of urban regime theory away from the
particular U.S. and urban-centered focus in which they first emerged towards the (admittedly significantly different)
political context of EU decision-making.
5 I use the term “political-economy” here in its wider social science meaning signifying a general approach
that sees political and economic forces as inextricably linked. I am not proposing to do an explicitly
Marxist analysis, nor do I wish to imply that my argument is explicitly following Keohane and Hoffmann’s
(1991) so-called “political-economy hypothesis” (also see McCormick 1996:22) that EU institutional
change and integration are first and foremost a response to global economic pressures. Also see Chapters 3
and 4.

10
national institution whose legitimacy as a planning and policy-making body is founded
on a mix of economic opportunism and geopolitical strategizing. While it would be
foolish to attempt to summarize the vast academic literature on the European Union in a
few paragraphs, at least a cursory revealing of scholarly preferences is in order.
Theories of the EU can be broadly divided between (realist) intergovernmentalist
perspectives that continue to stress the role of member-states in EU policy-making
(Moravcsik 1991; Moravcsik 1998; Peterson and Bomberg 1999) and institutionalist
accounts that consider a broader range of actors and focus on different levels and forms
of decision-making at the EU. The latter accounts are variously used to support theories
of (neo)-functionalism (Haas 1958), federalism (Scharpf 1999) or most generally, of
multi-level governance (see e.g. Marks, Hooghe et al. 1996; Bache 1998; Hix 1998).
Intergovernmentalist accounts are partially correct in asserting that national-level politics
continue to play a significant role in shaping European Union policies and programs.
However, much more attention indeed needs to be paid to the specific institutional setup
and the agency of particular interest groups to truly understand likely outcomes in
particular policy areas, especially in the case of transport.
Since this study is conceptualized much more within a urban
theory/planning/public policy tradition than within the political science sub-field of
European studies, my research should not primarily be understood as an explicit
contribution to the rapidly evolving institutionalist literature on multi-level governance in
the EU.
Nevertheless, I find Peterson and Bomberg’s (1999) three-fold model of EU
decision-making levels a very useful framework for analyzing different levels of EU
transport decision-making. Table 1.1 presents an adaptation of their model to the

11
particular context of EU transport policy. Note that according to this model, most of the
decision-making processes I analyze are either policy-setting or policy-shaping decisions.
The Trans-European Networks and the Pan-European transport corridors, however,
should be regarded as history-making decisions, since they were decided upon at the
ministerial level. This history-making character of the TEN and TEN-extensions is rather
important for my overall analysis.
In the end, I strongly support the notion that there is not one single best “grand
theory” that can explain all EU decision-making but that “different kinds of theories are
appropriate for different parts of the EU puzzle” (Sandholtz 1996, quoted in Peterson and
Bomberg 1999:9). To be sure, the subject of eastern enlargement, as well as the political,
economic, social, and environmental costs and benefits associated with it, are all
currently the subject of intense discussion among EU scholars (see e.g. Avery and
Cameron 1998; Grabbe and Hughes 1998; Redmond and Rosenthal 1998; Henderson
1999; Mannin 1999). However, most scholars would agree that by now, “the EU has
taken steps towards eastern enlargement which make the process irreversible” (Peterson
and Bomberg 1999:1). For the purposes of this study, I therefore work from a rather
pragmatic, pro-integrationist perspective that sees the accession of at least first-tier CEE
states like Hungary and Poland into the EU as both a politically desirable and attainable
goal.

12
Table 1.1: The Three Levels of EU Decision-Making
Level Type of
Decision
Case Study
Example
Bargaining
mode
Type of
Rationality
Super-
Systemic
historymaking
TENcorridors
intergovernmental
Political
Systemic
policysetting
White
Papers
interinstitutional
Political;
Technocratic
Sub-
Systemic
policyshaping
Phare;
ISPA
resource
exchange
Technocratic;
Consensual
Source: adapted from Peterson and Bomberg 1999:9
1.4 Some Preliminary Remarks on the Research Design and the Case Study Method
All inquiry is structured around one or several research questions. Yet there are
several ways of organizing and documenting social science research. Formulating a
series of ex ante hypotheses and developing a step-by-step research design that will
subsequently either clearly confirm or validate these hypotheses is a common, and
perhaps the most accepted way to organize original research, especially in the Anglo-
American sphere of influence. Documentation of such research designs will typically
portray results as being the (necessary) consequences of a stringent logical construct that
was clearly formulated prior to beginning the fieldwork. A variant, more explorative, and
perhaps more continental European way is to formulate more general research questions
and propositions, and to document the process of realization that guided and propelled the
investigation towards the key insights. The latter is also more typical of case study
investigations. It leaves less room for retrospective palliation of the research process.
Revisions to the research questions, designs and the process of data collection, as well as
intellectual cul-de-sacs need to be made somewhat more transparent, rather than glossed

13
over and forgotten. Of course, results might appear less imperative and less “neat,” so to
speak. However, documenting research in this way seems to me to be both more truthful
and more rewarding. 6
As King, Keohane and Verba (1994:19 ) note in their authoritative
book on Designing Social Inquiry:
Social scientists often begin research with a considered design, collect some data, and
draw conclusions. But this process is rarely a smooth one and is not always best done
in this order: conclusions rarely follow easily from a research design and data
collected in accordance with it.
Meanwhile, Robert Yin’s (1994) best-selling book Case Study Research has done
much to redeem case study research from being regarded as a useful yet scientifically
slightly dubious approach, to firmly establish it as a valid way of doing social science
research. Case studies like the present one are particularly applicable whenever the
investigation “emphasizes the importance of situating practices in their specific
circumstances” (Healey, Khakee et al. 1999). Additionally, my study can also be viewed
as a variant of policy research, and as Majchzak (1984:58) observes, policy research
often operates “at the boundaries of research methodology” and “there is no single,
comprehensive methodology for doing the technical analysis of policy research.”
Finally, as Yin (1994:1) notes, “in general, case studies are the preferred strategy when
‘how’ or ‘why’ questions are being posed, when the investigator has little control over
events, and when the focus is on a contemporary phenomenon within some real-life
context.” This is certainly the case in the present study. Case studies’ distinctive place in
(evaluation) research is to “explain the causal links in real-life interventions that are too
complex for the survey or experimental strategies” (Yin 1994: 15).
6 I am grateful to Uwe-Jens Walther and the participants of his graduate research seminar at the TU Berlin for
encouraging me to clearly avow myself an adherent of the latter, more openly investigative approach.

14
Case studies are often accused of subjectivity and selectivity since they are not
“replicable” science in the strict sense of the word. Non-replicability, however, is an
intrinsic, almost necessary feature of all qualitative work dealing with complex topics.
All research that relies upon the gathering, selection and evaluation of large amounts of
qualitative information is in some way non-replicable. In my case the vastness of the
information impacting on my subject area was especially overwhelming. Yet there is no
better solution to this problem than for the researcher to be diligent about documenting
her primary and secondary sources, about the (construct, internal and external) validity
and reliability of her research design, and finally, for the reader to give her the benefit of
the doubt as far as any purposeful distortion of facts, events or discourses is concerned. 7
1.5 The Unit(s) of Analysis
The general unit of analysis in this study is the European Union, or rather its
development approach, which the EU purports to be “sustainable development.” I use
the sub-area of transport infrastructure investment decision-making in the context of
enlargement as my specific case study area, i.e. sub-unit of analysis. In the end, as is
typical for many case studies, the overall case study review is really comprised of several
sub-case studies evaluating different EU policies, programs and actual projects related to
the topic. With regard to EU institutions, my view is mostly focused on the work and
workings of the European Commission, which is the only EU institution vested with
7 Recurring media reports about falsified results in medical research have taught us that even the supposedly more
objective natural sciences are not immune to politicking and outright deceit. But in the end, reductionism is not an
option for the social sciences, since quantitative research alone will never yield relevant answers to today’s most
pressing social and environmental problems.

15
formal agenda-setting powers. More precisely, I trace the policies, programs and
activities of those Commission Directorates-General - the Commission’s equivalents of
ministries - which are most relevant for sustainable transport decision-making (i.e. DG
Transport and Energy, DG Regional Policy, DG Environment and DG Enlargement).
Note, however, that especially when it comes to “history-making” decisions on EU
transport policy (also see Table 1.1. above), additional stakeholders (i.e. the EU Council,
the Council of Ministers, the Parliament, national governments, and, last but not least,
lobby groups) enter the picture as important decision-makers. Given necessary limits to
the scope of the study, I chose Poland and Hungary as two front-runner EU candidate
countries that might best illustrate key issues with regard to enlargement-related EU
transport policies and programs. Figure 1.1 provides a general overview of the relevant
stakeholders in Pan-European transport policy making as well as the key Pan-European
transport plans and programs which I investigate in this study.
With regard to the relationship between the different stakeholders, I agree with
Helen Wallace that European policy-making is best interpreted as a realm of multilocation
politics. Wallace (2000:73-74) makes the following crucial point (which I argue
holds for Central Europe as well):
The EU policy-process is frequently described as a multi-level process. … Here,
however, I make a more extended observation about different locations of policymaking.
In western Europe we can observe policies being made in many different
locations. Please note that here I deliberately avoid the term ‘level’, which implies a
hierarchy. Instead, I suggest, in a more open-ended way, that European policies are
constructed in locations that vary between, at one extreme, the local, and, at the other
extreme, the global. … This is an extraordinary array of locations. It provides those
demanding and supplying policy with a multiplicity of options for pursuing their
objectives and for developing capabilities. Nor does one location clearly separate
itself from others. On the contrary, they overlap.
[Emphasis in the original]

16
In adapting this concept of “multi-locationality” to my case study, figures 1.2 and
1.3 visualize the difference between an interpretation of EU (transport) policy-making as
multi-locational politics and an interpretation as multi-level governance.
Finally, note that throughout the study, I increasingly move from a larger to a
smaller scale, beginning with global and Pan-European discourses on sustainable
transport development and ending with a review of the national-, regional- and even
local-level implications of these discourses for transport infrastructure funding in the
candidate countries.
Figure 1.1 Key Stakeholders in Pan-European Transport Policy-Making
Source: Own compilation. Please consult the glossary for explanations on abbreviations.

17
Figure 1.2 European Policy-Making Interpreted as Multi-Level Governance
Pan-European &
International Organizations:
OECD/ECMT, UNECE, etc.
Cities
Regions
EU Member Countries
Cities
Regions
Candidate Countries
European Union
Other Stakeholders:
IFIs, NGOs, etc.
Source: Own compilation, inspired by Wallace (2000:73-5)
Figure 1.3 European Policy-Making Interpreted as Multi-Location Politics
Pan-European &
International Organizations:
OECD/ECMT, UNECE, etc.
EU
- DG Transport
- DG Enlargement
- DG Regional Policy
- DG Environment
Cities
Regions
Countries
Other
Stakeholders:
IFIs, NGOs, etc.
Source: Own compilation, inspired by Wallace (2000:73-5)

18
1.6 Personal Motivations for Choosing the Area of Inquiry
Not only are there many different ways to organize a case study, there are also
many different reasons for doing it. In my case, the formulation of the below described
research questions and propositions evolved and developed out of the professional work I
had been doing for an international non-governmental organization in New York 8 which
provides technical assistance to environmental groups in Central Europe in the area of
sustainable transport advocacy. Of course, as is also documented in this study, most
environmental NGOs have a particular normative view of what “sustainability” means in
the area of transport, and this view is neither fully congruent with interpretations
presented by the European Union nor with that of the business community. The goal of
my thesis, however, is less a verification or a falsification of one particular view on the
environment and on sustainability than an exploratory analysis of the “contextual
discourses” arising from the issue of EU transport sector investment decision-making in
the particular context of enlargement. The thesis thus provided me with a welcome
opportunity to “step back” from an area of work that I had become politically involved in
and to look at it from a more detached, more de-politicized perspective. In particular, I
wanted to re-visit some questions for which the environmental movement often has alltoo-easy
and limited answers. Attacking decision-makers for their lack of action
whenever a particular Habitats or Birds Directive is not recognized by investors, for
example, is useful in that it applies pressure where it is most effective politically, e.g. at
the level of legally sanctioned environmental agendas. What is missing from such a
8 The name of the NGO is the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP). See www.ITDP.org.

19
perspective, however, is the question in how far a legislative approach to environmental
matters even really addresses the crux of the “sustainability problem”.
Since environmental advocates fight for particular political outcomes, their world
of environmental politics appears neatly divided into allies, potential allies and
adversaries. Of course, this distinction does not entirely dissolve itself once one takes up
the role of social science researcher. My research is quite obviously motivated by an
ongoing belief that sustainability issues are in fact important in transport decision-making
and that planners and policy-makers can produce socially and environmentally preferable
outcomes by better operationalizing and implementing this admittedly still fuzzy concept.
This is the background before which I embark upon my scholarly review of currently
dominant EU discourses of sustainability. In my view, to not ground one’s research
within a larger belief system of human action is careless social science. The key issue,
however, is not whether or not one’s choice of a particular topic is personally motivated,
but whether the resulting research is carried out in a logical, plausible, transparent and
responsible manner. Motivated science does not automatically mean biased science. The
two are often confused.
Yin (1994:56) lists five key skills a good case study investigator needs to posses:
she needs to “be able to ask good questions,” “be a good listener,” “be adaptive and
flexible,” “have a firm grasp of the issues being studied [in order to] focus the relevant
events and information to be sought to manageable proportions,” and “be unbiased by
preconceived notions, including those derived from theory.” Certainly, the last two items
do not always go hand in hand very easily, since the more one already knows about a
particular issue, the more likely one also has opinions about it. Yin’s key criterion for

20
qualifying as “unbiased” is that a person “be sensitive and responsive to contradictory
evidence” (p.56). In my case, my entire research design, and its theory-building part in
particular, should in fact be looked at as a sensitive response - if not so much to the
contradictions then definitely to the limits that (too strongly) environmentally biased
views on European Union transport infrastructure decision-making pose for scholarly
inquiry. (This is of course also true for fields other than transportation). In the end, I am
convinced that my extensive prior knowledge of the subject area enriched rather than
limited my case study accounts, and that it even helped me to overcome the frustrations
of working in a field where contradictory evidence and biased research is particularly
extensive. Few areas of inquiry seem to be as inconclusive and contradictory in their
evidence as that of “sustainable” transport infrastructure investment.
1.7 Initial Considerations: “Rhetoric versus Reality” or “Realrationalität”?
The starting point of this study was the realization, made during my NGO work,
that there seemed to be a stark contrast between the sustainability objectives expressed in
key EU documents (e.g. the EC and EU Treaties, the EU Common Transport Policy, the
EU Sustainable Development Strategy, the EU Spatial Development Perspective etc.) and
actual EU-led transport-sector infrastructure investments, both in the member states
themselves and in the central European EU-accession countries. Take the issue of modal
preferences, for example. Even according to very mainstream sources, sustainable
transport development implies an increase of investments in the environmentally friendly
modes of rail, public transit, and combined transport and a move away from car and truck
dominance (ECMT and OECD 1990; ECMT 1995b; World Bank 1996). As will be

21
shown and further discussed in this study, neither within the EU nor in EU accession
countries is there a clearly recognizable trend in this direction. Inside the EU, the two
most important EU funds allocating money for transport infrastructure are the European
Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the Cohesion Fund. From 1994-1999, over
70% of the € 13.7 billion of EDRF Objective 1 funding went to roads. 9 The imbalance
was equally pronounced in the case of the EU Cohesion Fund which provides special
grant funding to the four poorest EU member states (Greece, Ireland, Portugal and
Spain). From 1993 to 1999, priority transport investments for Trans-European Network
projects in the four Cohesion countries accounted for over € 5 billion, of which 69% went
to roads. The situation is likely to be similar for EU investments into the transport
infrastructure systems in future member states. According to the EU-initiated Transport
Infrastructure Needs Assessment for the CEE candidate countries (TINA), road sector
investments were estimated to account for less than half of all funds needed in both
Poland and Hungary, while the rail sector should receive at least 40% of all funds.
Nevertheless, until the year 2000, both European Union grant programs and loans
approved by the “house bank” of the European Union, the European Investment Bank
(EIB), had allocated less than 30% of their funds to the rail sector. The most important
EU grant program for the CEE candidate countries, the so-called Phare program,
allocated 53% percent of the total € 884.2 million disbursed until 1999 to road, while
only 32% went to rail. This observable discrepancy between the rhetoric and the reality
of investments motivated me to attempt an investigation into the most important
institutional, economic, (geo)political or other relevant factors that influence European
9 Objective 1 funding is designated for the least developed regions of the EU, i.e. regions where GDP per
capita is below 75% of the EU average.

22
Union transport decision-making, both inside the EU and in future candidate countries. 10
Why does the EU not “put its money where its mouth is,” to put it colloquially?
Generally speaking, there are two possible explanations: either the EU does not
want to implement its own sustainability agenda - which raises fundamental questions
about the EU the “true” motives of EU decision-making, i.e. its rationality - or the EU is
not able to implement its own sustainability agenda - which raises fundamental questions
about the EU’s function as a modern planning and policy-making body, i.e. its power and
legitimation. Note that such an (in)ability to “implement sustainability” in turn has
several dimensions: First, there is the issue of “democratic legitimation” in the narrower
sense, i.e. the fact that within the currently prevailing context of multi-level, democratic
governance in Europe, the EU’s decision-making powers are limited by issues of national
sovereignty and subsidarity. Second, there is a procedural dimension focusing on the setup
and the (in)efficiency of those institutions actually implementing environmental and
transport policies. Finally, there is a more structural dimension concerning the
fundamental incompatibility of “sustainability” ideals with competing development
goals, e.g. enlargement (“goal incompatibility”). As subsequent sections will show, all
three dimensions provide partial explanations as to why the EU is fundamentally
“incapable” of implementing sustainability.
Taken together, the “rationality” and the “power/legitimation” explanations have
important implications with regard to the institutional nature of the European Union and
to the problem of (sustainable) planning and policy-making at the Pan-European, supranational
level. Let us briefly consider two possible explanatory paths:
10 To be sure, both the “rhetoric” and the “reality” of EU investments are elaborated in much more detail in
the following pages. For a closer analysis of EU policy statements on sustainable transport, see Part II. For

23
On one hand, there is the question of the validity of the approach of “sustainable
transport” and the underlying reasons and rationales for decision-making. One cannot
assert that the EU “fails” to implement its own sustainability agenda without first taking a
closer look at both general and EU specific interpretations of “sustainability” and
“sustainable transport.” We will therefore have to address questions such as: How are the
terms defined? What are their major connotations? How are the concepts
operationalized? What is the relationship between transport and development? How do
the EU's definitions relate to larger discussions around economic development and
environmentalism? Are the presented definitions and arguments coherent and internally
consistent? Can we distinguish different discourses with regard to sustainability and
sustainable transport? The overall aim here is to present an analysis of sustainable
development and sustainable transport as social constructs.
On the other hand, there is the question of the EU’s ability to implement a given
approach. Such a path of analysis asks fundamental questions about the process of
decision-making. Here the focus would be on an institutional analysis of the major
players and the relationships between them, guided by questions such as: Given its own
understanding of the concepts of sustainability as presented in official policy documents,
why do EU decision-makers fail to integrate environmental considerations into transport
investment decisions in the EU? Who are the major decision-makers in transport
planning and policy-making in the EU, especially with regard to Pan-European policies
and projects? Who else is participating in the decision-making process, who is left out?
What is the relationship between those who formulate policy objectives and those who
implement concrete investment projects? Are the formulated goals and objectives
more details on mode-specific EU-led transport infrastructure investments see Part III.

24
consistent with the needs assessed at the local level? And finally: What is the particular
situation in the case of the enlargement countries that are not yet members of the EU?
What are the power relationships between the EU, member states and candidate
countries?
Both explanatory paths are valid ways of organizing an investigative study on EU
transport sector investments, and as we will see, both yield interesting answers about how
the EU makes and implements decisions, not only in the realm of transport, but also as an
institution more generally. However, my study explicitly does not choose between either
path of investigation. Instead, I am interested in showing the relationship between the
validation and the implementation of the concept of sustainable transport. At the
intersection between underlying rationales and real-life processes of decision-making
always lies the intellectual process of rationalization, or, as Bent Flyvbjerg terms it more
appropriately, Realrationalität. For Flyvbjerg (1998:7), “the main question is not only
the Weberian ‘Who governs’ posed by most other students of power-as-entity […] [but]
also the Nietzschean question, ‘What “governmental rationalities” are at work when those
who govern govern?’” Enveloped in an in-depth case study of politics, administration
and planning in the Danish town of Aalborg, Flyvbjerg’s study Rationality and Power
presents a captivating analysis of real-life decision-making in modern (Western)
democracies. The key conclusion of his book is immensely relevant to my own study as
well (Flyvbjerg 1998:236):
The focus of modernity and modern democracy has always been on ‘what should be
done,’ on normative rationality. What I suggest is a reorientation toward the first half
of Machiavelli’s dictum, ‘what is to be done,’ toward verita effecttuale. We need to
rethink and recast the projects of modernity and democracy, and of modern politics,
administration, and planning, in terms of not only rationality but of rationality and
power, Realrationalität. Instead of thinking of modernity and democracy as rational

25
means for dissolving power, we need to see them as practical attempts at regulating
power and domination. When we do this we obtain a better grasp of what modernity
and democracy are in practice and what it takes to change them for the better.
Note that this process is particularly complex in the case of the EU, since all
decision-making is embedded in an overall framework of multi-level governance,
involving a complicated and shifting web of power relationships.
1.8 From a Set of General Research Questions to Six Key Propositions
So in focusing on both, the validity of the sustainable transport ideal and the
difficulties in implementing it, the study brings together the two major paths of analysis
described above. As already evident from above discussions, my study was motivated by
one overarching, dual research question:
Who and what “governs” EU transport infrastructure decision-making, and how is this
decision-making power being rationalized?
The research questions that guided the actual case study review can be summarized as
follows:
?? How can we explain the discrepancies between the sustainability objectives expressed
in key EU Commission policy documents and the reality of EU-led transport sector
infrastructure investments?
?? What are the key defining concepts and justifications used for EU-led transport
infrastructure investments?
?? How are these adapted and/or modified in the case of EU transport infrastructure
investments in the Central European candidate countries?
?? Who are the most influential decision-makers in Pan-European transport policy and
why?

26
I structured the resulting inquiry around six different propositions on EU transport
sector decision-making. These will be approached in consecutive order throughout the
study. The following discussion of these six consecutive propositions therefore also
serves as an overview of the overall structure of this dissertation.
1.8.1 The Ill-Defined Concept Proposition
1) The EU does not implement ‘a sustainable transport agenda’ because it is a flawed
concept that is internally contradictory
In the first theory-building chapter of Part I of this study (Chapter 2), I present
different international definitions for sustainability and sustainable transport. Sustainable
development is typically presented as having three dimensions, namely ‘growth,’
‘equity,’ and ‘environment’. I show that these different connotations connected to the
terms sustainability and sustainable transport are indeed contradictory, i.e. not congruent
with each other. I also discuss the complex and disputed relationship between transport
and economic development in general. Note that the Ill-Defined Concept Proposition
precludes the option of taking a normative approach of simply “picking” one particular
set of sustainability definitions as the “correct” ones. Instead, I pursue my investigation
through the following key proposition:
1.8.2 The Dominant Discourse Proposition
2) The EU employs a discourse in which the concept of ‘sustainable transport’ is
distorted to favor growth objectives at the expense of equity and environmental
preservation. More precisely, EU transport sector decision-making is dominated by the
discursive framework of ecological modernization.

27
Using Maarten Hajer’s (1995) important considerations on the constitutive role of
discourse in policy processes as a starting point, I show that the EU’s framing of
sustainable transport is not neutral but involves important choices with regard to which
objectives are favored.
The pertaining sections analyze sustainability and sustainable
transport as discourse. The two final theory-building chapters of Part I (i.e. Chapter 3
and Chapter 4) set the stage for this core proposition by first defining the notion of
“discursive frameworks” and by then identifying five alternative discursive frameworks
for sustainable transport. Apart from “ecological modernization,” I distinguish the
following four additional alternative discursive frameworks: “reflexive modernization,”
“communicative rationality,” “political economy” and “renunciation.”
In the first
chapter of the “Rhetoric” Part (i.e. Chapter 5 in Part II), I am then able to analyze key EU
documents to show in how far EU discourses are dominated by eco-modernist (i.e.
ecological modernization) ideals.
Since the key aim of my study is not simply to show how flawed and/or biased the
rhetoric of sustainability is, but to also explain actual policy and investment outcomes,
my attention then increasingly turns to the problem of implementing sustainability ideals.
No matter whether it be growth- or ecology-oriented, any chosen sustainability strategy
could still be transformed into an internally consistent, logical set of policy proposals
advocating a particular set of transport investments. What we have, however, is a world
of competing belief systems even within the EU itself. In the end, we encounter not only
different underlying rationales for sustainability, but also for development more
generally. Until this point, I have concentrated on showing the different ways in which
sustainability and sustainable transport have been (re-)interpreted by scholars and

28
decision-makers. But when focusing on the operationalization of the concept of
sustainability within EU decision-making, and its operationalization into actual
guidelines for transport investment decisions in particular, we also have to consider
alternative concepts that might be competing with it. So the second key insight guiding
my discussion of EU “rhetoric” in Part II is that sustainability is but one of several
overarching EU development goals, and that implementation-oriented discourses also aim
at achieving goals other than sustainability. I therefore make the following, additional
proposition with regard to transport-related EU decision-making:
1.8.3 The Conflicting Storylines Proposition
3) Decision-making for Pan-European transport infrastructure investments lacks
consistence and sustainability due to the existence of several, partially complementary,
but also partially competing EU development objectives. These objectives are in turn
expressed through several, partially conflicting guiding visions (‘Leitbilder’) and
storylines.
This key proposition already increasingly shifts our attention away from policy
discourses (“rhetoric”) towards actual investment rationales (“reality”). In Chapter 6, I
use the German notion of Leitbilder to identify and summarize the three overarching EU
“guiding visions” of integration, enlargement and sustainability. I subsequently adapt
Maarten Hajer’s concept of storylines to distinguish four spatial storylines for EU
transport infrastructure investments: “cohesion,” “polycentricity,” “missing links,” and
“bottlenecks.”
Armed with these insights into overall discourses of EU transport-related policies
and programs, I then finally enter the “realities” part of the study. Here, while conscious
of the fact that the two are intimately intertwined (through the concept of

29
Realrationalität), I still need to account for the circumstance that the analytical focus now
increasingly lies on actual decision-making powers, in addition to the above discussed
discursive rationalities. Hence, I make the following additional propositions with regard
to the particular problems of EU decision-making related to transport infrastructure plans
and investments in the context of enlargement:
1.8.4 The Decisional Power Proposition
4) Trans-European Transport Network policies and plans are primarily designed to
satisfy national economic and multi-national corporate interests.
This proposition is related to the Dominant-Discourse Proposition inasmuch as
favoring growth objectives already puts certain interest groups at an advantage over
others. However, the Decisional-Power Proposition goes even further by explicitly
connecting the key issues of discourse, decision-making and policy outcomes. The
pertaining analyses in Chapters 7, 8 and 9 are further guided by two additional
propositions:
1.8.5 The Challenges of Multi-Location Politics Proposition
5) The EU Commission has limited power to formulate and implement its transport sector
objectives and policies, especially with regard to policy concerning the candidate
countries.
This proposition naturally has two dimensions. On one hand, there are the
internal problems of EU governance related to multi-level, or rather: multi-location
decision-making (making it even possible to question concept of multi-level governance
as such). On the other hand, there is the special problem of influencing decision-making
in the candidate countries, focusing on the power-play between the EU and the respective
case study countries (Hungary and Poland). At first sight, one might suspect that the

30
influence of the EU in the candidate countries is even greater than in its member states,
since the candidate countries should be eager to fulfill all necessary requirements for
future membership. However, as we will see, national politics also strongly influence
transport decision-making in the candidate countries, especially when it comes to
strategic and geo-politically important routes and/or large-scale investments.
Taken together, the Decisional-Power and the Multi-Locational Politics
Propositions are particularly helpful for understanding the dynamics of the sub-case
studies presented in Chapters 7 and 8. Chapter 7 focuses on the gestation and
formulation of the EU’s Pan-European Transport Network plans and programs, focusing
on revealing the underlying rationales, key decision makers, and outcomes of the socalled
Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) exercise for the Central
Eastern European candidate countries. Chapter 8 presents a review of the first two years
of transport-related funding for Poland and Hungary under the EU’s new Instrument for
Structural Pre-Accession (ISPA).
Finally, I introduce one last proposition which explicitly accounts for the fact that,
once they are fully implemented, EU transport infrastructure decisions of course also
have an impact on transport and land-use patterns at the local/regional level. So
depending on the details of the related planning and implementation processes and the
observable spatial consequences of the respective infrastructures, EU transport-sector
decision-making can thus be interpreted as being more or less “sustainable”. Note that
such value judgments about the local and regional sustainability effects of EU-funded
infrastructures should of course be based on the EU’s own definitions of transport and

31
land-use sustainability, i.e. compare local “realities” with official EU “rhetoric.” The
pertaining proposition has wide-ranging implications:
1.8.6 The Local Impacts Proposition
6) The eco-modernist transport investment decision-making rationales currently
privileged by the EU tend to underestimate the negative local impacts of large-scale
infrastructures. Meanwhile, each of the four alternative discursive frameworks of
”reflexive modernization”, “communicative rationality”, “political economy”, and
“renunciation” adds an important additional dimension to the decision-making process
that would partially rectify this bias.
This final proposition pays homage to the fact that in the transport sector, the
local dimension presents important additional challenges to the analysis of sustainability.
In Chapter 9, I apply the five alternative discursive frameworks for sustainable transport
identified earlier in the study to the concrete case of the EU-funded M0 ring road around
Budapest. I compare how the overarching rationales and resulting policy proposals of
these discursive frameworks are reflected in the local controversies over a large-scale
transport infrastructure. As we will see, not all of the concerns raised within the
alternative discursive frameworks can be easily addressed within currently existing
decision-making structures.
1.8.7 Summarizing the Organization of the Study
It should be noted that the applicability of the different propositions is not as
limited to the various chapters of the study than the above structure might suggest. Also,
individual case studies may serve to illustrate more than one proposition. For example,
the material presented in Chapter 7 tracing the evolution of Pan-European transport
corridors not only provides insights about decisional power dynamics, but it also reflects

32
on multi-location politicking and/or the likely longer-term sustainability impacts of the
favored investment programs. Still, as evident from above outline, I decided to arrange
the findings and insights gathered from the interviews and document materials in a
manner such that the suite of chapters roughly corresponds to the systematic formulation
of the propositions. Table 1.2 summarizes the relationship between the consecutive
introduction of the six propositions and overall structure of the study.
A concluding chapter (Chapter 10) summarizes the various findings of the study.
My general case study conclusions are centered around the formulation of what I term the
“contextual discourse” dilemma of modern capitalist democracies. This dilemma can be
briefly summarized as follows: On one hand, it is true that successful planning and
policy-making is dependent on developing universally applicable, integrative guiding
visions and storylines such as “sustainability” or “cohesion” to guide and legitimize
decision-making. On the other hand, it is also true that such discursive concepts only
become useful policy tools for decision-makers if they can be operationalized into
concrete local/regional agendas resulting in specific investment choices in particular
locales. However, the more grounded planning and policy-making discourses become in
concrete local-regional contexts, the less universally applicable and the more conflictual
and contradictory they become (for additional details see Box 10.1 and subsequent
sections in Chapter 10).

33
Table 1.2 How the Six Propositions Relate to the Overall Structure of the Study
Ch 1 “EU Transport Infrastructure Investment in the Context of Eastern Enlargement”
(Intro)
PART I: THEORY-BUILDING
Ch 2 Defining Sustainability /
Ill-Defined Concept
Sustainable Transport
Ch 3
The Notion of
Discursive Frameworks
Dominant Discourse
Ch 4 Ecological Modernization &
Its Alternatives
PART II: RHETORIC
Ch 5
EU Discourses
Dominant Discourse cont.
(Review of Key Documents)
Ch 6
Four EU Storylines
Conflicting Storylines
for Transport Investments
PART III : REALITIES
Ch 7 Pan-European Corridors /
CEE TINA Network
Ch 8
Ch 9
Ch10
Decisional Power &
Challenges of
Multi-Location Politics
EU transport funds for
Poland & Hungary under ISPA
TINA-node Case Study
Local Impacts
(M0 ring road in Budapest)
PART IV: CONCLUSIONS
Conclusions: The “Contextual Discourse” Dilemma of Planning & Policy
Making
Source: Own complilation
1.9 Methods and Data Sources Used
In order to adequately discuss the various propositions, I employ a mix of several
social science methods. The first, theory-building part of the study (Part I) sets the stage
for the ensuring sections by introducing the study’s overall social constructivist,
discourse-analytical approach and by distinguishing five discursive frameworks for
decision and policy-making. The following “rhetoric” section (Part II) then aims at
understanding the EU from a more EU-centric, Brussels perspective, while the “realities”
sections (Part III) test the developed concepts and ideas “in the field,” i.e. as they relate to
EU transport activities in Poland and Hungary. The above presented research questions

34
and related propositions form the overall framework for the study, helping me to
operationalize each individual step.
In Parts I and II of this study, I rely on a vast array of secondary literature from
many social science sub-fields such as social/urban/planning theory, sociology, political
science, transport planning and policy, regional science, environmental studies or
political economy to formulate and corroborate my various propositions. I also do a
significant amount of direct document analysis. Primary data material is provided by EU
policy documents (both official and unofficial), supplemented with various non-EU
policy papers, as well as informal statements and interviews gathered from various
stakeholders. Part II strongly relies on the social constructivist method of discourse
analysis. In particular, I use the German concept of Leitbilder and on Maarten Hajer’s
concept of storylines to tease out the EU’s conflicting visions with regard to transport
infrastructure investments.
Set against this backdrop, Part III presents the case study on EU transport
infrastructure decision-making in Poland and Hungary. Here, I primarily use information
gathered from documents, personal interviews, and during conferences and workshops
related to the event. For the preparation of the case study chapter on the Budapest ring
road I also heavily rely on interviews and informal document material, especially for the
reconstruction of the debate between the European Investment Bank and
environmentalists. Personal visits to various ring road sites were made during my
interview phase in August 2000 and again in January 2001.

35
1.9.1 Document Review
Especially the second part of the study heavily relies on extensive review of
policy documents, primarily but not exclusively from the European Commission. The
availability of EU and EU-special agency documents and publications is very mixed.
Most official, and an increasing number of unofficial EU documents are available
through the Office for Official Publications of the European Commission (OOPEC).
More importantly, an increasing number of official and unofficial EU Council,
Parliament and Directorate General papers, policies, decisions and communications are
available on the sprawling (and sometimes difficult to navigate) EU web site
(www.europa.eu.int).
In addition to this, there exists a large body of hard-to-track-down, more specific
“gray” research literature, often funded and/or carried out by the European Union. Much
is in the form of commissioned but not very widely published studies and reports. 11
Many of the more politically “dangerous” consultant reports on large-scale transport
project assessments are not easily accessible to normal academic researchers, and many
internal assessments at international financial institutions such as the European
Investment Bank (EIB) are even confidential. At the time when I was doing my field
research, even the ISPA (Instruments for Structural Policies for Pre-Accession) National
Strategy documents in Poland and Hungary were not all publicly available and had to be
obtained though insider channels. Ironically, this lack of transparency, limit on
11 To give a specific example: when a colleague of mine conducted interviews with European Union
officials on the issue of strategic environmental assessments (SEAs) for transport projects she asked several
interview partners for literature. She returned with no less than ten photocopied cover pages of reports on
this specific topic alone, all of them EU-funded or initiated studies carried out within the last five years.
None of these were easily available through official channels, nor were they listed in library search engines.

36
information, and evasion of public accountability forms part of the story my research
intends to tell.
1.9.2 Interviews
The list of potential interviewees developed naturally out of the initial process of
identifying the relevant stakeholders.
Most key institutions, organizations and
individuals in European transport infrastructure decision-making are listed in the
glossary. Many of my choices for interviews at the European Union were selfexplanatory
in the sense that they could be picked directly from the organigram of the
relevant EU bureaucracies. After an initial set of interviews, a reputational (“snowball”)
method was used to identify the most relevant future interview partners, i.e. past
interviewees were asked to provide names of other persons that they thought were
particularly knowledgeable in the suggested areas of inquiry. In the end, the ultimate
selection of interviewees was purposive in the sense that I relied on my own good
judgment to define the final list of interview partners. However, it should also be noted
that my own long-standing professional experience in the area of sustainable transport
advocacy provided me with substantial advance knowledge of the key players.
All interviews, including all the longer, specifically arranged talks at the EU in
Brussels, and at various ministries and offices in Warsaw and Budapest, were conducted
as open-ended, unstructured interviews. I always had a set of more general policy
questions as well as some specific informational questions for the interviewees, but there
was no fixed list of questions. This was largely due to the complexity of the issues
involved and due to the fact that different interview partners provided information about

37
very different areas of the overall case study. Triangulation was nevertheless aimed for
whenever possible, i.e. different interview partners were asked the same question when
they were working in the same general area. For example, desk officers at the ISPA Unit
in Brussels were asked similar questions about the successes and failures of the first
round of applications received and on the formulation of the ISPA strategy document.
Information was considered to be true when confirmed by several interview partners.
Since I guaranteed anonymity to the persons interviewed, they are usually not quoted by
name. A large number of additional talks were also conducted in more informal settings,
outside office surroundings over lunch or dinner. Sometimes meetings were also
conducted in a quasi-participant-observation manner, for example during the course of
the many workshops and conferences related to European transport in which I took part
over the course of the last four years, and where I was often not only a passive observer
but also an active participant. Annex II provides a detailed list of the most important
contacts met over the course of the research period, while Annex III provides additional
information on the relevant meetings, conferences, and seminars I attended during that
time.
1.9.3 General Statistical Data
The EU Statistical Office collects up to date information on economic, social and
environmental indicators. OECD statistics are also generally up to date and helpful for
comparative purposes. Quantitative data is used primarily to establish measures for the
“sustainability” of existing transport systems and projections about future developments.
Readily available data includes information on motorization rates, transport-related air
pollution in major urbanized areas, rail and road network density and intensity of use,

38
maintenance and construction costs, national and regional level transport investments by
mode, percentage of transport sector investment by international financial institutions etc.
Since there is no European-wide traffic demand model, most traffic projections,
especially when it comes to Pan-European East-West connections are highly unreliable
and are therefore only discussed within the political context that they are used.

39
Printed on September 21, 2002
Last revised on Sept 15, 2002
PART I: THEORY-BUILDING
Five Discursive Frameworks for a
“Sustainable Europe”

40
Printed on October 31, 2002
Last revised on Sept 15, 2002
CHAPTER 2
Transport, Development and Sustainability:
First Approximations
2.1 Introduction....................................................................................................... 41
2.2 Transport and Economic Development ............................................................ 41
2.2.1 From Henry Ford’s Assembly Lines to VW’s “Transparent Factory” ..... 42
2.2.2 Macroeconomic aspects of transport investments .................................... 46
2.2.3 Reduction of transport cost ....................................................................... 46
2.2.4 Inter-regional trade theory ........................................................................ 47
2.2.5 Production Function studies: “Is public expenditure productive?” .......... 48
2.2.6 Rethinking the theory on transport investments ....................................... 51
2.3 “Sustainable Development”.............................................................................. 57
2.4 “Sustainable Transport”.................................................................................... 66
2.5 Two Ill-Defined Concepts?............................................................................... 72

41
2.1 Introduction
Neither development nor sustainability are easily definable concepts. Various,
internationally sanctioned, normative definitions of sustainable development and of
sustainable transport exist. Most famously among them are the Brundlandt definition of
sustainable development and the Vancouver principles for sustainable transport, both of
which are presented below. However, none of these normative definitions are directly
translatable into concrete infrastructure investment proposals at the local level. More
importantly, even these internationally accepted definitions are contestable, depending on
one’s underlying belief systems and rationales. The aim of this present chapter is simply
to present a series of first approximations regarding the notions of economic development
and sustainability in relation to the transport sector. My initial proposition in
approaching the subject is that the notion of “sustainable transport development” really
remains a relatively ill-defined concept. Later chapters will set this “Ill-Defined
Concept” proposition within a larger context of sustainability and sustainable transport as
contested discourses.
2.2 Transport and Economic Development
Transport has long been considered central to urban and regional development,
and to the concept of economic growth in general. The establishment of trade routes is
an essential prerequisite for the expansion of market ranges. And as settlements grow, an
efficient internal organization of infrastructures is key to facilitating the efficient
movements of people and goods. Distance and density remain the two most fundamental
concepts in spatial development. But today’s cities and regions are vastly different from
the places we used to live in as little as fifty years ago. As the next section shows, the

42
relationship between transport, transport infrastructures and economic development has
been dramatically redefined over the last half century.
2.2.1 From Henry Ford’s Assembly Lines to VW’s “Transparent Factory” 1
Wealth creation as a whole has become an increasingly complex and dematerialized
concept. Successful modern economies are less and less based on heavy
production industries dependent on large-scale flows of material goods and bulk
production. Instead, they rely on complex webs of inter-dependent service sector
industries that are much more dependent on flexible, small batch production and just-intime
delivery. Technological innovations have also vastly expanded the range of
transport options, with traditional land-based modes of transportation such as road and
rail now intensely competing both among themselves and with water and air transport.
Regardless of particular emphases and specialized terminologies, there is
widespread agreement that Western industrial societies now operate under a so-called
post-Fordist mode(l) of development. Since the mid-seventies, production in the
advanced Western societies has switched from mass production/mass consumption to
more flexible, just-in-time delivery of less standardized, more differentiated products.
Volkswagen’s recently opened transparent luxury car manufacture in Dresden, Germany
1 Advertised by Volkswagen (VW) as “the world’s most fascinating automotive assembly plant” and
opened in March 2002 with much national fanfare, the new VW car factory in Dresden, Germany
symbolizes the quintessential post-Fordist (and, in many ways, post-modern) production space. The plant’s
name “Gläserne Manufaktur,” – which VW itself translates as “Transparent Factory,” but which might be
more archaically translated as “Vitreous Manufactory” and whose German name also contains a clear
reference to the world-famous Dresden Porcelain Manufactory (Porzellan-Manufaktur) – is to be taken
quite literally in the sense that its outside walls are entirely made of glass so that all production processes
can be in full view of spectators. The plant is laid out to custom-produce 150 luxury sedans per day. All
workers wear clean, white overalls. For additional information and images of the plant, check out
http://www.glaeserne-manufaktur.de .

43
is probably the most extreme example for this transformation. New organizational
patterns and social structures have become dependent on expanded service economies
and advanced telecommunications. The overarching theme of decision-making under
post-Fordism is clearly flexibility. Theorists researching these so-called post-Fordist
transformations of course continue to argue about the primary causes and effects of the
transformation (see especially the edited volume by Amin 1994). In the mid-1980s to
1990s, scholars variously emphasized deindustrialization (e.g. Bluestone and Harrison
1982), and the rise of service sector economies (e.g. Häußermann and Siebel 1995),
corporate restructuring (e.g. Harrison 1994), new divisions of labor (e.g. Massey 1984;
Harrison 1988; Sayer and Walker 1992), flexible specialization (Piore and Sabel 1984),
the rise of “new industrial spaces” (Scott 1988) as well as the restructuring of local land
and real estate markets (e.g. Harvey 1985; Krätke 1991). (French) regulation school
scholars particular analyze the new organizational form late Capitalism has taken by
tracing different “accumulation regimes” (Aglietta 1979; Lipietz 1986; Boyer 1990),
more recently also focusing on environmental implications of changes in labor relations,
presenting a political ecology perspective (e.g. Lipietz 1997). Lately, the key Post-
Fordism-related catch phrase is the rise of the Network, or Information Economy (see
especially Castells 1989; Castells 1996; Castells 1997; Castells 1998).
Both the post-Fordist transformation in general and the resulting reconceptualization
of time and space in particular are doubtless important concepts with
many additional dimensions relevant to the present study. For example, Amin and
Tomaney (1995:31) in their volume on the “myth” of EU cohesion, characterize the new
emerging [European] economy as a “learning economy” in which the key competitive

44
elements are knowledge control, information, innovation, the capacity to quickly renew
products, as well as “the capacity to reduce the friction of distance and time” through the
use of informatics, advanced telecommunications and transport systems. Moreover, as
Banister and Berechman (1993:11) point out, in the modern economies of Western and
Central Europe, “industry can now locate almost anywhere as it is not dependent on a
single source of raw material inputs.”
Regarding infrastructure development, the shift towards a post-Fordist,
“networked” industrial model has elevated the importance of high-tech services and
technologies over traditional rail-, road- or water-based transport systems. Investment
into the general infrastructure of regions and cities, such as communication, education,
training, and R&D capabilities is often needed more than investments into traditional
transport systems. With the advent of the Information Age, the lines between social and
economic overhead capital are becoming increasingly blurred. Especially in less favored
regions, successful capitalist restructuring is thought to depend more than anything on
“building local institutional capacity” (Amin and Tomaney 1995:218). Within these
institutional settings, post-Fordist scholars stress the importance of territorially bound
linkages, and predict “an increase in the regional embeddedness of firms and, hence,
benefits even for peripheral regions” (Giunta and Martinelli 1995:246). Note that such an
emphasis on the vertical disintegration of firms and the emergence of new spatial
structures is somewhat at odds with the two-way roads argument (see 2.5.4 “Rethinking
the theory on transport investments”). More importantly, if it were true that the new
capitalism was no longer based on economies of scale, it would give smaller, flexible,
interconnected firms in less central locations better opportunities to compete through

45
economies of scope, regarding transport investments. While somewhat doubtful
empirically, such arguments would then call for a focus on intra-regional rather than
inter-regional infrastructures, and for a redirecting of funds from Pan-European, largescale
infrastructures towards locally-targeted, regional infrastructure investments. 2
Concurrent with these observations, Van Geenhuizen and Ratti (1998:84) identify
four basic forces that are reshaping the geopolitical and socioeconomic positions of
European regions: 1) the unification of Europe (which resulted in an increased openness
of regions), 2) the shift to a new local-global network economy, 3) the (related) rapid
progress in information technology, and 4) policies for an environmentally sustainable
growth (however these might be defined). The first three factors in particular lead to an
increased competition between European regions and cities (Cheshire and Gordon 1995).
Of course not everyone has drawn the same conclusions from the new realities unfolding
around us. While everyone seems to agree that investments into physical rail and road
infrastructures will remain crucially important even in the information age, opinions
about investment priorities differ widely. This following section presents a general
overview over theories on the economic aspects of transport investments.
2 Not all scholars agree that flexible specialization is a necessary outcome, however. Capello and Gillespie
(1993), for example, use a Regulation School underpinning to investigate spatial changes in Europe. They
compare “the long-distance, regular, standardized commodity flow demanded by the (late) Fordist
production system” with several future scenarios, notably Piore and Sabel's classic “flexible specialization”
model of industrial organization and a “network firm/global-local” scenario. Interestingly, Capello and
Gillespie (1993:58) raise doubts over “the over-idealistic view that a completely different industrial and
spatial structure can be developed, with completely opposite features from those of Fordism.” They see the
most likely future scenario in their own global-local model, where so-called network firms aim at
“diversified mass production.” They conclude that “[w]ith respect to spatial organization, the outcome … is
far less dramatic than the one suggested by [Piori’s and Sable’s] ‘flexible specialization’ scenario…. [I]t
can be argued that the spatial extent of firms will remain … largely the same.” 2 The most serious drawback
with Regulation school-type Post-Fordist scholars such as Capello and Gillespie, of course, is their often
surprisingly narrow focus on the changing nature and re-organization of firms. Infrastructure decisions are
then seen as simply following the (new or old) logic of capitalism, without much room for agency in the
decision-making process.

46
2.2.2 Macroeconomic aspects of transport investments
Much confusion persists over the growth potentials of infrastructure investments.
The simplistic notion that cities and regions will necessarily grow stronger with increased
trade and interaction does not carefully enough distinguish between different
beneficiaries, i.e. the economic interests of a) existing businesses in a particular city or
region whose production and service costs will be affected by the improvement of
infrastructures, b) consumers/employees inside the region, c) businesses outside the
region who supply the region with products and services and/or receive products, services
or labor from it (or wish to do so in the future) and d) consumers/laborers outside the
region. All too often, economic growth potential is only assessed in terms of the benefits
accrued by local firms, not residents. It is thus worth considering several macroeconomic
dynamics in more detail.
2.2.3 Reduction of transport cost
Traditionally, the reduction of travel costs has been the most important factor by
which economists calculated the economic benefits of road improvements. In theory,
road investments are supposed to lead to an overall lowering of transport costs, most
notably through the reduction of delivery and access times. Improved transport
conditions increase the market range for producers. However, in mature economies such
as Western Europe and the US, this has rarely proven to be a significant factor in
production patterns (SACTRA1999). Even the European Commission now admits that
transport costs represent less than 5 percent of the total production cost of goods and

47
services in Europe (CEC1999b). Button (1993) also stresses the declining importance of
transport costs and estimates that they now account for as little as 2 to 3 percent of total
costs. For the US context, Boarnet (1997) points out that previous studies often
overestimated the macroeconomic effects of road investments by counting in both the
reduced travel costs for producers and the resulting lower consumer prices, hence in
effect double-counting the benefit. Also, since in post-industrial societies products are
increasingly high-value goods resulting transport cost components are relatively low.
This does not mean that transport infrastructures overall are less important. But the
demand for higher quality, faster infrastructure is more important than a quantitative
improvement of infrastructures per se. It should also be noted that the rise of
telecommunication has not necessarily replaced travel with electronic transactions but in
many instances even created new demand for movement. Even in cases where
production costs are lowered due to a fall in transport costs caused by infrastructure
investment, the output effect depends on whether the fall in costs is passed through to
prices and, if it is, on the price elasticity of demand. Thus market elasticities and
competitive conditions in the transport-using sector are critical determinants of the
outcome.
2.2.4 Inter-regional trade theory
In some cases, poor accessibility may actually benefit and protect businesses in
weaker regions. In these cases, better transport connections open local markets to the
increased competition of larger businesses outside the regions that produce a greater
variety of products at lower prices. In other words, the regional monopoly power of

48
existing businesses is reduced.
This is a key component of the ‘wider economic
benefits’ story. In these cases, local consumers benefit, but the region as a whole may be
negatively affected by the local non-competitive businesses who struggle and begin to
fail. The negative employment effects from failing local businesses may outweigh
consumer benefits from lower prices. Opening the region up to intra-regional
competition therefore requires at least some local sectors to be strong enough to survive
the competition. Given the increasing integration of European economies both within
current member states and with Central Eastern European countries, regional isolation is
of course increasingly a non-option for European regions, but regional economists need
to carefully analyze the particular strengths and weaknesses of the region in question
before transport-investment-led economic development strategies can be successfully
employed. Otherwise, investments might exacerbate existing divergence. As P. Martin
(1999:12) notes, “recent models of geographic economics show that regional integration,
by reducing transaction costs between the regions, may lead to self-sustaining
inequality.”
2.2.5 Production Function studies: “Is public expenditure productive?”
In the late eighties, especially in the US, the discussion over transport
infrastructure benefits shifted away from individual project analysis to studies that sought
to assess the larger relationship between total infrastructure stock in a region and its
economic performance. This production function approach was inspired by the larger
debate spawned by Aschauer’s (1988) provocative public capital hypothesis. His core
argument was that public investments created benefits that spilled over to many areas

49
distant from the actual project. These spillover benefits, it was believed, could be
demonstrated by taking a more network-oriented approach, that looks at how a particular
road (or rail) investment changes accessibility dynamics in other parts of the road (or rail)
network. The argument obviously has large political implications. If a general
relationship between infrastructure investment and economic wealth could be plausibly
demonstrated, then an expanded government role in stimulating investment into public
capital was justified. The narrower neo-classical approaches that focus on cost-benefit
analyses at the project level then could be said to underestimate the economic effects of
public investments.
In the specific context of the US, Aschauer, and others after him, argued that the
downturn in economic productivity in the US in the early 1970s could largely be
explained by the overall decrease in (public) infrastructure investment since the mid-
1960s. Consequently, they argued, only a pro-public investment approach would be able
to bring growth rates in the US back up to previous levels. So the supposed positive
relationship between increases in public infrastructure stock and the productivity of
private sector capital was largely asserted through negative deduction. Aschauer’s
conclusions were immediately contradicted by a number of authors, both on empirical
and more ideological grounds. Interestingly, while several authors arrived at similar
results as Aschauer, Ford and Poret (1991) employed a similar methodology but
expanded their study to include longer data over longer time periods and for several
additional OECD countries, and they end up rejecting the public capital hypothesis.
Other authors have attacked Aschauer on methodological grounds. Aschauer’s focus on
total capital stock, i.e. an exclusive focus on quantitative infrastructure measures, versus

50
the qualitative aspects of the infrastructure in question is especially problematic.
Gramlich (1994) presents an important review essay on the debates. Boarnet’s (1997)
more recent review article on highways and economic productivity also discusses
implications for policy reform in the US context. R. Martin (1999:143ff) discusses
several mid-1990s studies that lend support to Aschauer’s hypothesis for the EU context.
In particular, Seitz and Licht (1995) look at the West German Länder during the 1971 and
1988 period, and Mas et al. (1996) look at Spain. However, the specific emphasis in
these studies is on whether public capital has cost-reducing and productivity-enhancing
effects on the private sector. In other words, their interest is only in whether private firms
benefit, not the resident populations. Wherever these studies find evidence for positive
inter-regional spillover effects from network enhancement, they also find that these
effects decline over time.
In the end, Aschauer, while providing an important ideological boost to proinvestment
professionals and politicians, is not very useful in helping decision-makers
with either the location or even the concrete nature of the investments. Boarnet (1997)
noted: “The most reasonable interpretation of the production function literature is that the
US infrastructure stock is well developed, such that further public capital investment will
have little additional economic impact.” Also, when summarizing recent U.S. literature,
Rephann and Isserman (1994) found that when looking at the economic effects of
highway construction, empirical studies have broken down the causal links into three
different dimensions, looking at effect over time, by industry and by region. They also
insist that study periods need to be divided into construction and post-construction stages,

51
as economic multiplier effects of infrastructures are most evident while construction and
engineering firms employ labor and purchase equipment.
In the end, the biggest problem with the Aschauer debate is that by limiting the
discussion to an aggregate analysis of total investment stock, we learn nothing about
whether, for example, road investments are more ‘productive’ than rail investments or
whether investments are more ‘productive’ in core or peripheral regions. Yet these
questions, as we will see in the ensuing chapters, lie at the heart of EU regional
development policy.
2.2.6 Rethinking the theory on transport investments
State-of-the art regional development theory, including most recent research
funded by the EU itself, now offers a much more careful assessment of the economic
benefits of transport investments than it did ten years ago. This is not only due to the
overall rethinking of regional policy, but also relates to an earlier shift in emphasis from
merely large-scale infrastructure investments to high-quality ones. The EU’s recognition
that the greatest economic benefits were likely to result from closing gaps in
infrastructure connections in (centrally located) border regions rather than from a higher
endowment of infrastructure stock in peripheral regions already indicated a significant
shift in thinking away from a merely quantitative approach to a more qualitative one.
Additionally, recent empirical studies emerging from a variety of EU countries,
particularly from those countries that have received large sums of Cohesion Fund aid for
road construction, provide strong counter-evidence against the notion that large-scale
transport infrastructures are a panacea for economic development. Even early on, some

52
European researchers warned that correlations between transport endowment and
regional wealth were more likely to point to a historical relationship due to long-term
agglomeration processes and did not necessarily reflect recent infrastructure investments
(Brocker and Peschel 1988). A London School of Economics study on the socioeconomic
impacts of transport projects financed by the Cohesion Fund found that the
actual impacts varied widely, even for carefully selected infrastructure investments (LSE
1997). Several recent studies, in particular, cast serious doubt on the notion that weaker
regions always benefit from transport investments (see especially Vickerman,
Spiekermann et al. 1999). Even those scholars who continue to believe that transport
investments are a key trigger for economic benefits increasingly admit that these benefits
will not necessarily be reaped by the majority of inhabitants in the disadvantaged
regions. 3
The Italian Mezzogiorno presents a strong example of a lagging region where a
relatively high endowment with transport infrastructure has not as of yet resulted in a
significant rise of local incomes, thereby strengthening the frequent assertion that other
socio-economic factors are more important (also see CEC 1999b). Meanwhile, the
Nordic countries present the opposite case of highly successful regions with high average
incomes and relatively low-density transport infrastructures. In fact, the Nordic countries
are an interesting reminder that transport is a derived demand and that the key
comparison for inter-regional or international comparisons is infrastructure endowment
per capita, rather than per square mile or kilometer, as other studies have implied.
Comparing the Nordic countries to the EU 15 average, it is obvious that the Nordic
countries have significantly less roads and railways per square kilometer, a fact easily
3 Also see the discussions in Chapter 5.

53
explained by the lower population densities (see figure 2.1). However, both passenger
and freight mileages per year are larger in the Nordic countries, owing to the simple fact
that larger distances must be overcome. Interestingly, the so-called peripheral countries
in the North also have higher GDPs per capita than the EU average. (Note that we will
return to these issues in Chapter 6 during our discussion of the EU storylines of
“cohesion.”)
Figure 2.1 The EU and the Nordic Countries Compared
140
120
100
EU 15
Nordic*
80
60
40
* Data
includes
Denmark,
Finland,
Iceland,
Norway,
Sweden
20
0
Population Density
(inh/km2)
Railways (m/km2) Roads (10m/km2) Mileage per
inhabitant
(100km/inh)
Freight Mileage
(100tkm/inh)
GDP
(US$1000/capita)
Data Sources: Nordic Council of Ministers. 1999. "The Northern Dimension and EU
Transport Policy." Stockholm: Nordregio; World Bank Data query (1999 data)

54
In examining the difficult question whether investments in large-scale transport
links bring economic development benefits, both costs and benefits therefore need to be
carefully assessed on a case-by-case basis. Even if an investment comes up positive in
the end, this still only means that from the perspective of the project promoters, the
benefits were greater than the costs. There still might be losses. And depending on the
inclusiveness of the cost-benefit methodologies employed, significant losses may be
externalized. Often economic benefits are reaped at the expense of greater environmental
impacts, such as air pollution, which raise health care expenditures.
Interestingly, the narrowness of cost-benefit approaches has been attacked from a
number of different camps, and often for opposite political reasons. Environmental
externality scholars attack cost-benefit analysis not for the benefits but for the costs that
remain unaccounted for in traditional analyses. In the case of new toll roads, for
example, environmentalists attempting to block investments will point to increasing
traffic congestion and raising pollution on parallel networks due to shifted traffic onto
(toll-free) roads. Meanwhile, investment boosters attempting to leverage additional
highway investments that cannot be justified by narrow project analysis alone will attack
cost-benefit analysis for not counting macro benefits. Rural politicians are still
particularly prone to hold on to the mistaken notion that roads alleviate poverty by
automatically bringing employment and growth. It should also be noted that as long as
the external costs of transport, particularly for freight, remain as highly externalized as in
Europe (see especially Teufel 1989), easier transport access is likely to allow
manufacturers to use production inputs from more and more distant places. The longer
the distances traveled, the larger the environmental impact. The irrationality of using

55
increasingly diverse inputs was underscored by Böge (1995) who demonstrated that if all
product relationships were examined, i.e. if one included all the distances the different
ingredients and packaging materials have to travel in order to deliver the finished
product, one “theoretical” truck of simple 150g strawberry yogurt pots was moved over a
thousand kilometers to supply her study area in Southern Germany. Böge’s analysis also
shatters another often-heard pro-investment argument, namely that large-scale
investments will bring about a more “rational” land use system by reorganizing
production and distribution systems in more efficient ways. This statement typically
triggers a heated debate over what exactly an “optimal” organization of a land use and
transportation system would be – a debate that we can scarcely afford to enter at length
here. However, the following key issues should be kept in mind with respect to regional
transport infrastructure investments:
First, a particular investment might ease congestion costs and hence improve
travel times in the short run. However, by making travel cheaper, the investment is then
also likely to encourage longer journey-making in the medium to long-term, hence
inducing additional travel. And again, additional travel without concrete additional
benefits is increasingly seen as undesirable. Depending on its nature, an investment
might either encourage a greater clustering of activities around certain locations
(agglomeration effects) or encourage a greater dispersal of economic activity (sprawl
effect). The latter is generally considered to be both less efficient from a land-use
perspective and responsible for more externalities. Effects can be contradictory,
however. Another key analytical question is whether the investment triggers an overall
increase of economic activity (win-win situation) or a just re-location of economic

56
activity from one place to another (win-lose situation). The latter case is the essence of
the so-called two-way road argument, which warns that “improved accessibility between
two countries (and similarly, between cities, areas or regions) may sometimes benefit one
of them to the disbenefit of the other.” (SACTRA 1999:2). Finally, there is one last
irresolvable methodological challenge that brings us full circle and goes beyond
challenging the productivity of transport investments to give recognition to the simple
fact that travel itself can be both productive or unproductive, so that, depending on its
nature, either an encouragement or a discouragement of movement is in order. This
dilemma is most succinctly summarized in the comprehensive SACTRA report (1999:2-
3), which is worth quoting at length:
[T]heory suggests that there are a number of important mechanisms by which …
transport improvement could, in principle, improve economic performance. […] In
the search for empirical evidence, we find that direct statistical and case-study
evidence on the size and nature of the effects of transport costs changes is limited.
[…] The state of the art of this important field is poorly developed and the results do
no offer convincing general evidence of the size, nature or direction of local economic
impacts. […] Our studies underline the conclusion that generalisations about the
effects of transport on the economy are subject to strong dependence on specific local
circumstances and conditions.
In sum, the discussion on the economic development effects of transport
infrastructure investments is not likely to be concluded any time soon. Certainly, one’s
answer also has much to do with one’s overall ideological background and/or
professional training in particular disciplines. Neoclassical economists, of course,
provide different answers than old time Keynesians, neo-Marxists or environmentalists.
Note that these more contextual aspects of the discussion will be picked up in more detail
in ensuing chapters.

57
In the end, the fact that dominant notions about the economic development effects
of transport are changing has much to do with the fact that the very notion of
development is changing. Development is increasingly being understood as a concept
that cannot be understood simply in narrow economic terms, but needs to encompass
broader aspects including standards of living and the quality of the natural environment.
In short: instead of economic development, we need to focus on sustainable development.
The ensuing sections therefore present initial definitions of for the concepts of sustainable
development and sustainable transport.
2.3 “Sustainable Development”
The words ‘sustainability,’ ‘sustainable’ and ‘sustainable development’ have
become some of the most (ab)used terms of the last decades. The word sustainable first
appeared around 1727. Its original meaning related mostly to agriculture and forestry,
and can be defined as “of, relating to, or being a method of harvesting or using a resource
so that the resource is not depleted or permanently damaged.” 4
In this sense, it is a term
with deep roots in ecology. 5
Other definitions of sustainable are “something … able to be
continued in its present form” or, more relevant for our context, “a way of using natural
products so that no damage is caused to the environment.” 6
Etymologically, the word
sustain comes from the Old French sustenir and from the Latin sub-, from below, and
tenere, to hold. 7
Its broad etymological base also explains how the term can be used to
mean almost anything:
4 Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, online version http://www.britannica.com
5 Beware of the all-too obvious pun.
6 Cambridge International Dictionary, online version http://dictionary.Cambridge.org
7 The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2000.

58
The earliest meaning of sustain is to “support,” “uphold the course of” or “keep into
being.” What corporate chief, treasury minister, or international civil servant would
not embrace this meaning? Another meaning is “to provide with food and drink, or the
necessities of life.” What underpaid urban worker or landless peasant would not accept
this meaning? Still another definition is “to endure without giving way or yielding.”
What small farmer or entrepreneur does not resist “yielding” to the expansionary
impulses of big capital and the state, and thereby take pride in “enduring”?
(O'Connor 1994:152, as quoted in Pezzoli 1997:549)
Beyond being an increasingly (ab)used, “fuzzy” term (Markusen 1999), the
concept of sustainability is closely related to the evolution of environmental debates and
the environmental movement from the 1960s onward. Whereas the 1960s and the 1970s
were initially only dominated by a growing concern over pollution issues, more profound
critiques of the way in which conventional growth strategies exploited and often
destroyed global environmental resources eventually came to the fore. The most famous
account of the growing uneasiness among scientists is the Club of Rome report The
Limits to Growth (Meadows, Randers et al. 1972). In many ways, the sustainability
concept as it was developed in the 1980s provided an answer to the Club of Rome’s
limits-to-growth argument in that sustainability inherently assumed that continuing
economic growth was compatible with environmental protection. It thus broke the
perception that environmental protection could only be achieved ‘at the expense of
economic development,’ instead re-defining the two as interdependent and mutually
reinforcing (Baker, Kousis et al. 1997:3).
The best-known definition of sustainable development was put forward by the UN
World Commission on Environment and Development in 1987 in the so-called
Brundtland report (whose official title is Our Common Future). This report strongly
influenced the future global environmental agenda, favoring a sustainability definition

59
with a compatibility-oriented approach aiming to reconcile growth and environmental
protection rather than defining the two as being in conflict. The Brundtland Commission
defined sustainable development as “development that meets the needs of the present
without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” This is
now readily accepted by most countries and international institutions as a fundamental
development goal.
Of course, the Brundtland report is not without its critics. Langhelle (1999) has
demonstrated that the assumed relationship between sustainable development and
economic growth contained in “Our Common Future” has been overemphasized and lead
to a “neglection of other vital aspects” of the concept. However, at present it will suffice
to note that the Brundtland report was highly successful in influencing future policy
making in the environmental area and beyond. The two key concepts of the Brundtland
report were needs (especially the basic needs of the world’s poor) and limitations on the
environment’s ability to meet humans’ (present and future) needs. The report
subsequently identified the eradication of poverty in the development and the realignment
of consumption patterns in the developed world as key elements of a global strategy for
sustainability. It also struck a different tone than previous documents such as the IUCN’s
1980 World Conservation Strategy by moving away from an ecology-based approach to a
much more anthropocentric line of argument. The message of Our Common Future “is,
above all, directed towards people, whose well-being is the ultimate goal of all
environment and development policies” (WCED 1987:xiv, quoted in Baker, Kousis et al.
1997:4).

60
The underdevelopment debates of the 1980s were quickly superseded by
environmental debates, and half a decade after Brundtland, the UNCED Earth Summit in
Rio inaugurated environmentalism as “the highest state of developmentalism” (Sachs
1993:3, quoted in Nygren 1998:201). Since the Rio Summit, a whole cluster of UN
conferences, conventions and proceedings have concerned themselves with the subject of
sustainable development and its environmental, social and economic dimensions (see
table 2.1).
Table 2.1. The “Rio Cluster” of UN Summits, Conferences, and Conventions
o World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) – “Rio +10” (Jo’burg, 2002)
o UN Special Session “Istanbul +5” (New York, 2001)
o Earth Summit +5 (New York, 1997)
o Habitat II – “The City Summit” (Istanbul, 1996)
o UN Conference on Trade and Development (Midrand, 1996)
o Fourth World Conference on Women (Beijing, 1995)
o World Summit for Social Development (Copenhagen, 1995)
o Migratory and Straddling Fish Stocks (New York, 1995)
o Conference on Population and Development (Cairo, 1994)
o Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States (Barbados, 1994)
o World Conference on Natural Disaster Reduction (Yokohama, 1994)
o World Conference on Human Rights (Vienna, 1993)
o Earth Summit (Rio de Janeiro, 1992)
o United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Meetings (annually from
1993)
o UN Framework Convention on Climate Change – UNFCCC (New York, 1994),
resulting in the Kyoto Protocol (Kyoto, 1997) and additional Conferences of the
Parties (COPs)
o Misc. International Conventions on Biodiversity, and Desertification
Note: Details about these conferences and conventions including references to related
literature, can be found on the internet at http://www.igc.apc.org/habitat/unproc/index.html,
http://www.earthsummit2002.org/, and http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/.
Source: Pezzoli (1997), own additions

61
Following the UNCED Rio Earth Summit, Agenda 21 became the international
blueprint for sustainability. Energy efficiency, environmental protection, inter- and intragenerational
equity and a long-term horizon emerged as major themes. An increasing
number of international organizations began to subscribe to the concept, with major
players including the United Nations Environment Programme and other UN agencies,
the World Bank, the OECD as well as the European Union. To operationalize the
concept without having one single commonly accepted definition proved difficult for
these international organizations. The OCED, for example, circumvented the definitional
problem by instead defining a series of policy goals forming the OECD’s core
Sustainable Development Strategy. The list of nine goals combines typical sustainability
calls ‘to promote worldwide economic growth,’ or ‘to integrate economic and
environmental policies’ with other developmental agendas such as ‘to control population
growth where it is excessive,’ or ‘to upgrade human and institutional resources’ (quoted
in Gillespie 1998:95). The post-Brundtland phase was thus a time where the term
sustainability was extensively broadened, rephrased and adapted. Both Pezzey (1989)
and Pearce et al. (1989) provide longish lists with different definitions of sustainability
developed in the 1980s, and the inflation of definitions certainly continued throughout the
1990s. In their 1997 volume evaluating the politics of sustainable development within
the European Union, Baker et al. develop a so-called “ladder of sustainable development
in advanced industrial societies” that - among other things - distinguishes between
approaches with anthropocentric versus eccocentric/biocentric philosophical
underpinnings. Meanwhile, McManus (1996) differentiates as many as nine general
approaches to sustainability. However, Lafferty (1995:223-224, mentioned in Baker,

62
Kousis et al. 1997) makes the important point that despite (or rather: because of) its
deficiencies as a consistent analytical or normative concept, sustainable development
remains a highly popular and important political concept.
Recent efforts at the United National Development Program (UNDP) have
focused on definitions that approach the concept of development from the perspective of
quality of life improvements (Qizilbash 2001). In pertaining theoretical works, notions of
ethical universalism and of intergenerational equity are of particular importance (Anand
and Sen 2000), as well as new approaches to the concept of living standards (Sen 1987).
To this end, ever more sophisticated indicators are being developed in order to measure
progress in this arena. Most prominent among them is the Human Development Index
(HDI, see e.g. UNDP 1999). Nevertheless, even many economists are well-aware that
the task at hand is not one of taking stock of any particular natural assets on earth. As the
renowned economist Robert Solow noted in a lecture in 1992:
The duty imposed by sustainability is to bequeath to posterity not any particular thing
– with rare exceptions such as Yosemite, for example,-- but rather to endow them with
whatever it takes to achieve a standard of living at least as good as our own and to
look after their next generation similarly. We are not to consume humanity’s capital,
in the broadest sense.
(Solow 1992:15, quoted in Anand and Sen 1994)
Other indicator programs are much less andocentric than the HDI, instead
focusing on the quality of the environment thus partially reverting to more ecological
interpretations of sustainability. The most relevant indicator program for transport and

63
environment issues in Europe is the TERM program of the European Environment
Agency which is now published annually (EEA 2001). 8
Scientists often differentiate between a weak or minimal definition of
sustainability that guarantees the avoidance of environmental catastrophe and a strong or
maximal version that aims at preserving natural capital that cannot be replaced, thus
leaving future generations the opportunity “to experience a level of environmental
consumption at least equal to that of the present generation” (Jacobs, 1991, quoted in
Kozeltsev 1998:134). Of course, since it was firmly inserted into the environmental
debates in the 1980s, sustainability had already become much overused and turned into “a
big, sloppy term for a big, complex subject” (Prugh, Costanza et al. 2000:2).
At one end of the spectrum, economists have attempted to make the concept fit
into their models and formulas, resulting in definitions that might even sounds humorous
8 TERM stands for Transport and Environment Reporting Mechanism. The TERM process is steered jointly
by the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Energy and Transport, the Directorate-General for
Environment, Eurostat and the European Environment Agency (EEA). Interestingly, the report is in fact
much more than a mere reporting mechanism. Instead, it reflects general attitudes of the EEA with regard
to transport. Consider the following excerpt from its September 11, 2001 press release:
Most of the report’s key indicators signal unfavourable trends or show that there is still a long way to go
to reach policy targets for “greening” transport. The report warns that current trends point away from
achieving the EU’s recently-announced objectives of breaking the link between economic growth and
growth in transport, and of returning the market shares taken by rail, maritime and inland waterway
transport to 1998 levels by 2010. As a shift towards greater use of cars and planes continues, passenger
and freight transport is growing at a faster rate than the economy as a whole, bringing increasing threats
to the environment and human health, it says. For example, growth in energy use and greenhouse gas
emissions from transport is jeopardising the EU’s ability to meet its targets under the Kyoto Protocol on
combating climate change. But there are also some positive trends, mainly due to advances in
technology and fuels that have made new road vehicles less polluting. A significant improvement in
urban air quality has resulted, although in many cities air quality still poses health risks and further
improvement is needed. The energy efficiency of car transport has improved slightly over the past two
decades, although low occupancy rates and the use of heavier and more powerful vehicles have partly
offset fuel efficiency gains in new cars. There has been no increase, however, in the energy efficiency
of freight transport by road and little corresponding change in rail or shipping. Air transport remains the
least energy efficient mode of transport despite technological advances. The report argues that better
integration of environmental considerations into all areas of transport policy-making is required to
achieve progress towards a more environmentally sustainable transport system.

64
to other social scientists. For example, contrast Rasmussen’s (1997:352) entirely
process-oriented sociological interpretation:
Sustainability is a process with a beginning but no end: and in considerable measure it
is a social construct. … It is thus a matter of human imagination and dreaming as well
as concrete technologies, tasks and policies
with the reductionist formula for sustainability that Heal (2000:5) offers
[Some economists] argued that sustainability is captured by a Rawlsian definition of
intertemporal welfare. [And] welfare is maximized by maximizing the welfare of the
least well-off generation. One can write this formally and succinctly as
{ max feasible paths { min generations t { welfare t } }}.
One key message regarding the sustainability concept forcefully voiced even by
economists is the fact that markets to not adequately protect nature and public health.
Thus calls for greater sustainability have typically gone hand in hand with caller for a
greater role of the state in protecting the environment and human health. As Anand and
Sen (1994:2) argue:
the obligation of sustainability cannot be left entirely to the market. The future is not
adequately represented in the market … and there is no reason that ordinary market
behavior will take care of whatever obligation we have to the future. Universalism
demands that the state should serve as a trustee for the interests of future generations.
[Emphasis in the original.]
Nevertheless, many scholars are rather defeatist with regard to the usefulness of
the concept: “To put is crassly, consumers want consumptions sustained. Workers want
jobs sustained. … With the term meaning something different to everyone, the quest for
sustainability is off to a cacophonous start” (Norgaard 1994:11). 9
9 The last two quotes are adapted versions from longer quotes presented in Prugh, Constanza and Daly
2000:4.

65
There are some common threads in all these definitions, however. Despite the
vast spectrum of definitions, almost all relevant definitions conceptualize sustainability as
a concept with three fundamental dimensions that can also be thought of as the three ‘e’s
of sustainability: economy, environment/ecology and equity (i.e. society). This central
and recurring distinction between different sustainability dimensions is commonly found
in the literature (see figure 2.1). In a nutshell, the image implies that there is indeed a
mode of development that can somehow balance the aims of economic growth,
environmental protection and social equity in a benign and mutually beneficial way.
If there is widespread dismay over the inherent vagueness of the concept, perhaps
the best explanation for its success is precisely this ambiguity which enabled its
promoters to integrate a vast array of policies and programs into the sustainability
agenda. In fact, Maarten Hajer (1995), whose discourse analytical approach to
environmental debates is discussed in more detail in later chapters, has long argued that it
is precisely the relative superficiality and ambiguousness of sustainability argument that
has assured the concept such widespread support. Even prior to the Rio Summit, Hajer
characterized the concept of sustainable development as “not only an attempt to provide
solutions to improve the objective state of the environment but also an effort to
accommodate latent social conflict” (Hajer 1991, quoted in Whitelegg 1993:6). This
interpretation rings ever more true today, with the term having suffered extremely
inflationary use in policy papers throughout the world over the last decade.

66
Figure 2.2 The Three Dimensions of Sustainable Development
Environment
Equity
Economy
2.4 “Sustainable Transport”
Given its enormous emissions and its land use requirements, transport quickly
became a major focus for concern within the larger discussions on sustainability. The
environmental and social impact of transport are enormous. Transport is responsible for
about 50 percent of global oil consumption, up to 90 percent of carbon monoxide,
nitrogen oxide and hydrocarbon emissions in heavily trafficked urban areas (World
Resources Institute 1996). Transport emissions are a both major contributor to global
warming and a significant threat to human health. The WHO estimates that in European
cities, 80,000 adult death every year are related to long-term exposure to traffic-related
air pollution (WHO 1999:16). Noise from transport also has significant health impacts.
About 65 percent of Europeans are exposed to noise levels of 55-65 dBLAeq over 24
hours, which have shown to lead to serious annoyance, speech interference, and sleep
disturbance (WHO 1999:17). Globally, over 500,000 people are killed in road accidents

67
every year with vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and cyclists accounting for one
third of deaths (World Bank 1996). 10
Agenda 21 itself contained several specific transport policy suggestions, as did the
1996 UN Habitat Global Plan of Action and numerous European policy documents.
Even under a minimum definition, the dual requirement to minimize environmental
impacts and make the most economic and equitable use of resources has been interpreted
by most transport and land use planners to mean a favoring of higher density, compact
land use-oriented along nodes of public transportation over lower-density uses that
require individual motorization.
Overall, there is a divide between those who believe
that greater transport sustainability can be achieved through technological fixes, e.g.
through greater fuel economy, alternative fuels, better or perhaps smaller engines, and
those who believe that the transport problem needs to be addressed in a more
comprehensive manner, e.g. through modal shifts to non-polluting modes, better land use
planning, traffic management and calming (also see Whitelegg 1994:25).
More generally, definitions for 'sustainable transport' follow a similar pattern as
those for sustainability. As the World Bank (1996:4-5) explains:
Economic and financial sustainability requires that resources be used efficiently and
that assets be maintained properly. Environmental and ecological sustainability
requires that the external effects of transport be taken into account fully when public
or private decisions are made that determine future development. Social sustainability
requires that the benefits of improved transport reach all sections of the community.
(Italics in the original.)
10 Figures are often controversial, both for industrial and developing countries. According to a recent
ECMT press release, over 32,000 people were killed on the roads of Western Europe, and close to 16,000
in Central Eastern Europe in 2000 (ECMT 2001:2). The WHO, however, presents more inclusive figures,
speaking of 2 million traffic accidents in the European Region of WHO (which includes FSU countries)
killing 129999 and injuring 2.5 million (Dora and Racioppi 2001:2 and WHO 1999:16).

68
A recent definition provided by the European Conference of Ministers of
Transport (ECMT 2000:7) 11
also stressed all three dimensions, but emphasized the
welfare aspect at the same time:
The Objective of sustainable development is to maximise welfare, and provide a sound
economic, social and environmental base for both present and future generations. ...
The development of sustainable transport policies implies reconciling environmental,
social and economic objectives and will require further improvement on a wide range
of forms for inland transport. (my emphasis)
Obviously, different stakeholder groups stress different dimensions of
sustainability depending on their own particular bias. For example, the Sustainable
Mobility Project of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development
(WBCSD), 12 which is comprised of an illustrious grouping of major automobile and oil
multinationals, predictably focuses on mobility, rather than transport, and defines
sustainable mobility more as a fundamental human right subject to certain value
limitations or ‘sacrifices’ than as a responsibility requiring urgent human action. In its
voluminous Mobility 2001 report, the group defines sustainable mobility as “the ability to
meet the needs of society to move freely, gain access, communicate, trade, and establish
relationships without sacrificing other essential human or ecological values today or in
the future” (WBCSD 2001:1.2).
A much more skeptical, political economy interpretation of sustainable transport
is presented by Baeten (2000:72):
11 The inside cover of the ECMT publication 'Sustainable Transport Policies' notes that "Ministers from
ECMT's 47 Member and Associate countries endorsed this approach, and this paper as a whole, at their
Council meeting in Prague 2000" (ECMT 2000:4). (All EU member and candidate countries are also full
ECMT Members.) The provided definition itself is a reiteration of definition provided in a OECD Policy
Brief from 1998 (No. 8).

69
Sustainable transport, then, can be defined as an attempt to reconcile, on the one hand,
the economic imperatives of growth, competitiveness and profit seeking which are
imposed upon producers of transport means, and, on the other hand, ecological values
and norms. In other words, sustainable transport aims at tackling the environmental
crisis without touching the economic strongholds of Western Society. (italics added)
Note that Baeten’s transport-specific definition is embedded in very critical
overall assessment of the meaning of Brundtland, which he credits with presenting a
solution for the economy-ecology paradox which essentially lets “mightly economic
monoliths” off the hook. His view of sustainable development is thus that of a deeply
contested concept: “The political and economic world elite eagerly reacted to the
optimistic, reconciling and harmonizing language of sustainable development that swept
aside the underlying contradictions of the environmental policy process” (p.72).
However, as we will see in more detail in later chapters, mainstream assessments
are less pessimistic.
When referring to transport, probably the best-known
comprehensive definitions for sustainability are provided by the Vancouver Principles of
Sustainable Transport. These principles were developed at the OECD Conference
“Towards Sustainable Transportation” in Vancouver in 1996. The problem statement
presented at the OECD conference in Vancouver stands in direct contrast to the WBCSD
approach of focusing on mobility. Transport experts in Vancouver formulated the issue
as follows (OECD 1996a):
Our current transportation system is not on a sustainable path. Our admirable
achievements in terms of mobility have come at some considerable environmental as
well as social and economic cost. The challenge now is to find ways of meeting our
transportation needs that are environmentally sound, socially equitable and
economically viable. Accessibility, not mobility, is the issue.
[Emphasis in the original.]
12 The WBCSD, now a coalition of 150 international companies, spearheaded the business community’s
response to the Rio Earth Summit. Chemical, automobile and oil multinationals such as Dupont, Ford,
General Motors, Royal Dutch Shell, BP and DaimlerChrysler are major supporters of the WBCSD.

70
The Vancouver principles are also more comprehensive than most definitions in
that they move beyond the common - but also problematic (see e.g. Campbell 1996) -
threefold definition of sustainability towards a ninefold definition that not only explicitly
includes important aspects such as access, integrated planning and land and resource use,
but also issues such as community responsibility and public participation, which always
risk of being relegated to being afterthoughts rather than integral parts of the sustainable
development principle. Table 2.1 presents an overview of the Vancouver principles.
Evidently, the EU itself also considers the Vancouver principles to be relevant to
decision-making on transport infrastructure investment in Central Europe. This is
indicated by the following noteworthy detail: When the 8-page Phare Multi-Country
Transport Program Newsletter (edited at DG Transport and Energy and published by the
European Commission) ran an entire edition on the topic “Transport and the
environment” in January 2000, these principles were printed on the back page of the
newsletter in their entirety (i.e. including all definitions).
The Vancouver principles have also provided the basis of additional work on
sustainable transport by the OECD in Europe, and most notably for the recently
completed OECD project on Environmentally Sustainable Transport (EST) which
produced numerous workshop reports, guidelines as well as case studies. Within the EST
project, the OECD produced the following environmental definition for sustainable
transport (OECD 1996b:54):
Transport that does not endanger public health or ecosystems and meets mobility
needs consistent with (a) use of renewable resources at below their rates of
regeneration and (b) use of non-renewable resources at below the rates of development
of renewable substitutes.

71
A pilot study and a special report on environmentally sustainable transport in
Central Eastern Europe are also available (CEI 1999 and OECD 2000a).
Table 2.2 The OECD’s Sustainable Transport Principles
Principle OECD Definition
1. Access People are entitled to reasonable access to other people, places, goods
and services, as well as responsible information that empowers them
towards sustainable transportation
2. Equity Nations, states and the transportation community must strive to ensure
social, interregional and inter-generational equity, meeting the basic
transportation-related needs of all people including women, the poor,
the rural, and the disabled. Developed countries must work together
with developing economies to foster practices of sustainable
transportation
3. Individual All individuals and communities have a responsibility to act as
& Community stewards of the natural environment, undertaking to make sustainable
Responsibility choices with regard to personal movement and consumption
4. Health and
Safety
5. Education
and public
participation
6. Integrated
Planning
7. Land and
resource use
8. Pollution
prevention
Transportation systems should be designed and operated in a way that
protects the health (physical, mental, and social well-being) and safety
of all people, and enhances the quality of life in communities
People and communities need to be fully engaged in the decisionmaking
process about sustainable transportation, and empowered to
participate. In order to do this, it is important that they be given
adequate and appropriate resources and support, including
information, about the issues involved as well as the benefits and costs
of the array of potential alternatives
Transportation decision-makers have a responsibility to pursue more
integrated approaches to planning.
Communities should be designed to encourage sustainable
transportation and enhance access, as a contribution to pro viding
comfortable and congenial environments for living. Transportation
systems must make efficient use of land and other natural resources
while ensuring the preservation of vital habitats and other
requirements for maintaining biodiversity
Transportation needs must be met without generating emissions that
threaten public health, global climate, biological diversity or the
integrity of essential ecological processes.
9. Economic Taxation and economic polices should work for, and not against,
well-being sustainable transportation, which should be seen as contributing to
improvements in economic and community well-being. Market
mechanisms should support fuller cost accounting, reflecting the true
social, economic and environmental costs, both present and future, in
order to ensure users pay an equitable share of costs.
Source: Conference ‘Towards Sustainable Transportation,’ Vancouver, March 1996

72
2.5 Two Ill-Defined Concepts?
We have now seen how controversial theoretical debates on transport investments
are. Overall, there is a continued ambiguity regarding the assumed relationship between
transport investments and economic development (i.e. growth). We have also learned to
question the internal consistency of the concept of sustainable development. The
supposedly harmonious relationship between the “three dimensions of sustainability”
namely economy, environment, and equity, remains the most problematic aspect of the
concept. Most comprehensive definitions of the concept tend to broaden the definition to
include a host of additional aspects, as is the case with the Vancouver definitions. Other
definitions simply over-emphasize one of the three dimensions, typically skewing it in
favor of economic goals.
As we will see in later chapters, there is no single one European Union document
that conclusively defines the term sustainable transport. It even took the European
community ten years after the Rio Summit to finally to come up with an official
Sustainable Development Strategy. Given the difficulty the international community has
had in conclusively defining and operationalizing either of these concepts, this is hardly
surprising. In the end, for any normative definition of an abstract concept such as
sustainability to be acceptable for an institution such as the EU, it would always have to
be tied this institution’s underlying rationales for policy-making. We therefore need to
move away from a normative, definitional approach to the topic of sustainability towards
a more structural one. We need to look at sustainability and sustainable transport as
discourse. Such a discourse-centered approach is the theme of the following chapters.

73
Printed Thursday, October 31, 2002
Last amended on September 15, 2002
CHAPTER 3
Introducing the Notion of Discursive Frameworks
3.1 Introduction: The Notion of a Dominant Discourse ......................................... 74
3.2 From Three Definitions of Sustainability to Five Discursive Frameworks...... 77
3.3 Modernity and Modernization: Some (Meta-)Theoretical Considerations....... 79
3.3.1 A Discourse Analytical Approach to Planning & Policy-Making............ 79
3.3.2 Modernity, Post-Modernity, Anti-Modernity ........................................... 83
3.3.3 Reconceptualizing Planning and Policy-Making? .................................... 86
3.3.4 The Environment As Discourse................................................................ 89
3.3.5 Post-Modernism ? Post-Fordism and pro-modern ? pro-capitalist .......... 91
3.4 The Notion of Discursive Frameworks............................................................. 93
3.4.1 Discursive Frameworks vs. Paradigms..................................................... 93
3.4.2 Discursive Frameworks vs. the “Ladder” of Sustainable Development... 97
3.4.3 The Use of the Term “Frameworks” in the Political Science Literature .. 99
3.4.4 Discursive Frameworks versus Epistemic Communities........................ 101

74
“We are all Greens now” unattributed quote, Hajer 1995:14
3.1 Introduction: The Notion of a Dominant Discourse
Sustainable development is a rhetorical concept that is interpreted differently
depending on the overarching framework people operate in. As we will see in the
following chapters, sustainability definitions used by the European Union tend to favor
interpretations that place economic growth at the center of the agenda. I will show how
this is part of a particular environmental discourse related to the overall framework of
ecological modernization, i.e. a framework that sees growth and environmental protection
as compatible and a positive sum game. The overall aim of the next chapters is to
categorize, question and/or re-interpret different underlying “rationalities” of planning
and policy-making, focusing on the sectoral realm of sustainable transport and the
geographical realm of the European Union.
Chapter 2 confirmed the “Ill-Defined
Concept” Proposition. It demonstrated the inherently vague nature of the terms
sustainability and sustainable transport, and warned us that definitions and statements
with regard to the two concepts are inherently contradictory. This provides us with a
partial explanation of why EU decision-making in the transport sector is not consistent:
there is still no proper definition of what a sustainable transport policy would entail.
However, rejecting the concept of sustainable transport on the grounds that it is simply an
ill-defined and internally contradictory concept does not help us to explain the nature and
direction of the contradictions and inconsistencies in the case of EU transport policy. For
example, how do we explain the fact that so many EU policy documents define modes
such as combined transport, rail, and public transit as “more sustainable” yet ultimately
concentrate EU transport infrastructure investments on highways and high-speed rail? In

75
order to fully explain such systematic biases, one needs to focus not only on the rhetorical
content of official definitions but also on the underlying rationales of EU transport sector
decision-making.
The main proposition for the next three chapters is the “Dominant Discourse”
Proposition. This proposition assumes that the EU employs the concept of sustainable
transport in the context of a discursive framework which favors (short and medium term)
growth and efficiency objectives at the expense of equity and environmental preservation
objectives. More precisely, I argue that EU transport sector decision-making is
dominated by the discursive framework of ecological modernization. I define ecological
modernization as a modernist model of development that is relatively successful in
integrating a variety of environmental and social concerns into its framework, but that
nevertheless privileges competitiveness and economic growth over alternative
development goals.
My ensuing interpretations of decision-making in the European Union heavily
rely on the fundamental insight that decision-making rationalities are always expressed
through discursive processes.
Maarten Hajer (1995:44) has defined the term
(environmental) discourse as “a specific ensemble of ideas, concepts, and categorizations
that are produced, reproduced, and transformed in a particular set of practices and
through which meaning is given to physical and social realities”. 1
This has since become
1 A few pages later, Hajer (1995:60) introduces three further definitions with regard to discourse worth
noting:
We will speak of discourse structuration if the credibility of actors in a given domain requires them to
draw on the ideas, concepts, and categories of a given discourse, for instance, if actors’ credibility
depends on the usage of the terms of ecological modernization in the domain of environmental politics.
We will speak of discourse institutionalization if a given discourse is translated into institutional
arrangements, i.e. if the theoretical concepts of ecological modernization are translated into concrete
politices (i.e. shifting investment in mobility from road to rail) and institutional arrangements. … If

76
a frequently quoted definition, and it is also in this vein that I employ the adjective
discursive here.
Discourses, I argue, are structured in different “discursive frameworks” each of
which emphasizes different overarching themes and each of which has different
analytical foci. I define a discursive framework as a theoretical approach consisting of
an ensemble of underlying rationales and concepts that together form the intellectual
backdrop for a set of policy responses and actions relating to a particular topic. Each
discursive framework I identify is distinguished by its overarching theme, its unit of
analysis, and its framework of action. 2
Table 3.1 provides an overview of the five identified discursive frameworks for
sustainable policy-making. These discursive frameworks will be discussed in more detail
in Chapter 4. The rest of this chapter is devoted to “setting the stage” for this discussion.
I first explain how and why I move away from the previous definitional search related to
the three-dimensional concept of sustainability to a wider, structural analysis of
environmental discourse. I then make a general distinction between three metatheoretical
perspectives on social science research, namely modernity, post-modernity
and anti-modernity, which variously influence the empirical foundations of the five
discursive frameworks. After that, I differentiate the notion of a discursive framework
from the notion of a paradigm, and explain the concept’s relation to the academic
literature on advocacy coalition frameworks and on epistemic communities.
these two conditions are satisfied, a discourse can be said to be hegemonic in a given
domain.[Emphasis added.]
2 If my definition uses the term “discursive framework” as essentially synonymous to “theoretical
approach,” why am I introducing the neologistic term, on might ask? The key reason is that the generic
term “theoretical approach” is variously used at the practical/methodological, theoretical and even at the
meta-theoretical/epistemological levels. As section 3.4 explains, my “discursive frameworks” are meso-

77
Table 3.1 Five Discursive Frameworks for Sustainable Policy-Making
Theoretical
Approach
Overarching
Theme
Unit of
Analysis
Pro-
Modern
?
Pro-
Capitalist?
Key Policy
Relevance
Ecological
Modernization
“Sustainable
Growth”
(Market)
Economy
Yes Yes Proactive,
Competitive
Action
Reflexive
Modernization
“Risk
Rationality”
Society Yes Yes Precautionary
Action
Communicative
Rationality
Rationality
People &
Institutions
Yes Yes /
No
Communicative
Action
Political
Economy
Equity &
Social
Justice
Society &
Space
Yes / No No Re-distributive
Action
Renunciation
Source: Own compilation
Ecological
Balance
Nature Yes / No No Protective
Action
(Eco-centric)
3.2 From Three Definitions of Sustainability to Five Discursive Frameworks
For many advocates of the sustainability concept, my distinction of five different
discursive frameworks – with ecological modernization being the dominant one in EU
policy-making – might seem somewhat counter-intuitive. Conventionally, sustainability
scholars argue that the three-dimensional nature of sustainable development presented in
Chapter 2 (“efficiency” – “environment” – “equity”) can be ascribed to the fact that the
level theoretical constructs located somewhere between Kuhn’s “paradigms” and Sabatier’s “policy theory
frameworks,” and with a much greater affinity towards the former.

78
concept aims to integrate aspects from three fundamentally different development
“paradigms”. Campbell (1996), fortunately avoiding the use of the term paradigm,
speaks of a “planner’s triangle of sustainable development” comprised of the three
fundamental aims of environmental protection, economic development and social equity.
This view is also exemplified by Masser, Sviden and Wegener (1992:35) in the
Geography of Europe’s Future where they identify three main transport development
“paradigms” in Europe which are often in conflict with each other: growth, equity and
environment. They further equate these “paradigms” with conservative, socialdemocratic
and green transport politics, respectively. Note that I consider the use of the
term “paradigm” quite inappropriate in this context (also see section 3.5.1 below).
Nevertheless, in my initial analyses of EU transport policy, I originally also planned to
follow this more conventional three-part distinction. However, the discussion of the
relationship between transport and economic development in Chapter 2 already indicated
that rather than simply viewing the term sustainability as having three main, somehow
complementary “dimensions” of growth, environment and equity, we have to instead
consider several additional factors in the equation. For example, we have to somehow
account for the fact that the very nature of capitalist development is undergoing profound
changes. We also have to consider more process- and institutionally-oriented arguments
related to “sustainable” decision making (transparency, participation). We have to also
take into account that many scholars increasingly reject the concept of sustainable
development. Finally, additional concerns related to the changing nature of rational
decision-making in the context of globalization, multi-level governance and multilocation
politics also need to be considered. This chapter therefore takes a fundamentally

79
different approach, moving away from narrow three-part definitions of sustainability and
sustainable transport. Instead of seeking to further define the concept of sustainability,
and considering how EU policies measure up against this definition, I seek to describe
and analyze the larger discursive framework in which EU definitions of sustainable
transport are being formulated and advanced as policy. In a sense, I take the very
existence of the tern “sustainable transport” as indicative of a larger phenomenon, namely
the rise of environmental concerns in modern societies. We thus enter a much broader
debate over different approaches to the environment and to development more generally.
3.3 Modernity and Modernization: Some (Meta-)Theoretical Considerations
3.3.1 A Discourse Analytical Approach to Planning & Policy-Making
How can we restore the concept of rationality in light of post-empiricist/postmodern
challenges? Such questions can hardly be avoided when taking a discursive
approach. Many regard it as the core challenge for planning and policy-making in the
21 st century (also see chapter 3). Rather befittingly, Frank Fischer and John Forester
opened their 1993 volume on The Argumentative Turn in Policy Analysis and Planning
with the following question: “What if our language does not simply mirror or picture the
world but instead profoundly shapes our view of it in the first place?” One possible
response is that we need to pay closer attention to rhetoric, albeit without forgetting
reality (i.e. power relationships).
Fuelled by the publication of Maarten Hajer’s (1995) well-argued and wellreceived
book The Politics of Environmental Discourse, there has been a rapidly evolving
literature on environmental discourses in planning and public policy. Its interdisciplinary

80
influence is reflected in several recent articles in scientific journals relating to
environmental studies, planning, geography, and even anthropology (Campbell 1996;
Nygren 1998; Fischer and Hajer 1999; Lumley 1999; Ruzza 2000; Harper 2001). There
is now also an emerging literature on sustainability discourses in the specific area of
transport policy. 3
More generally, in the wake of Foucault and other post-positivist
critics, scholars of all disciplines have found it necessary to focus much more closely on
the various discourses that both researchers and practitioners employ. Struggles over
transport-infrastructure decision-making particularly clearly illustrate the use of different
discourses and their consequences (see e.g. Flyvbjerg 1998; Sager 1999; Langmyhr 2000)
Hajer (1995:43) warns that “discourse analysis has come to mean many different
things in as many different places.” The Oxford English Dictionary (OED, 2 nd Edition,
1989) defines the now prevailing sense of the word “discourse” as “a spoken or written
treatment of a subject, in which it is handled or discussed at length.” The OED further
defines “discourse analysis” as a special combined word pertaining to “a method of
analyzing the structure of texts or utterances longer than one sentence, taking into
account both their linguistic content and their socio-linguistic context” or to “[an]
analysis performed using this method.” 4
This is perhaps the most minimal definition of
discourse analysis. As we will see in later chapters, both more text-oriented analyses
searching for linguistic content (Chapter 5) and more thematic analyses searching for
3 Although the authors of these scattered articles have not yet entered into a full-fledged debate with each
other, this is foreseeable for the future. The journal European Planning Studies has been especially
prominent in advancing the debate by publishing four key articles on the topic over the course of the year
2000 alone (Sager 1999; Baeten 2000; Langmyhr 2000; Richardson and Jensen 2000). Other recent
contributions have been provided by Willson (2001), Langmyhr (2001), and Vigar (2000; Vigar 2001).
When analyzing automobility, rather than sustainability, Beckmann (2001a) even posits the emergence of a
new "sociology of transport and mobility." See Chapter 4 for additional details on these authors.
4

82
“discourse coalitions” and “storylines”, while immensely attractive as an analytical
method, is sometimes too lenient in its assumptions about initial stakeholder preferences.
In my view, personal agency and deliberate agenda-setting by particular actors tend to
disappear from view when structural discourses are over-emphasized. Consequently, the
following chapters represent an attempt to “rescue” discourse theoretical approaches for
theorists like myself who are extremely wary of overstating the social constructivist case.
At this point, it is also necessary to emphasize a fundamental difference between
at least two different camps of “discursively-minded” researchers in the field of planning
and policy analysis. On one hand, there are researchers who, like myself, are interested in
employing discourse-centered strategies to better understand the rationality of urban,
regional, transport planning and/or environmental policy. In this case, discourse analysis
is mostly seen as a means to an end. Closer attention to language is seen as a helpful
device for revealing underlying rationales for decision-making and power relationships
(see especially Hajer 1995; Richardson 1996; Flyvbjerg 1998; Baeten 2000). Note that
for me, this means learning from Foucault and rejecting the excesses of instrumental
rationality, but it does not necessarily mean adopting a full-blown poststructuralist
position which questions rationality as such. In particular, it should not mean reneging
on an overall political economy perspective which is predominantly concerned with
issues of equity, redistribution and social justice.
However, contrary to such more Foucault-oriented scholars, there is one other
main strand of discourse theory. This second group of scholars relies heavily on the work
of Jürgen Habermas. To them, the question of how discursive interaction is organized
becomes itself the key question that determines what is “good” versus “bad” planning

83
and policy-making. For these Habermasian adherents to the communicative rationality
approach, the focus on discourse and rhetoric is itself the centerpiece of a new approach
to planning and policy-making, and even to the social sciences more generally (for the
realm of transport planning, see especially Sager 1999; Langmyhr 2000; Willson 2001).
Here, discourse theory is no longer a means to an end. Rather, discourse and
communicative rationality provide the solution to environmental and social equity
struggles that we have been struggling with of late. Greater communicative rationality is
assumed to result in greater equity and social justice and better environments. In sum, we
have an entire theoretical approach that is strongly process-oriented at its core. We will
come back to this important point during our detailed discussion of the different
discursive frameworks in Chapter 4. For now, suffice to note that for communicative
rationality scholars, Habermasian ideal speech situations usually seem more important
than either Foucauldian discourses or Flyvbjergian power-rationalities. I, however,
ultimately tend to stress the latter.
3.3.2 Modernity, Post-Modernity, Anti-Modernity
Above, I defined the EU’s dominant discursive framework of ecological
modernization as a “modernist” model of development. Modernity and modernism are
rather contested notions these days, and this categorization therefore deserves some
additional explanation, also with regard to the other discursive frameworks I develop.
Overall, one can differentiate between three different meta-theoretical
perspectives on social science: pro-modern, post-modern and anti-modern views.
Generally speaking, the rise of greater environmental awareness is frequently seen in

84
conjunction with the decline of the modern(ist) research framework, or Modernity as a
whole. At the origin of the “Modern Age of Reason” lies the development of the
“scientific method” which eventually replaced the scholastic method of reasoning. 7
More
recently, scholars from a variety of disciplines, usually grouped under the generalizing
labels of postmodernism and/or post-structuralism have rung in a new post-positivist era
of (social) science, rejecting what some of them derogatively call Promethean visions of
human progress and domination of nature. Instead, these scholars strive for an improved,
social constuctivist understanding of Human Nature in the widest sense. Postmodern
meta-theoretical approaches aim at countering essentialist, biological, overly normative,
materialistic and universalizing understandings of human progress, and they label
research approaches which they perceive as being guilty of this as “modernist.” Many
postmodernists question the very notion of progress itself. Postmodern perspectives
distinguish themselves by their explicit rejection of positivism 8 and of “grand theories”
claiming to generate “singular, objective truths” about society and/or the environment.
7 The “scientific method” is best described as a multi-step procedure consisting of 1) observation, 2)
hypothesis-building, 3) hypothesis-testing through experiments and/or further observations, 4) hypothesismodification
in light of obtained results, 5) repetition of steps 2-4 in order to eliminate discrepancies
between hypothesis and observation. When consistency is obtained, a hypothesis may be considered a
“theory.”
8 Set off by Nicolas Copernicus’, Johannes Kepler’s and Galileo Galilei’s challenges to Ptolemian
astronomy, the so-called “Scientific Revolution” of the Modern Age culminated in René Descartes’
mechanical philosophy (and his Discourse on Method) and Isaac Newton’s creation of classical physics in
the 17 th century. Yet it was not until the 19 th century that the early social scientist August Comte – who
coined the term “sociology”! - developed his theory of positivism. According to positivist philosophy, the
scientific method is the only source of knowledge. Comte explicitly rejected religion, traditional
philosophy and any science that could not be reduced to direct observation. Moreover, Comte’s “Law of
Human Progress” paralleled the evolution of the individual mind to the perceived evolution of human
intellectual history, which – via progression through the theological and the metaphysical stages -
culminated in the so-called “positive state” as the highest state of intellectual progress.

85
Pointing to the ultimate contingency of all research settings, postmodernists emphasize
heterogeneity, difference, and the multiplicity of viewpoints. 9
In addition to this, there are a variety of scholars and practitioners adhering to a
critical perspective which I would argue is more appropriately described as anti-modern
than post-modern. Many of these writings are strongly environmentalist. Antimodernists
would agree with postmodernists that the various “pro-modern” or
“modernist” frameworks should be rejected, albeit for very different reasons. Where
postmodernism emphasizes multiplicity for the sake of multiplicity, anti-modernism
instead celebrates multiplicity only in the context of the ultimate one-ness of the universe.
I see the crucial distinction between postmodern and anti-modern views in the perceived
relationship between society and nature. This is a critical, but unfortunately often
overlooked difference which goes a long way towards explaining recurring dissonances
in environmentalist debates over sustainability. Post-modernists believe that the very
concept of Nature is itself socially constructed, and as such they are mostly unable to
develop normative concepts of sustainability. Anti-modernists, by contrast, typically
have a rather fundamentalist view of Nature. From an anti-modernist perspective, the
crucial failing of Modernism is the attempted “domination” of Nature, or, put more
plainly, modern societies’ ecological insensitivity and lack of environmental
consciousness. To anti-modernists, Nature is the tangible dimension of a larger world
that has both material and spiritual aspects to it, and as such Nature is intrinsically worthy
of protection. Sustainability and environmental protection thus become normatively
definable and justifiable concepts.
9 However, many social scientists thusly accused by postmodernists as being “modern”, “modernist,” or –
even worse – as “positivist” would themselves reject these labels, or at least their negative connotations.

86
An understanding of these different meta-theoretical differences is important since
only three of the five identified discursive frameworks, namely ecological modernization,
reflexive modernization, and communicative rationality can be said to operate as
modern(ist) frameworks in the sense that they do not reject the Enlightenment project and
the Rational model. The Ecological Modernization framework is the most unabashedly
modernist framework of the five. Within the Reflexive Modernization framework, Ulrich
Beck predicts the rise of new “counter-modernities” but nevertheless assumes that these
will arise as a result of a break within modernity, rather than as an indication of its end.
Meanwhile, Communicative Rationality approaches base their discursive framework on
Jürgen Habermas’ Enlightenment-inspired ideas of communicative action and ideal
speech situations (see especially Habermas 1984). By contrast, the Political Economy
framework unites an amalgam of various pro-modern, post-modern and even anti-modern
views all aimed at formulating a broad range of arguments for greater social and
environmental justice in decision-making. Last but not least, the renunciation framework
features strongly nature-focused approaches such as Deep Ecology, radical
environmentalism or Gaia, which could be categorized as anti-modern.
3.3.3 Reconceptualizing Planning and Policy-Making?
To date, the modernity – post-modernity debate continues to rage in the planning
and public policy literature at full speed (see e.g. Brand 1999; Fainstein 2000;
Allmendinger 2001; Allmendinger 2002a), with some even proclaiming a “postpostmodernist”
perspective (Turner 1996; Alexander 2000). Although planning as a
discipline was once deemed to be a bastion of instrumental rationalism and positivism,
Also see the note on Sabatier’s Advocacy Coalition Frameworks later in this chapter.

87
Allmendinger (2002b:77), in a recent review article on typologies of planning, now notes
the existence of a “post-positivist domination of planning theory in recent years …
[whose] impact through various guises including collaborative, postmodern and neopragmatic
approaches has been significant.”
Post-modern meta-theoretical arguments are at the same time immensely
important and greatly problematic for anyone attempting to re-conceptualize planning
and policy-making processes at the beginning of the 21 st century. The practical relevance
of post-modern theories for planning and policy-making is primarily in challenging their
technocratic and elitist traits. On a theoretical level, Foucauldian discourse theory is now
increasingly being posited as an alternative to Habermasian communicative rationality in
planning theory debates, thus indicating the growing influence of postmodern discourses
in the discipline (Richardson 1996).
On one hand, post-modern approaches are certainly correct to sharply criticize the
negative social and environmental consequences of industry-led modernization. It was
particularly the inability of the modern state and its multi-layered institutions to
adequately respond to global environmental challenges that prompted post-modernist and
anti-modernist scholars to reject the Enlightenment project and Modernity. On the other
hand, by calling an end to all aspects of Modernity, and, most importantly, by denying
the possibility of some form of “enlightened rationality” (however redefined), it seems
that post-modernists are often throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Although
rightfully criticizing instrumental rationality, many postmodernist analyses leave us with
few alternative visions as to how restore faith in the possibility of benevolent, futureoriented,
“rational” decision-making. This presents an immense dilemma for planners

88
and policy-makers who are dependent on such visions to guide their actions. Planners
and policy-makers have been particularly vulnerable to post-modern attacks since the
goal- and progress-oriented nature of their professions traditionally put them in the promodern
camp. Planners and policy-makers, according to postmodernist critics, are guilty
of having produced “totalizing discourses” that disregarded the dialectical relationship
between man and nature and the contradictory nature of capitalist development.
This is of course a vastly oversimplified critique. Put more appropriately, the
planning and policy-making professions have always been deeply rooted in what Gleeson
(2000) termed “the radical political-ethical vision of the Enlightenment.” It does not
follow, however, that planning and policy-making necessarily therefore need to be
modernist activities oblivious to contradictions and flaws in Western patterns of thought.
Particularly with regard to aesthetic values and urban design, planning has often been
anti-modernist. 10
Without wishing to enter into a lengthy debate over these contested
notions, I therefore should state that for the purposes of this study, I consider the
postmodern allegations against the modernist, rationalist foundations of planning and
policy-making only partially relevant and, more importantly, partially incorrect. The
Enlightenment tradition might be guilty of privileging certain (Western) patterns of
thought over others, but in the end, it was thanks to Enlightenment followers such as
Hegel and Marx that we were able to overcome the boundaries of Cartesian rationality
(built into classical physics). That is: it was precisely the Enlightenment thinkers who
posited dialectics and dialectical argumentation as an alternative to previous, ontological
systems of thought and therefore opened the path to new forms of knowledge, resulting in
10 This is witnessed by various communitarian traditions in planning as well as most recently by the New
Urbanism movement in the United States, which is almost antithetical to modernist architectural theory.

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everything but one-sided interpretations of the world. In this larger context, present
(planning theory) debates over whether the thusly labeled “postmodern” Foucauldian
discourse analysis is preferable to “modern” Habermasian communicative rationality
approaches appear of secondary interest, especially since the two seemingly adversarial
theoretical camps are ultimately joined in their aim to empower disadvantaged interests.
Speaking on a more pragmatic level, recognizing sustainability as a contingent,
discursive, rather than normative concept, and understanding material realities as being
socially constructed, does not resolve existential, philosophical debates over power and
rationality. Neither can we afford to shortcut related political discussions over how to
conceive of a just – and justly-governed – society by simply reverting to a celebration of
multiple viewpoints. Given that my own visions of sustainable planning and policymaking
remain guided by the central challenge of achieving a just, responsible, equitable
(re-) distribution of power and material resources, I still see myself as mostly working in
the political economy tradition.
3.3.4 The Environment As Discourse
In the social sciences, “the environment,” “ecology” and “nature” have recently
been identified as new “global narratives” that fundamentally transform contemporary
policy-making. Many scholars go even further in postulating that a new “master
narrative of the environment” has replaced the former “master narrative of
enlightenment” (Lyotard 1984). And significantly, this new “ecology masterframe” has
transformed the nature of political debate, not only in the more narrow field of
environmental policy-making, but of all political discourse (Eder 1996). Resource

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scarcity, environmental risk and pollution are major themes in such environmental
conflicts. Interpreted anthropologically as a discourse that is intrinsically trans-cultural,
environmentalism also has been looked at as a positive form of globalization (e.g. Milton
1995). The internationalization and institutionalization of environmentalist arguments
into most relevant political and social spheres can also be viewed as a major success of
global activism, fuelled by both governmental and non-governmental actors. The
international arena of environmental protection now has its own dynamic, developed
thanks to such diverse factors such as global policy-learning, a proliferation of nongovernmental
actors, increased coverage of environmental issues in the global media, an
overall tendency towards policy convergence as well as a periodic appearance of socalled
leading-edge countries (Vorreiterländer) (Jänicke and Weidner 1997). 11
It is
noticeable that, while the potential of environmentalist narratives in forging grassroots
coalitions and in bringing together and empowering non-governmental activists from a
wide variety of ethnic and political backgrounds has been widely documented (e.g.
Lipshutz 1996), the same discourses are now increasingly employed by scientific,
governmental and corporate bodies. These institutions are sometimes accused of coopting
the grassroots interests that were more genuinely working to protect the natural
environment (Harper 2001). Harré et al. (1999:vii) coined the catch-all term
“Greenspeak” to signify “all the ways in which issues of the environment are presented.”
They posit it as a new environmental “lingua franca,” and suggest that the globalized
media industry played a pivotal role in formulating a new environmental discourse that is
new in both its universality and its quality. Harré et al also assume a “globalization of
11 Despite their positive assessment, however, Jänicke and Weidner nevertheless acknowledge the
continued difficulties of translating the developed environmental potential into action. A mere consensus

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green consciousness” as the result of this universalizing discourse (p.20). At other times,
however, they are quick to point out that Greenspeak does ultimately not represent one
unified voice, but rather “new worldwide cluster of dialects.”
In summarizing recent literature on the topic, one can note a tension between two
types of environmental discourse analysis. On one hand, there are very linguisticallyoriented
scholars who are strong believers in the social constructivist research framework
and who employ environmental discourse analysis because they believe that all social
action can only be understood discursively (e.g. Harré, Brockmeier et al. 1999). On the
other hand, there are more orthodox Foucauldian scholars who remain careful to still
relate the discerned discourses back to social and political power relations (e.g. Darier
1999). The former sort of analysis is most frustrating for planners and policy-makers in
that it has the greatest difficulty in moving from critique to recommendation. The
concluding paragraphs of such studies typically call for “greater rationality,” or “clearer
argumentation,” forgetting that the art of persuasion in planning and policy-making does
not necessarily imply that the most rational argument is necessarily the most attractive to
decision-makers. 12
3.3.5 Post-Modernism ? Post-Fordism and pro-modern ? pro-capitalist
The overview in table 3.1 not only distinguishes the various discursive
frameworks with regard to their relationship to modernity, but also with regard to
capitalism. We have already noted in the previous chapter that during the last three
on technical standards, rather than visionary environmental policy-making is often the result.
12 Rydin (2000) makes similar points in her excellent book review on the two cited works. Especially in this
last point, there is a strong affinity between studies of environmental policy-making written in discourse

92
decades, the very nature of capitalist development has changed dramatically, deeply
affecting all sectors of society, including transportation. Scholars within all of the five
discursive frameworks discussed differ significantly both in the degree to which they see
current changes as problematic and to which they reject capitalist systems more
generally. Practically everyone acknowledges that current regimes of production and
consumption are undergoing profound changes. Some even conflate the rise of post-
Fordist flexible modes of production and consumption with the rise of post-modern
cultural forms emphasizing multiplicity and discontinuity (see especially Harvey 1989).
I need to stress, however, that one need not be a postmodernist in order to analyze and
anticipate the rise of post-Fordists, post-capitalist and/or post-industrial societies. Many
scholars grouped below under the ecological modernization label would reject
postmodernist ideas – both at the (meta)-theoretical and at the design level – yet
emphasize the growing importance of flexible, networking systems over linear,
hierarchical structures. Meanwhile, many Marxist-influenced approaches, grouped here
under the general heading of political economy approaches, can be said to be Post-
Fordists in the sense that they critically analyze late Capitalism and its post-Fordist traits.
Yet most Marxists reject post-modern interpretations of socio-economic change. Despite
their explicit rejection of the capitalist development model, Marxist-oriented scholars
typically remain epistemologically pro-modern in the sense that they continue to believe
in some version of historical materialism, subsequently finding that the postmodern
“reduction of everything to fluxes and flows, and the consequent emphasis upon the
transitoriness of all forms and positions has its limits” (Harvey 1996:7). There are, of
analytical tradition and many studies of urban and regional policy-making written in the communicative
planning theory tradition.

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course, also scholars propagating a “postmodern Marxism” (see e.g. Gibson-Graham,
Resnick et al. 2001) as well as many other political-economy scholars which consciously
root themselves within the postmodern tradition. This explains why the columns “promodern”
and “pro-capitalist” in Table 3.1 are not congruent with each other, and why
some of the fields contain yes/no categorizations.
3.4 The Notion of Discursive Frameworks
3.4.1 Discursive Frameworks vs. Paradigms
Most researchers use the term “paradigm” whenever they wish to connote a
fundamental shift or difference in the way that research and/or policy-making is being
framed. The term was first popularized by Thomas Kuhn in his famous book The
Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1970). 13 In common usage, the term “paradigm” is
now frequently understood to mean “worldview”. Consider the following uses of the
term among many researchers writing on sustainable (transport) development and
environmental policy (all emphases are mine):
The 1987 Brundtland Report “Our Common Future” can be seen as one of the
paradigm statements of ecological modernization.
(Hajer 1995:26)
There seems to be widespread agreement that environmental policy has undergone
substantial changes in the past 10-15 years … Two ‘paradigms’, in particular, have
been used to describe these changes: ecological modernization and sustainable
development. (Langhelle 2000:303)
One of the major efforts of planning theory has been to attempt to define what
planning is, through the development of paradigms of planning thought. However, we
have yet to see a universally accepted paradigm.
(Richardson 1996:10)
13 The first edition of the book was published in 1962, but the 1970 edition is more useful since it contains
an illuminating 1969 post-script from the author in response to theoretical discussions since the original
publication.

94
In a market-oriented paradigm, we may expect that the central values are likely to
follow the needs of the market.
(Dabinett and Richardson 1999:233)
In transport planning the synoptic paradigm still represents a barrier towards
acknowledging the importance of rhetoric.
(Langmyhr 2000:684)
Communicative rationality offers a new paradigm for transportation planning.
(Willson 2001:1)
Goodwin et al. (1991) suggest that the [UK] road traffic forecasts of 1989 could be the
key factor, ‘the watershed’, in bringing about a change in attitudes and approaches to
transport planning. … They can be seen retrospectively as the central factor in
facilitating a policy, or indeed a paradigm shift.
(Vigar 2000:22)
The first and theoretical part of [the Ph.D. thesis] draws a detailed picture of
automobility as a modern mobility paradigm.
(Beckmann 2001a:1)
This list of quotes could easily be extended indefinitely. We will come back to
most of the above statements later in the chapter. The last authors in particular imply that
paradigm shifts are mainly related to changing attitudes of researchers and/or policymakers.
This is not entirely incorrect but highly misleading. The key distinguishing
feature of a paradigm is that it provides a new meta-theory, i.e. a larger explanatory
framework that serves to explain many sub-theories. Most scholars today, however,
employ the term only at the level of middle-range theorizing and theory-building. To
boot, the diagnosed changes are often rather incremental, non-revolutionary, and
sometimes largely amount to wishful thinking on the part of the diagnosing scholars as
far as actual practice is concerned. 14
Note that for a meta-theory to become a new
paradigm, as defined in the Kuhnian sense, it also has to be accepted by a community of

95
practitioners and a majority of practitioners subsequently needs to develop a pertaining
body of what they regard as successful practice. Kuhn’s phenomenological evolutionary
scheme described the history of natural science as a progression of periods of so-called
normal science broken by periods of radical and revolutionary change leading to new
paradigms. Science is understood here as a process of searching for fundamental
principles governing cause and effect in the universe, and scientific knowledge is thought
to be attainable via use of scientific methods such as hypothesis building, repeatable
experiments and observation. Yet most researchers ignore that Kuhn’s analysis really
only pertained to the history of the natural sciences, and that the notion of paradigm
cannot so easily transferred to the social sciences. As Muller (1998:287) summarizes:
Disciplines in the natural sciences have illustrated the validity of his paradigmatic
principles by applying those principles to their fields of activity. The rigorous
application of Kuhn’s formulation of in social science disciplines is, however, a
different proposition. The intrinsic attributes of the human sciences are not congruent
with those in the natural science domain, nor – by logical inference – with those of the
paradigm.
Bent Flyvbjerg (2001) equally argues that the case is fundamentally different for
the social sciences. In his recently translated book Making Social Science Matter he
comes to the following conclusion:
The social sciences do not evolve via scientific revolutions, as Kuhn says is the case
for the natural sciences. Rather, as pointed out by Hubert Dreyfus, social sciences go
though periods where various constellations of power and waves of intellectual
fashion dominate, and where a change from one period to another, which on the
surface may resemble a paradigm shift, actually consists of the researchers within a
given area abandoning a “dying” wave for a growing one…. Not paradigm shifts but
rather style changes are what characterize social science: it is not a case of evolution,
but more of fashion.
(Flyvbjerg 2001:30) 15
14 This is particularly true for the case of “communicative rationality” in transport planning. Also see
below.
15 Note that Flyvbjerg is of course employing a very Foucauldian critique here. He even continues the
above paragraph with a quote from Foucault: “Foucault poses the questions of whether it is reasonable at

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While Flyvbjerg’s claim that social science is ruled by different waves of
“fashion” seems a bit overstated, his polemic statement nevertheless underscores the
urgent need to develop a term distinct from the notion of “paradigm” to connote
fundamental differences in the way that social scientists and professionals intellectually
frame, conceptualize and apply their work. These described differences can, but need
not, be directly linked to meta-theoretical, epistemological discussions about
postmodernist challenges and the (im)possibility of conducting doing valid, objective,
true social science research. In either case, it seems preferable to avoid the use of the
term paradigm. Taylor (1999), in an essay that analyzes intellectual changes in Anglo-
American town planning developments from 1945 onwards, also comes to the conclusion
that even the important shift from “modernist” to so-called “postmodernist” planning
theory is “a significant development but no paradigm shift”. I find Taylor’s (1999:329)
argumentation convincing:
Of course, we are not compelled to adopt the strong, fundamentalist conception of
paradigms … It is possible to use the concept in a weaker, more generous sense to
describe shifts of thought which are significant, but not necessarily fundamental to
people’s world view or conceptual scheme. …. However, … we need to be alert to the
dangers of over-using the concept. If every twist and turn in planning thought over the
past fifty years is described as another paradigm shift, the very notion of ‘paradigm
shift’ becomes superfluous. I therefore favor the use of the term in its ‘purer’, more
strict (and more restricted) sense.
According to Muller, Taylor, and, most recently and most emphatically,
Flyvbjerg, it is therefore incorrect to speak of a “paradigmatic shift” every time social
science theory and/or their resulting policy approaches undergo significant change. I
all to use the label “science” for this kind of activity. Even the expression ‘body of knowledge’ is too
pretentious for Foucault: ‘let us say, to be more neutral still … body of discourse.’” (The quote is taken

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strongly agree with these authors that no matter how dramatic these changes may seem,
they are not paradigmatic in the strict Kuhnian sense. 16
And in the end, the described
differences in the belief systems are not so much successive as parallel phenomena, and
they are altogether less meta-theoretical and epistemological than socio-political in
nature. This is why I revert to the term “discursive framework” and define it in the above
described manner. Note that this neologism also accounts for the fact that it is not only
the ensemble of theories embodied in a framework that matters, but also the particular
way in which these are organized as a body of discourse.
3.4.2 Discursive Frameworks vs. the “Ladder” of Sustainable Development
Probably one of the best known and most widely distributed contributions to the
topic of sustainable development in the EU is the edited volume The Politics of
Sustainable Development – Theory, policy and practice within the European Union.” In
the introductory chapter to this volume, Baker at al (1997:8) propose the following:
The diversity of policy options associated with the different meanings attributed to
sustainable development can best be seen in terms of a Ladder. … This enshrines a
number of alternative frameworks for putting sustainable development into practice:
the treadmill approach; weak sustainable development; strong sustainable
development; and the Ideal Model. … The variety of approaches to sustainable
development are an indication of differing ideological beliefs about the natural world,
which for simplicity can be divided into the ‘anthropocentric’ and ‘ecocentric’
positions.
from Foucault’s The Order of Things (1970), whose original French title is Les Mots et les choses. Une
archéologie des sciences humaines (1966)).
16 However, Mastermann (1970)) points out that even Kuhn himself uses the term “paradigms” in at least
20 different ways. Taylor (1999:342) also refers us to Kuhn’s postscript to his original essay to point out
differences in Kuhn’s use of the term. Nevertheless, although some of Kuhn’s uses are indeed less
fundamental than others, all of them are still narrower uses than those now common in the social science
literature.

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The book then proceeds to present a table detailing a four-step “Ladder of
Sustainable Development in advanced industrial societies” that ranges from an entirely
pro-growth, business-as-usual “treadmill” approach to a an entirely eco-centric/biocentric
“ideal model”. So why, one might ask, did I renege on the convenient option of simply
using this pre-existing typology for my study? The reason is simple: I ultimately found
the “Ladder” typology to be insufficient for explaining the various policy preferences of
key EU stakeholders. In particular, Baker et al’s “Ladder” strongly parallels positive,
progressive attitudes towards matters that are not strictly environmental (local selfsufficiency,
democratization, participation, redistribution) with positive attitudes for
“stronger” environmental sustainability. In my view, their “Ladder” thereby somewhat
too cleverly conflates the key dimensions of “ecology and “equity”, and thus in turn
downplays the persistence of rather divergent views on society, nature, and the
relationship between the two. Not every grass-roots citizen organization is automatically
interested in protecting the environment.
In the end, the key differences between the two typologies are as follows: My
mainstream discursive framework of “ecological modernization” more or less occupies
the ladder range between “weak” and “strong” sustainability, which, as Baker et al note,
focus on end-or-pipe to clean technologies, are based on a market-reliant to somewhat
regulated economy, and which favor certain changes in patterns of production and
consumption, to name but a few elements. My “renunciation” framework is roughly
congruent with the environmental elements of the “Ideal Model” in the “Ladder.” Yet
my three other discursive frameworks, i.e. “reflexive modernization,” “communicative
rationality,” and “political economy,” have no counterpart in the “Ladder” typology.

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Instead, Baker et al. subsumes these perspectives under the various non-ecology-oriented
elements of the “strong” or the “ideal” sustainability model. Meanwhile, Baker et al.’s
“treadmill” approach at the anthropocentric end of the “Ladder” does not appear in my
typology at all, since I find that an approach which propagates “exponential growth,”
“resource exploitation,” and no policy or institutional change at all, should be more
appropriately be characterized as non-sustainability and thus be categorized as standing
outside any sustainability typology.
3.4.3 The Use of the Term “Frameworks” in the Political Science Literature
My decision to coin and define the term “discursive framework” to describe
policy-relevant differences in socio-political belief systems among scholars and decisionmakers
also has the unfortunate disadvantage that the term “framework” has been
extensively used, and often re-defined, in the political science literature that focuses on
the analysis of policy-processes. Rein and Schön, for example, define the term framing
as a way of selecting, organizing, and interpreting of a complex reality to provide
guideposts for knowing, analyzing, persuading and acting, so that a frame provides a
perspective from which to make sense and act upon an amorphous, ill-defined
problematic situation (see especially Rein and Schön 1994:263; for an article about a
radical “reframing” of transport policy see Dudley and Richardson 1998). Fortunately,
this does not necessarily challenge my use of the term framework. Moreover, Andrew
Moravcsik’s (1999:19) decision to call his intergovernmentalist approach “a rationalist
framework of intergovernmentalist cooperation” is also clearly delineated and thus
should thus not lead to any confusion. He himself clarifies that he employs “the term

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framework (as opposed to theory or model) … to designate a set of assumptions that
permit us to disaggregate a phenomenon we seek to explain.”
More problematic, however, is the fact that Sabatier (1988; 1998), the volume
edited by Sabatier (1999) and many scholars in the relevant literature all heavily rely on
the term “frameworks” to categorize different policy theory approaches. In light of my
own definition of the term, this must be regarded as an unfortunate linguistic
circumstance, since my own definition is neither explicitly built on an elaboration or
adaptation of Sabatier’s concept of advocacy coalitions, nor does it depend on any of the
other six select policy theory frameworks recognized by Sabatier as “legitimate” tools for
the “scientific” analysis of policy processes. Sabatier’s major contribution to policy
analysis consists of a systematic search for concepts of policy learning in the context of
what he calls “advocacy coalitions.” Advocacy coalitions can be comprised of a mélange
of interest groups, administrative agencies, analysts, researchers, journalists and other
stakeholders with an interest in the policy sector (Sabatier 1988:138). Yet while the
advocacy coalition framework is doubtless a very useful, actor-oriented model that helps
to explain both consistencies and discontinuities in the policy process, it is not a
framework – let alone a discursive one – in the interdisciplinary, discipline-transcending
sense that I employ the term in this study. Rather, it represents but one of several
analytical frames within the particular discipline of political science/public policy. 17 In
Sabatier’s case, “frameworks” represent methodologies that are consciously applied by
17 It should also be noted that Sabatier’s neo-positivist, anti-constructivist and U.S. centric bias by now has
been widely discussed in the literature (see especially Dudley, Parsons et al. 2000). Far from denying the
importance of his contribution to the field of public policy, I agree that Sabatier’s overall perspective
remains quite limited. Alternative, less rationalist approaches to policy analysis are simply dismissed, not
refuted. To put it in Wayne Parsons unvarnished terms: “To ignore the kinds of idea [sic] associated with
what has become known as the ‘argumentative turn’ (Fischer and Forester 1993) in policy analysis, for
instance, is just plain silly.” See page 129 of Wayne Parsons’ individual contribution in Dudley (2000).

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policy analysts to built scientific knowledge on policy processes. In my case, discursive
“frameworks” are to be understood as categorizations that explain fundamental,
structural differences in people’s approaches to policy-making and planning.
3.4.4 Discursive Frameworks versus Epistemic Communities
There is yet another EU-focused strand of the political science literature whose
relationship to my theoretical approach needs to be clarified. My argument that EU
decision-making is dominated by the “discursive framework of ecological
modernization” could seem to imply to some scholars that there is a simply dominant
intellectual community of policy- and decision-makers in Brussels who operate both from
within and outside the European Commission and who share common beliefs and
worldviews. 18
In considering recent political science writings by Haas (1992) as well as
other U.S. (Miller and Fox 2001) and European-based writers (e.g. Radaelli 1999; Toke
1999; Dunlop 2000; Zito 2001), one could therefore be tempted to argue that
Commission employees, EU policy advisers, environmental advocates and lobbyists,
together with scientists from various disciplines, simply form part of different “epistemic
communities,” where the dominant community shares the discursive framework of
ecological modernization, and others adhere to other discursive frameworks. Haas’
18 Note that the frequent distinction between “academics” and “practitioners” is particularly blurry in the
context of the European Commission and the stakeholders surrounding EU decision-making. Commission
employees are highly trained staff coming from all over Europe, usually holding at least one Masters
degree from a major European or U.S. university, and very frequently holding a doctorate as well. Almost
all of them therefore have been socialized within academia, most of them in legal and economic disciplines.
Commission staff are further engaged in an ongoing dialogue with the academic community. The majority
of senior-level employees continues to publish in academic journals and presents papers at international
conferences, and many of them hold academic positions before, during or after their time of employment at
the Commission.

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(1992:3) comprehensive definition of the concept of epistemic communities, presented in
the 1992 special issue of International Organization, is worth quoting in full here:
An epistemic community is a network of professionals with recognized expertise and
competence in a particular domain and an authoritative claim to policy-relevant
knowledge within that domain or issue-area. Although an epistemic community may
consist of professionals from a variety of disciplines and backgrounds, they have (1) a
shared set of normative and principled beliefs, which provide a value-based rationale
for the social action of community members; (2) shared causal beliefs, which are
derived from their analysis of practices leading or contributing to a central set of
problems in their domain and which then serve as the basis for elucidating the
multiple linkages between possible policy actions and desired outcomes; (3) shared
notions of validity – that is, intersubjective, internally defined criteria for weighing
and validating knowledge in the domain of their expertise; and (4) a common policy
enterprise – that is, a set of common practices associated with a set of problems to
which their professional competence is directed, presumably out of the conviction that
human welfare will be enhanced as a consequences.
In developing the notion of discursive frameworks, however, I am in fact taking a
very different, almost opposite approach from Haas and his colleagues. Contrary to
political scientists who focus on tracing the influence of these so-called “epistemic
communities”, my framework analysis focuses on the structural rationales underlying
material decisions. Later chapters of my study then identify particular stakeholders (such
as the European Round Table of Industrialists) who have influenced Commission
thinking on infrastructure issues, yet these have done so not so much – as is expected
from epistemic communities – through consensual means or impeccable rational
argumentation but rather through concrete political and material forms of influence. I
also argue that it is precisely the lack of a consistent policy approach which defines
Community policy-making in the area of transport. For example, the Directorate General
for Transport and Energy is most certainly home to somewhat different norms, causal

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beliefs, notions of validity and policy practices that the Directorate General for
Environment, and both of them are in turn different from the Enlargement Directorate. 19
In the end, the concept of epistemic communities remains inchoate and lacks
rigorous empirical testing, most likely due to the methodological challenge of
operationalizing it, i.e. of identifying, and gaining access to those suspected to be
members of an epistemic community (Dunlop 2000). Also, the concept itself was
developed in the context of a strand of political science (neo-functionalism) that tends to
be overly idealistic about the possibilities of swaying European policy-makers away from
short-term interest calculation by means of developing benign “knowledge” and
“ideas.” 20 Haas’ conceptualization has further been accused of being overly positivistic,
particularly in his portrayal of epistemic communities as being superior stakeholders to
social movements due to their shared belief systems and knowledge bases (Toke 1999).
The most debated, ultimately unresolved, question in the literature remains the relation of
epistemic communities to other policy actors.
Together, this explains why my subsequent analysis of EU decision-making does
not make any further reference to the (rapidly growing) literature on epistemic
19 In response, defendants of the “epistemic communities” approach could still argue that it is then possible
to identify several different communities housed under the common roof of the Commission of the
European Communities. This is a possible but increasingly far-fetched argument, especially since even the
pertaining literature typically sees epistemic communities as acting mostly from outside the Commission
(for a contrasting account, see Drake and Nicolaidis 1992; e.g. Peterson and Bomberg 1999; Radaelli
1999). It is interesting to note that based on such an interpretation of multiple epistemic communities
influencing EU policy-making, Zito (2001) shows how an epistemic community gathered around the (ecomodernist)
principle of “critical loads” influenced EU policy on acid rain. Zito also introduces a simpler
definition of an epistemic community as “a network of professionals sharing a common worldview” (p.
588).
20 Neofunctionalism is the most influential of the “classical” theories of European integration. Developed
initially by Ernst Haas and others in the 1950s and 1960s, early account particularly focused on the selfreinforcing
tendencies of integration, often emphasizing the importance of a technocratic consensus (see
e.g. Haas 1958; Haas 1968; Pentland 1973 esp Ch 4). For a recent textbook article see Cram (1996), for a
critique see Moravcsik (1998, especially 13ff).

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communities and related concepts. 21
In my view, the major failing of the epistemic
communities literature is that epistemic communities are envisioned to be rational actors
limiting themselves to persuasion and foregoing other means of influence. As Zito
(2001:588) has it: “The epistemic community should persuade EU actors to conform to
its consensual (i.e. intersubjectively constructed) ideas without recourse to more material
form of power.” By contrast, my case study of EU transport decision-making finds
power and material practices to be much more influential than rational arguments in
many instances. Put somewhat differently: My argument is based on the insight that
ideas are shaped by power, and that “power defines reality” (Flyvbjerg 1998).
21 A more realist concept that is also used by neo-functionalists is “entrepreneurship.” An entrepreneur is
defined as “an actor or organization that advocates a policy and invests resources in promoting a position in
return for some benefit” (Kingdon 1984, as quoted in Zito 2001:586). Consequently, entrepreneurship
scholars are concerned with agenda-setting, support building, and deal brokering. According to the neofunctionalist
strand of this literature, the Commission itself is an entrepreneur who has influenced and
actively advanced European Integration (Sandholz and Zysman 1989; Cram 1997).

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Printed Thursday, October 31, 2002
CHAPTER 4
Ecological Modernization & Its Alternatives:
Five Discursive Frameworks for Sustainable
EU Transport Policy Making
.
4.1 Introduction..................................................................................................... 106
4.2 Ecological Modernization: The Dominant Discursive Framework ................ 109
4.2.1 Introducing the Framework..................................................................... 109
4.2.2 Ecological Modernization and Sustainable Development ...................... 114
4.2.3 Ecological Modernization as a Framework for EU Transport Policy..... 117
4.3 Reflexive Modernization ................................................................................ 123
4.3.1 Introducing the Framework..................................................................... 123
4.3.2 Reflexive (Auto)mobility as a Framework for EU Transport Policy ..... 130
4.4 Communicative Rationality ............................................................................ 136
4.4.1 Introducing the Framework..................................................................... 136
4.4.2 Communicative Rationality as a Framework for EU Transport Policy.. 141
4.5 Political Economy........................................................................................... 146
4.5.1 Introducing the Framework..................................................................... 146
4.5.2 Political Economy as a Framework for EU Transport Policy................. 149
4.6 Renunciation ................................................................................................... 159
4.6.1 Introducing the Framework..................................................................... 159
4.6.2 Renunciation as a Framework for EU Transport Policy......................... 166
4.7 Addendum: The “Institutionalist” Focus on EU Space and Governance ....... 170
4.8 Concluding Remarks....................................................................................... 173

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4.1 Introduction
In the previous chapter, I defined a “discursive framework” as a theoretical
approach consisting of an ensemble of underlying rationales and concepts that together
form the intellectual backdrop for a set of policy responses and actions relating to a
particular topic. Table 3.1 already provided an overview of the five identified discursive
frameworks for sustainable policy-making, summarizing their overarching themes, their
main unit of analysis and their main relevance for policy action. In this chapter, I
elaborate on these five identified discursive frameworks and show how they are relevant
for transport planning and policy-making in Europe. The explicit aim here is to not only
elaborate on the dominant discursive framework of the European Union (and particularly
of its Commission), namely ecological modernization, but to instead also make an effort
to better contextualize this framework by clearly delineating it from complementary and
alternative discursive frameworks which also make important contributions to the
ongoing interdisciplinary debates on sustainability and sustainable development, both at
the academic and at the professional level. Put in very simple terms, much of the
disagreement between EU Commission staff at the Transport Directorate and sustainable
transport advocacy NGOs over investment preferences, for example, can be explained by
the fact that the two stakeholder groups operate within two fundamentally different
discursive frameworks. One emphasizes growth, while the other stresses environmental
sustainability and equity.
While my typology of discursive frameworks is unlikely to present exhaustive
coverage of the full range and diversity of writings on the subject of sustainable
(transport) planning and policy-making, it nevertheless aims to categorize major trends

107
and capture the most important strands of argumentation. Needless to say, the following
categorizations are ideal-typical distinctions, and most researchers, policy-makers and
activists do not necessarily fit neatly into one of the categories. The environmental
movement, for example, is particularly torn between different strategies, with an
increasing tendency to adhere to more mainstream (i.e. ecological or reflexive
modernization) strategies in recent years (cf. Mol 2000, also see discussions below).
Each section in this chapter begins with a general description of the approach,
followed by an analysis of its more transport-specific elements drawing mainly from
academic literature and, where appropriate, selectively from NGO policy statements. I
also identify the key adherents to each approach. Chapter 5 will then review the most
important EU policy statements in the area of sustainable development and transport in
order to show the EU’s overall bias towards the discursive framework of ecological
modernization.

108
Table 4.1 Five Discursive Frameworks for Transport Planning and Policy-Making
Theoretical
Approach
Key concepts
Typical Transport
Policy Proposals
Key Proponents
Ecological
Modernization
Competition
Comparative
Advantage
Efficiency
High-Technology
Expand Networks
Favor High Speed transport
Low Emission Vehicles
Polluter Pays
Managed Growth
EU & International
Organizations
Governments
Business/Industry
Mainstream NGOS
Reflexive
Modernization
Risk
Unintended
consequences
Expert Systems
Democracy
Precautionary principle
(account for future impacts)
Individuals “self-monitor”
mobility (e.g. car sharing)
Pricing Policies
Transport
Sociologists
Some practitioners
Some environmental
NGOs
Communicative
Rationality
Argumentation
Legitimacy
Discourse & Rhetoric
Rationality
No preference on proposals,
focus on “rational” process
& more participation in
transport decision-making
Equal access to information
Mostly Academic
(Planning theorists)
Some practitioners
Political
Economy
Redistribution
Power Struggle
Who benefits?
Core vs. Periphery
Subsidize public transport
Make services affordable
Charge Luxury taxes
Socialist Politicians
Civic NGOs
Environmental
Justice NGOs
Renunciation
Ecology
Externalities
Habitats
Carrying Capacities
Non-motorized transport
Less long distance travel
Less land use consumption
Decrease overall mobility
Deep Ecologists
Some Green
Politicians
Conservationist
NGOs
Source: Own compilation

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4.2 Ecological Modernization: The Dominant Discursive Framework 1
To the extent that sustainable development has come to have meaning, it has …
primarily served as a vehicle for a form of ‘eco-managerialism’. In its most
sophisticated form it has facilitated elements of what has been called ‘ecological
modernization.’
Frank Fischer and Maarten Hajer (1999:3)
4.2.1 Introducing the Framework
It is to the analysis of the concept of ecological modernization and its relationship
with concept of sustainable development that we now turn. 2
The overarching theme of
the discursive framework of ecological modernization is “sustainable” growth, the key
unit of analysis is the (market) economy and the related policy suggestions are those of
pro-active, competitive action.
Speaking simplistically, the concept of “ecological modernization” is really no
more than an “efficiency-oriented approach to the environment” (Hajer 1995:101). Some
see in it no more than a “neo-liberal environmentalism that is friendly to capitalist
development” (Harper 2001:101). In my view, this is an overly simplistic, and partially
1 In this study, I purposely do not distinguish between a “standard” modernization and an ecological
modernization perspective. No serious scholar today would deny that environmental concerns are relevant
and important for any kind of decision-making. So in my (as well as Hajer’s and other scholars’) view,
ecological modernization rhetoric now is the standard development rhetoric (at least in Europe) to the point
where it only makes sense to identify different levels of environmental commitment within the dominant
perspective of ecological modernization. David Harvey (1996:373-383), by contrast, still (rather
artificially) differentiates between a “standard view of environmental management” and ecological
modernization. Yet even he himself is forced to admit that in this attempt to portray the general
characteristics of ecological modernization, he is “exaggerating both its coherence and its difference from
the standard view” (p.380).
2 Eco-managerialism can be seen as a sub-concept of ecological modernization and it is therefore not
specifically discussed in this study. Broadly defined, it focuses on the management of natural resources,
risks and recreation (also see Luke 1999).

110
incorrect view. Another, more useful definition of ecological modernization, at the same
time relating it to the concept of sustainability, is provided by David Harvey (1996:377): 3
Ecological modernization depends upon and promotes a belief that economic activity
systematically produces environmental harm … and that society should therefore
adopt a proactive stance with respect to environmental regulation and ecological
controls. Prevention is regarded as preferable to cure. … The key word in this
formulation is “sustainability.” And even though there are multiple definitions of
what this might mean … the concept nevertheless lies at the heart of the politics of
ecological modernization.
It is useful to distinguish between an analytical and a prescriptive dimension of
the term ecological modernization (Murphy 2000). By now, ecological modernization is
both an academic theory and a political program. This is easily explained by the history
of the concept, which Murphy aptly summarizes as follows (p.1):
During the 1980s and early 1990s ecological modernisation was discussed and
developed by a relatively small group of environmental social scientists, particularly
within politics and sociology. From here, interest spread to other disciplines, such as
geography, whilst the sphere of influence expanded away from Germany to the
Netherlands, the UK and the USA. The growth of academic interest in ecological
modernization is such that it is now becoming part of mainstream debate in the
environmental social sciences.
Note, however, that this chapter is not limited to a discussion of the function of
ecological modernization as an academic theory or its function as a political program.
Instead, my interpretation of the concept is more inspired by Maarten Hajer’s work.
Hajer was mostly interested in ecological modernization as a particular environmental
discourse that came to the fore in the 1980s. More precisely, Hajer has defined ecological
3 Note that David Harvey’s understanding of the concept of ecological modernization was very much
shaped and influenced by Maarten Hajer. Chapter 13 “The Environment of Justice” in Harvey’s 1996 book
Justice, Nature and the Geography of Difference is the same as his chapters in the edited volumes The
Urbanization of Injustice by Andy Merrifield and Erik Swyngedouw (1997) and Living with Nature by
Frank Fisher and Maarten Hajer (1999). In the Merrifield and Swyngedouw volume Harvey adds the
following enlightening acknowledgement at the end of his chapter, missing in both the JNGD chapter and
the Fisher and Hajer volume:
Much of this chapter could not have been written without the stimulus of supervising Maarten Hajer’s
doctoral dissertation work in Oxford. That dissertation is now published under the title: The Politics of
Environmental Discourse: Ecological Modernization and the Policy Process.

111
modernization as “the discourse that recognizes the structural character of the
environmental problematique but none the less assumes that existing political, economic,
and social institutions can internalize the care for the environment” (Hajer 1995:25). It is
thus defined as an approach that does not necessarily challenge status quo (power)
arrangements in society and politics. It is therefore very appealing to policy-makers.
The term ecological modernization was originally developed in the early 1980s in
Germany by two political scientists, Joseph Huber and Martin Jänicke. They used the
original German term ökologische Modernisierung to connote a more preventive,
foresighted type of environmental policy that relied heavily on the precautionary
principle (Vorsorgeprinzip) and had a long-term perspective. This is to be seen in
contrast to the more end-of-pipe approaches of earlier periods that relied mostly on
pollution control. Its core message is fundamentally optimistic, implying that better
environmental protection ultimately improves economic efficiency in the long run.
Within the framework of ecological modernization, growth and environmental protection
are no longer antithetical, but complementary. Efficiency and ecology are almost treated
as synonymous. In the words of Martin Jänicke (1988:23): “The strategy of ecological
modernization aims at the same time for the improvement of ecological and economic
efficiency.” Huber introduced the term “super-industrialization” to connote the idea that
“the dirty and ugly industrial caterpillar will transform into an ecological butterfly”
(Huber 1985:20 as quoted in Mol 1995:37). This frequently quoted sentence (see e.g.
Murphy 2000:2; and Cohen 2001:3) has been become a central metaphor of ecological
modernization.

112
Although often misinterpreted as a free market ideology, from its beginnings the
concept was also based on a political vision relying on active government intervention
within a social market economy, as well as on state subsidies for research and
development (see Murphy 2000:1). It therefore also has been called “a kind of green
Keynesianism” (Boehmer-Christiansen 1994, quoted in Massa and Andersen 2000b:339).
Not surprisingly, social democratic and green politicians across Europe are often strong
proponents of the approach.
Ecological modernization relies heavily on business and industry to develop
cleaner and integrated technologies that are more resource efficient and less polluting. 4
The European Union initiatives such as the Auto-Oil and Clean Air For Europe (CAFE)
programs or the Automotive Fuel Quality Directive (98/70) are prime examples of this
approach. Industrial development is seen as possibly in harmony with ecological
development. Not surprisingly, Joseph Huber, one of the founders of the concept, has
now become an active proponent of the somewhat newer term industrial ecology. 5
Employing biologically imbued rhetoric, Huber (2000:269) hereby basically attempts to
give the core concept of the original term of ecological modernization a new name:
Industrial ecology aims at an industrial metabolism that is consistent with nature’s
metabolism. The transformation of traditional industrial structures, which are often
environmentally unadapted [sic] to an ecologically modernized consistent industrial
4 The various billion Euro, multi-year EU research programs are a perfect testimony to the idea that
sustainability research should receive government support. Also note that the proponents of the famous
Factor 4 or Factor 10 approaches or of other eco-efficiency and eco-intelligence approaches typically
associated with Green Party politics also tend to self-describe their suggestions as “ecological
modernization.” However, several eco-efficiency scholars such as Erich von Weizsäcker or Wolfgang
Sachs also clearly reject current growth-oriented strategies and related expansionary infrastructure schemes,
and thus partially belong in the renunciation framework.
5 Industrial ecology, like its predecessor ecological modernization, is now quickly becoming not only a new
academic catchword, but also a new academic discipline. See, for example, the new home page of the
International Society for Industrial Ecology (ISIE) hosted at the Yale School of Forestry and
Environmental Studies (http://www.yale.edu/is4ie/). The Society held its inaugural meeting in Leiden, The
Netherlands, in November 2001. I interpret industrial ecology here as yet another a sub-concept of
ecological modernization.

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metabolism, implies major or basic technological innovations, as being different from
incremental efficiency increasing change.
Part of the reason that its original promoters presently apparently attempt to
rescue the concept for themselves by means of the use of a new term is that the term
“ecological modernization” has since undergone constant refinement and reinterpretation.
Most importantly, although it would be incorrect to speak of an ecological
modernization theory per se (also see Buttel 2000), the overall concept of ecological
modernization has nevertheless become the dominant discourse in mainstream
environmental policy-making. Researchers have differentiated between “weak” and
“strong” versions of the concept (Christoff 1996).
Nevertheless, most view it as a
coherent view and attach high hopes to it. Massa and Andersen (2000a) even quote
Giddens (1998:57-58) as remarking that “there is no doubt that ecological modernisation
links social, democratic and ecological concerns more closely than once seemed
possible.” 6
Taking a more historical approach, Hajer (1995:94-96) provides four main
reasons for the rise of ecological modernization in the 1980s: 1) the economic recession
of the late 1970s where environmental issues began to lose out against concerns over
inflation and mass unemployment, 2) changes within the environmental movement
including professionalization and a restructuring among NGO elites, 3) the emergence of
environmental problems such as acid rain or the greenhouse effect, which he interprets as
6 Albert Weale (1992), however, maintains that it is an incoherent and ultimately ill-formulated ideology
that often has to operate in rather different contexts. In his study, he compares British and German
approaches to acid rain, finding that only in the German case did there develop a synthesis between
adherents of the ‘clean air’ and the ‘economic feasibility’ coalitions. Maarten Hajer’s later study on The
Politics of Environmental Discourse also focuses on the issue of acid rain, this time comparing acid rain
campaigning in Britain and the Netherlands.

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being ‘less politically illuminating’ than nuclear power issues, and 4) the fact that an
alternative, solution-oriented discourse was available.
Finally, there is some disagreement in the literature over whether or not
ecological modernization constitutes a new era within modernity or not. As interpreted in
this study, it is decidedly not a radical concept, but precisely the one that allows for a
continuation of current consumption and production schemes within capitalist
democracies. That is, it is seen in contrast to a radical ecological or otherwise
revolutionary concept aiming at a fundamental restructuring of present economic and
political conditions. This is more in line with the interpretations of Hajer, Dryzek (see
below) and others. 7
4.2.2 Ecological Modernization and Sustainable Development
At this point, it is also necessary to briefly clarify the relationship between the
concepts of “ecological modernization” and “sustainable development”. Several scholars
posit ecological modernization as an alternative to sustainable development, thus
7 However, this is somewhat at odds with the interpretation that Mol and Spaargaren (1993) provide. Mol
and Spaargaren distinguish two aspects of the concept, namely ecological modernization as a theory and as
a political program (also see Seippel 2000:290). In its latter dimension, ecological modernization is seen
as part of a three-part historical process in which environmentalism moves from a “counter-ideology” or
“detraditionalization” towards “ecological modernization”, which is then to be succeeded by reflexive
modernization. In linking perspectives on environmentalism with the concept of reflexive modernity, a
concept most prominently developed by Ulrich Beck and Anthony Giddens, Mol and Spaargaren assert the
existence of a distinctive change within modernity. It should be noted, however, that this interpretation is to
be seen as distinct from Giddens’ argument regarding reflexive modernity. Giddens interprets reflexivity as
an inherent characteristic of modernity throughout its history, and not as an only recently acquired
additional quality (Giddens 1990). Also see below. To Mol and Spaargaren, the fact that ecological
modernization is becoming institutionalized within the economic sphere is a key factor. In a later attempt
to clarify the central elements of ecological modernization (not so much as a theory but as an historically
distinct, political program), Mol (1995) proposes several, ultimately rather circular criteria: On one hand,
changing roles are assigned to the nation-state, to market actors (both businesses and consumers), to
science and technology, and to environmental NGOs. (The latter also change their overall ideologies).
Finally, this is supposedly complemented by the emergence of a new environmental discourse (which
brings us right back to the need to identify the elements of said new discourse).

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defining it as one of two theories for environmental policy-making in industrialized
countries (Langhelle 2000). Their distinction is that while both theories ultimately
assume that there is a postive-sum game between the environment and the economy,
ecological modernization is supposedly more explicit about the assumed
complementarity of the two. However, in such interpretations, ecological modernization,
like sustainable development, remains a political and ideological concept and is not
viewed as a distinct discursive framework (Berger, Flynn et al. 2001). As noted above, in
this study, ecological modernization is identified as the key theoretical framework that,
consciously or unconsciously depending on who uses it, has guided European
environmental policy-making since the late 1980s.
In this sense, sustainable
development is a frequently used discursive concept used within the framework of
ecological modernization, but it does not constitute an alternative framework in and of
itself. In fact, the key point I want to make is that various sustainability discourses are
being used within all of the discursive frameworks, but that the term “sustainable
development” has ultimately been most successfully appropriated and re-interpreted by
the mainstream proponents of ecological modernization. This distinction becomes more
confused when researchers such as Mol and Spaargaren insist that ecological
modernization itself is as much a distinct political program as it is a theoretical
framework. 8
Whenever it comes to political rhetoric, it is still almost always the concept
of “sustainable development,” and not the more awkward-sounding term “ecological
8 Ecological modernization does, however, have political implications. We can certainly identify distinct, or
typical, policies and political programs that are the result of an adherence to the ecological modernization
framework. This different from claiming that ecological modernization itself is mainly a political program.

116
modernization” that is invoked by decision-makers. 9
Few non-academics outside of
Europe have even heard of ecological modernization as a distinct concept, whereas most
high-school graduates will recognize the term “sustainable development” and even have a
vague idea that it is “somehow related to environmental policy.”
Since many researchers conflate or contrast the two terms in ways quite different
from mine, their contributions deserve a quick analysis. In 2000, Langhelle wrote a
longish article aimed at clarifying the relationship between ecological modernization and
sustainable development. He makes a valuable contribution when he initially compares
the two concepts and finds, most importantly, that “sustainable development is not only
about the environment” and that the WCED and the Brundtland report were “first and
foremost an attempt to reconcile the tension between developmental and environmental
concerns at the global level” (p.308). To him, ecological modernization, on the other
hand, “has no established relationship either to the global environmental problems or to
social justice” and “relates primarily to the experiences of western industrialized
societies.” 10
It is thus an “OECD-centric” concept. Langhelle, borrowing from Jänicke
(1997), also finds that “sustainable development seems to imply a larger degree of
structural change.”
Meanwhile, Dryzek (1997:143) understands “ecological modernization” and
“sustainable development” as two different “sustainability discourses” and finds the key
difference between the two is the frame of reference: He points out that ecological
9 Ecological Modernization as a term for a political program, however, has gained more prominence among
West European governments lately, and translations of the term are now actively used in governmental
and/or party programs in Germany, Sweden, Finland and the Netherlands.
10 Langhelle continues to point out several additional supposed differences between the two concepts, most
of which I find much less relevant, e.g. that sustainable development goes further in acknowledging limits
to growth and that it assumes greater ecological interdependence.

117
modernization is about “what needs to be done with the capitalist political economy” so
that it does not challenge the current world order, but it accepts and works within it.
Dryzek is rather specific about the advantages of ecological modernization for business:
since future cleanup is expensive, pollution prevention pays; moreover firms can make
money by selling preventive devices and strategies as well as other green goods.
Consequently, “the key to ecological modernization is that there is money in it for
business” (Dryzek 1997:142), making it a pro-capitalist concept. By contrast, the
concept of sustainable development provides both pro-capitalist and anti-capitalist
interpretations, with a tendency towards the latter. This is consistent with my own
interpretation of sustainable development as a term that is applied within different
discursive frameworks. Note that ecological modernization is also defined as an
exclusively pro-modern discursive framework, while sustainable development as a
concept is also used by post-modernists and anti-modernists.
4.2.3 Ecological Modernization as a Framework for EU Transport Policy
Quite predictably, modernization-oriented transport economists and engineers
stress the vital importance of efficient transport infrastructures for successful economic
development, i.e. growth. They often narrowly equate sustainability with technological
innovation and/or profitability. 11 In the modernization-oriented literature, technical and/or
economistic solutions for road transport such as low-emission vehicles, smart cars,
congestion pricing systems, or HOV lanes take precedence over a more fundamental
11 To give a concrete example: during the 1999 World Bank Transport Expo, the ‘sustainability’ of toll
roads was repeatedly defined as the ability of the private concession company to turn a profit.

118
rethinking of transport systems, let alone of land use sustainability. 12 Yet most
mainstream transport experts now at least verbally admit that there are “environmental
limits to motorization.” There is also a growing recognition that the transport sector, and
motorists in particular, impose costs on both society and nature that are not accounted for
in present transport pricing mechanisms. In the last few years, a multitude of transportsector
“social cost” or “externality” studies have been conducted for the US and Europe
(see e.g. Greene, Jones et al. 1997; Hohnmeyer, Ottinger et al. 1997; Weinreich 1998;
INFRAS/IWW 2000). Free parking has been identified as a major hidden subsidy to
drivers in the US (Shoup 1997). Pressure on national governments for “getting the prices
right” (T&E 1995) and for a more consistent application of the “polluter pays” principle
is rising.
At the same time, the macro-oriented debates over oil depletion, finite resources
and the earth’s limited carrying capacities based on Malthusian insights of “Limits to
Growth” (Meadows, Randers et al. 1972), or more recently, on the ideas of
environmental economists like Daley or Constanza only inspired rather capital-intensive,
innovation- and technology-based transport solutions which would fall in the “ecomanagerialism”
category (Luke 1999). 13
One striking example of this is that the
international community’s main climate-change-combating financial instrument, the UN-
12 For a particularly vehement argument that “the road transport system is almost always more efficient for
the user than its competitors,” see Gerondeau (1997:pxxxvi). For a typical publication advocating electric
vehicle use, try Sperling (1995). For a rather comprehensive and up-to-date overview of road and
congestion pricing issues, pick up the edited volume by Button and Verhoef (1998).
13 In the recent report “Toward a Sustainable Future” (TRB 1997:253ff) by the TRB Committee for the
Study on Transportation and a Sustainable Environment in the US, STTP co-founder David Burwell issued
a very interesting dissenting statement in the back of the report, carefully exposing the narrow, biological
approach of this scientific committee. He clarifies that an analysis of environmental threats is not the same
as a sustainability analysis, which would necessarily take a broader, systems view and include social
measures of performance.

119
and World Bank-funded Global Environmental Facility (GEF), was initially only going to
fund transport projects related to alternative fuels and fuel cell technology. 14
As the following chapter will confirm, most of official EU-speak is very close to
the overall ideal of modernization and there is general agreement among scholars that the
ideas of ecological modernization have directly influenced European Union policy
making, particularly in the formulation of the influential 1993 White Paper on Growth,
Competitiveness and Employment. More specifically, it was Jaques Delors himself and
his think-tank Cellule de Prospective who picked up on the ideas of ecological
modernization (also see Massa and Andersen 2000a; and Massa and Andersen 2000b).
Tellingly, the White Paper also devoted a whole chapter to the TENs, “identifying them
as a means of promoting growth and creating new jobs” (Williams 1996:168). The
Commission itself then sold the ambitious TEN infrastructure plans with promises of
huge economic savings, packaged in glossy brochures. To present one typical example:
The EU could save transport users, and earn transport operators, a combined total of
ECUs 138bn a year by 2005 in terms of money, time and reductions in other indirect
costs like inflexibility. But such a big saving can only be reached if a whole building
block of measures is carried out. (Commission of the European Communities
1996b:131)
Pro-construction optimism is not limited to Eurocrats, however. Gerondeau
(1997) provides us with a recent example of a scholarly work defending the idea that
“only the road can relieve the road” (p.xxxv). For him, European transport is
increasingly dominated by road transport simply because “the road transport system is
almost always more efficient for the user than its competitors” (p.xxxvi). Taking up all
the major environmental and social problems associated with transport, such as
14 Due to the intervention of sustainable transport advocacy groups, the emphasis has now been refocused.
See www.ITDP.org.

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increasing congestion, air pollution, natural resource depletion, accidents and dominance
of a road lobby, he concludes that critics distort the situation and that all these problem
are solvable, preferably by building new, state-of-the art infrastructures. To him,
modernization certainly means increasing automobilization, since “the car is an
extraordinary key to freedom and quality of life.” His positivist belief in technical
progress is unfailing:
Of course, it would be absurd to deny the existence of harmful effects linked to the use
of road vehicles. But in areas such as air pollution, they are now often grossly
exaggerated. In fact, the problem is now being solved, as remarkable progress has
been made by vehicle manufacturers.... Why should air quality be the only area where
technological progress does not yield results?
A similar attitude is apparent in the publication “Towards More Rational
Transport Policies in Europe” by Achim Diekmann (1995:11):
In a few years time, pollution by motor vehicles will have ceased to be a major
problem and there will be sizeable cuts in fuel consumption as well. … Mobility must
no longer be discriminated against. On the contrary, it has again to be seen as a
positive, dynamic element in our society, as a provider of growth and welfare.
It is typical for such positivist believers in technological progress to claim that
their own views are non-ideological, and strictly based on “objective” evaluation of the
facts. Excerpts from Gerondeau’s concluding paragraph reveal an interesting,
“objectivizing” opinionatedness:
There is then the risk that decisions are made based on ideological aphorisms. But
ideology should have no place in transport policy. ... Means of transport are only tools.
... The things that count are services rendered ... and the financial side of the issue, as
one of the first duties of any public or private service is to not squander resources. ...
It is a question of making the best possible decisions objectively and on the basis on
facts and not opinions. ... All that really counts is the happiness of the people and the
proper functioning of the economy, which is one of its conditions.
(Gerondeau 1997 pp. 299-300, emphasis added)

121
The automobile lobby, of course, takes the pro-car efficiency and modernization
rhetoric to its most extreme. Diekmann’s book is a perfect example of the way in which
this lobby appropriates the language of supposed scientific (read: market) rationality in
order to argue for subsidy cuts in the rail sector and further deregulation of services. His
concluding argument oscillates between economic rationality and ordinary polemic
(pp.109-114):
The primary objective of a rational transport policy is the optimal use of scarce
resources and the protection and furthering of important economic and social goals.
This objective requires reliance on market forces. It rules out subsidies.
Environmental sustainability, which is one of the social goals, has to be pursued
within this framework. … Instead of simply “milking” the road sector … increased reinvestment
in improving and updating transport systems is required. … Maximising
tax income from road transport is a permanent temptation for hard-pressed exchequers
but the opposite of a rational long-term investment approach. [Among other things]
governments should … press ahead the restructuring of railways in order to eliminate
the huge subsidies they require, which have been the greatest stumbling block in
making Europe’s transport system more efficient in the past.
Together, Gerondeau and Diekmann exemplify a vision of modernization that
does not really deserve the name “ecological.” For them, the environment is largely an
obstacle to achieving modernization, growth and prosperity. Sustainability becomes a
“social issue” (read: additional cost factor) and rail transport simply remains an
“inefficient” mode. 15
To be fair, there is of course a much more moderate strand of modernizationists
who also tend to be economists rather than engineers. These scholars are less obsessed
15 To some readers, it may seem unfair to base this sub-typification on highlights from quotes by only two
select authors. However, Christian Gerondeau, a graduate of France’s prestigious Ecole Polytechnique,
could hardly be regarded as “just any” independent, marginal, outside evaluator of European transport
developments. During his distinguished 30-year civil service career at the highest levels of French public
administration, Gerondeau played a significant role in shaping his country’s transport policies and plans,
being personally responsible for several reform initiatives. Achim Diekmann is an economics professor at
the university of Cologne. More importantly, Diekmann has been the director of the German Association
of the Automobile Industry (Verband der Automobilindustrie e.V. - VDA) since 1968. He also held the
position of chairman of the Liason Committee of the European Automobile Industry.

122
with the expansion of road infrastructures than with the inefficiencies of all modes and
networks. Very few of them are as dismissive of rail’s future as the car-oriented
engineering and construction lobby. To these moderate modernizationists simple
efficiency improvements in the physical transport infrastructures are futile unless they are
complemented with other logistical, organizational and regulatory changes, especially
where multiple national territories are transversed. The persistence of major transport
bottlenecks at (former and still existing) national border crossings therefore emerges as
another major concern. For example, Ratti (1995:71) identifies three major problems
related to border crossings: 1) border barriers, in which real economic effects due to
‘shipment ruptures’ can be observed, 2) border filters, characterized by the persistence of
legal, fiscal and customs differences, and 3) border contact zones that are influenced by
the heritage of old infrastructural situations as well as persistent institutional and cultural
differences. These scholars also tend to focus on Trans-European Networks as providing
the “missing links” necessary for proper European integration, but see them as a less
exclusively physical problem. 16
The resulting studies clearly emphasize the importance
of national border crossings as a major impediment to efficient transport flows, and they
tend to favor high-speed rail and combined transport infrastructures over road as the most
appropriate modern transport solutions for Europe. The political weight this expert
perspective has within the EU is demonstrated by the fact that of the 14 selected highpriority
TEN transport projects, almost all involve high-speed rail or combined transport;
only three are road-only projects and one is an airport. These “moderate
modernizationists” would also never fail to mention the increasing importance of
telecommunications and other technological solutions, while also recognizing the grave
16 Chapter 6 presents a close examination of EU policy discourses on “bottlenecks” & “missing links”.

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external environmental and social costs of the transport sector. This more nuanced view
is representative of a large number of recent works on transport and European integration
funded by the NECTAR research group of the European Science Foundation (see
especially the edited volumes by Nijkamp, Reichman et al. 1990; Banister and
Berechman 1993; Nijkamp 1993; Banister, Capello et al. 1995; Coccossis and Nijkamp
1995). Although these studies ultimately tend to concentrate on technological and
logistical innovations as well as new, improved transport links as the keys to solving
Europe’s transport problems, they nevertheless display a high degree of awareness of the
comprehensive spatial, social and environmental issues involved. This particular network
of scholars involved in the ESF’s transport research projects well represents current
“mainstream” academic opinion with regard to Pan-European transport policy.
4.3 Reflexive Modernization
The social and the natural worlds today are thoroughly infused with reflexive human
knowledge; but this does not lead to a situation in which collectively we are the
masters of our destiny.
Ulrich Beck, Anthony Giddens and Scott Lash (1994:vii)
4.3.1 Introducing the Framework
The concept of “risk rationality” has been immensely influential over the course of
the last decade. One can even go as far as saying that in over the last decade, social
scientists’ faith in modernity has been restored primarily through two concepts developed
by the German sociologist Ulrich Beck: “reflexive modernization” and its subsidiary
concept of the “risk society.” Note that there are important parallels in Beck’s work with

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the work of British sociologist Anthony Giddens. 17
There is now even an emerging
“sociology of (auto)mobility” and of “auto risk” that uses Beck’s work as a starting point
(e.g. Beckmann 2001a, also see below).
In distinction to ecological modernization, which is more economy-focused, reflexive
modernization is thus a discursive framework that comes out of a sociological tradition
and distinguishes itself through the overarching theme of “risk rationality”. The key
policy relevance lies in the idea of precautionary action (also see below). Nevertheless,
the discursive framework of reflexive modernity is quite complementary to ecological
modernization. In fact, the term reflexive modernization is often discussed in conjunction
with ecological modernization, with many scholars discussing the two as part and parcel
of the same changing outlook on the future. This is particularly true of reflexive
modernity’s overarching concern with risk. As David Harvey (1996:377) notes: “Beck’s
(1992) formulation of the idea the we now live in a ‘risk society’ … has proven a useful
and influential adjunct to the discursive thrust to define a risk-minimizing politics of
ecological modernization.” In this study, I view reflexive modernity as an analytically
distinct, albeit highly complementary discursive framework to ecological
modernization. 18
17 For a detailed outlook on the similarities and differences between the Beckian and the Giddensian
conceptualizations of reflexive modernization/modernity, as well as the additional perspective of Scott
Lash, see the insightful volume “Reflexive Modernization” co-authored by Beck, Giddens and Lash (1994).
18 Remember that Mol and Spaargaren (1993), by contrast, present an evolutionary explanation that views
reflexive modernization as the concept that will eventually supersede ecological modernization as a
mainstream political program (also see above). Alternatively, Davoudi (2001b) views ecological
modernization and the risk society as the two “twin discourses of sustainability” and credits the latter with
seeing “irreconcilable conflict between the current mode of production and environment,” calling for
“greater participation in policy-making … and social transformation” and presenting a “radical” and
“moral” vision of sustainability. In essence, her “risk society” face can thus be seen as a conflation of my
discursive frameworks of reflexive modernization, communicative rationality, and political economy.

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The Australian planning theorist Brandon Gleeson (2000:117ff) has made a
pertinent argument that sociological theories of reflexive modernization, despite their
limited consideration in fields such as urban, regional or transport planning at present, 19
are in fact highly relevant to all spatial science, and to infrastructure decision-making.
This can be taken as an indirect argument that this perspective is relevant for EU
transport policy as well, and the concept indeed provides a useful framework within
which “to place and understand the recent transformation of western urban and
environmental planning systems.”
The overall crisis of state legitimacy (see e.g. O'Connor 1973; Habermas 1976;
Connolly 1984; Offe and Keane 1984) has haunted planners and policy-makers for
decades now, challenging them to reevaluate their inherent reliance on “modernist”,
hierarchical decision-making systems. Various green, feminist and otherwise progressive
social movements have attempted to reclaim democracy by refocusing attention on grassroots
activism and local politics. In this context, Gleeson (2000:118) claims that
reflexive modernization offers at least a partial solution to the legitimation crisis by
“suggesting a transformative politics that is at once historical and progressive … [and]
demands the re-modernization of modernity, involving, inter alia, the replacement of the
modernist state by a reflexive, cosmopolitan democracy.” How is it then, precisely, that
theories of reflexive modernization offer solutions with regard to the desired reenlightening
of planning and policy-making?
A quick review of Beck’s work yields some interesting answers. A first step is
the analytical separation of industrialism (and the related industrial society model) on the
19 Some noteworthy exemptions are Gleeson’s own work (Gleeson 2000; Low and Gleeson 2001), Blowers
(1997) and Beckmann (2001a).

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one hand, and modernization (and modernity more generally) on the other hand.
Consequently, the political-economic and cultural changes brought about by the deindustrialization
of Western societies should be seen not as an indication of a move
towards post-modernity, but rather as a “break within modernity, which is freeing itself
from the contours of the classical industrial society and forming a new form – the
(industrial) risk society” (Beck 1992:9, also quoted in Gleeson 2000:119 with added
emphases). Triggered by two deeply symbolic historical events – the 1984 Chernobyl
disaster and the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall 20 – Beck finds that previous, sciencefocused,
linear, instrumental rationality is increasingly giving way to a new reflexive
rationality in which nature and society are no longer objectified but assessed in a more
self-aware manner. In this process, nature becomes highly politicized and social
institutions radically recomposed. In essence, Beck explains the rise of environmental
awareness and the emergence of new forms of (multi-level) governance as an outcome of
the most evident failures of the industrial society model. Neither capitalist nor socialist
attempts at industrial modernization were ultimately capable of producing the universally
prosperous, just and nature-controlling societies that their various proponents promised.
Nature is indeed increasingly disenchanted but never successfully dominated. What is
more important is that, quite frequently, the negative side effects or unintended
consequences related to the usage of modern technologies outweigh their benefits.
The transport sector provides a perfect example of this dynamic. At present, the
comfortable and speedy mobility afforded to large parts of the population in OECD
countries by means of fossil fuel-dependent automobile and air transport is in large part
20 These two events are, as Gleeson correctly notes in his own review of Beck, indeed very eurocentric
choices.

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responsible for rising levels of carbon dioxide emissions. These emissions are in turn
likely to alter the earth’s atmosphere to the point where an accelerated process of global
warming negatively affects the entire world population, especially those living in coastal
and otherwise ecologically-exposed regions. So far, governments have been rather
unsuccessful in reversing this dynamic.
The key insight Beck provides in his book Risk Society is that modern society has
entered a development stage in which governments and other institutions are increasingly
unable to adequately assess and monitor the social and environmental risks of industrial
development (especially those embedded in the use of nuclear and biochemical
technologies). Uncertainty and risk enter the equation. Technology and science are no
longer unconditional guarantors of prosperity and progress.
However, this does not mean that the modernist project needs to be rejected,
since, as Beck as well as Giddens argue in later works, modernity is well capable of reevaluating
and reinventing itself. The rise of “counter-modernizing” forces does not
threaten modernity but strengthens it, resulting in a new stage of reflexive modernization
in which a new dialectic of counter-modernization and modernization continually propels
us forward, opening the way for other, perhaps yet more advanced “alternative
modernities” (see e.g. Beck 1997). These could, in principle, be regressive – indicated,
for example, by Augé’s (1995) ideas of the excessiveness of supermodernity or the rising
concerns among scholars with regard to the resurgence of nationalist and ethnocentric
movements. Beck’s hope, however, is for a “reinvention of politics” that addresses the
problems of uncertainty and risk by re-integrating and reinstitutionalizing the core
Enlightenment concept of doubt into modern policy-making. For Beck, “doubt … is the

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most certain victor of modernity” (p.166). To be sure, he is speaking of a doubt “arising
not from ignorance but from greater knowledge and further questioning” i.e. a doubt
arising out of a general attitude of self-awareness and even self-criticism.
Gleeson (2000:124), inspired by contemporary defenders of Enlightenment
thought such as Beck and Hayward and, ultimately, by Kant himself, joins their plea for
“a non-reductionist view of the Enlightenment that avoids the simple depiction of
modernization as the rule of instrumental rationality.” In particular, he correctly points to
the misleading dichotomy apparent in much ecological thought opposing Nature and
Enlightenment. Gleeson (132-133), however, ultimately ends up concluding his call for a
re-enlightenment of planning and policy-making by simply suggesting the following:
In the contemporary context, modernization implies a broad reanimation of urban
governance that recognizes and addresses the demise of simple industrialism and the
rise of a new reflexive modernity.… What Beck’s thesis suggests is that planning, and
other democratic institutions, must project uncertainty into domains of ‘constructed
certitude’, such as the market, and resist the pressures to surrender up critical
awareness. The precautionary principle seems to recommend itself as a concrete
instance of what Beck has in mind. Reading Beck, this principle represents perhaps
one possible public interest for a re-enlightenment of planning. [Its] application to
planning would help identify and regulate the ecological and social risks arising
from the production of space. This is not to furnish an excuse for institutional
procrastination, but a new remit for precautionary action authorized by democratic
rather than simply scientific or economic opinion.
[Bold emphasis added, italics in the original.]
For Gleeson, as an urban theorist/planner, to inadvertently revert to this oldest,
most original of all ecological modernization principles at the end of his reflections on
reflexive modernization is highly revealing. The article is explicitly based on a review of
Ulrich Beck’s work and makes no reference to the ecological modernization literature, so
Gleeson does not mention the central role that the originators of ecological modernization
theory, Jänicke and Huber, afforded to the Vorsorgeprinzip (i.e. the precautionary

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principle) for the development of their ecological modernization theories. Yet it appears
as an almost Freudian slip for Gleeson to suggest that the suggested re-enlightenment of
planning in essence consist of an improved identification and regulation (!) of “the
ecological and social risks arising from the production of space.” By presenting such a
limited vision, Gleeson holds planners (and policy makers) locked within the bounds of a
crisis-managing ecological modernization approach that keeps them deeply implicated in
the ongoing crisis of state legitimacy which he himself also bemoaned at the outset of his
article (and which is now more fashionably discussed under the label “governance”). The
actual “producers of space” in modern capitalist democracies (e.g. property developers,
industrialists, construction companies, and, in some limited cases, the state itself), on the
other hand, remain fundamentally unchallenged in their role, since their actions are at
best being “regulated”. Planners are once again relegated to being the “henchmen” of
capitalist market development. Foglesong’s (1986) capitalist-democracy contradiction
remains unresolved. Finally, Gleeson’s suggestion that this precautionary action (i.e.
regulation) be legitimated by “democratic rather than simply scientific or economic
opinion” shows a welcome post-positivist awareness regarding the impossibility of
scientific objectivity, but it also ends the discussion at the very point where it should
begin, namely with a debate over how exactly democratic institutions would need to be
re-conceptualized in order to successfully build critical awareness (and, equally important
in my view, re-distributive mechanisms) into planning and political decision-making.
Gleeson simply leaves us hanging, concluding with the insight that democracy, (defined
here as “the refusal of humanity to be governed without reason”) is the central ideal of
reflexive modernization.

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While it would be unfair to make Ulrich Beck responsible for the shortcomings in
Gleeson’s conclusions (which, in my view, ultimately fail to successfully re-enlighten
planning), Gleeson’s article is nevertheless highly indicative of a common problem of
theoretical adaptations of reflexive modernization, namely that the theory, like ecological
modernization, has a rather limited potential to induce (radical) political change. Even in
the face of dramatic social and environmental threats and injustices, we are always to
have faith in modernity’s (and modernity’s institutions’) capacity to re-invent itself. 21
4.3.2 Reflexive (Auto)mobility as a Framework for EU Transport Policy
The term reflexive auto(mobility) connotes the fact that scholars writing within
the discursive framework of reflexive modernity increasingly consider automobility and
modernity to be interwoven, mutually dependent concepts (Urry 1999; Kesselring 2001;
Rammler 2001; Beckmann 2001a). In this new, emerging field of transport sociology,
the private car is viewed as the central element shaping late modernity. These scholars
show how the automobile symbolizes speed, acceleration, flexibility of movement,
individualized mobility and protection from outside environmental influences. At the
same time, they argue, highways, and in particular the North American parkways, were
explicitly built to afford middle class car owners a pleasant drive though nature. And it is
of course North America which has been most prominent in the development of
21 It is thus not completely by chance that Beck’s British brother-in-arms in the popularization of reflexive
modernization, Anthony Giddens, has been such a key influence on Tony Blair in the UK. Regardless of
whether one considers the approach successful or not, it seems undisputable that Giddens’ and Blair’s
“Third Way” reinterpretation of social-democratic politics as an approach “beyond left and right”
thoroughly erased whatever radical potential the British Labor party had left.

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automobility as part and parcel of modern culture. 22
Freeways are seen as connoting
ultimate freedom. 23
Sociologists writing on reflexive automobility are not prescriptive in their
analyses. They claim to observe, rather than judge, developments, and thus seldom
present policy recommendations. They recognize the fact that the environmental effects
of automobility are highly problematic, but instead of focusing on the negative effects of
motorization, they tend to focus on the social “causes” of automobilization (Beckmann
2001:28). Automobility is interpreted as a “spatio-temporal phenomenon” (Beckmann
2001) which is in turn related to the time-space compression characteristic of late
modernity (see Giddens 1990 and Harvey 1989). John Urry (1999:1) finds that “the
social and technical system of the car constitutes an enormously complex hybrid
‘automobility’” and he develops a set of six components that together make up the
“’specific character of domination’ that automobility exerts over almost all societies
across the globe.” 24 It is a rather subtle type of domination, however, largely relying on
the use of expert systems and knowledge. As Giddens (1990:28) notes:
When I go out of the house and get into a car, I enter settings which are thoroughly
permeated by expert knowledge – involving the design and construction of
automobiles, highways, intersections, traffic lights, and many other items. … I have
minimal knowledge about the technicalities of modes of road building, the
maintaining of the road surfaces, or the computers which help control the movement
of traffic.
22 Think, for example, of Tom Waits’ songs, Jack Kerouac’s novel On the Road, or films such as Easy
Rider, Bonnie and Clyde, Thelma and Louise, Paris, Texas. For an academic analysis of the road movie
genre and its relationship to mobility, see Eyerman and Löfgren (1995).
23 Urry (1999) uses Baudrillard’s America in order to elaborate on this as follows:
American post-war landscapes are empty and stand for modernity and the rejection of the complex
histories of European societies. This emptiness is a metaphor of the American dream. Baudrillard
suggests that ‘America’ undertook to make utopia real, to realise everything through the strange destiny
of simulation. Culture then in America is ‘space, speed, cinema, technology’ (Baudrillard 1988:100).
24 The six components he discusses are manufactured object, individual consumption, machinic complex,
quasi-private mobility, culture, and environmental resource-use.

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In short, the car, which is also commonly called private motorized transport, 25
with its reliance on social and physical infrastructures, turns out to be far from being the
perfectly individual means of transport that it purports to be (Beckmann 2001:45).
As far as policy approaches related to the phenomenon of reflexive automobility
are concerned, both scholars and practitioners working within the related discursive
framework pointed to new individual user strategies and user typologies (see e.g. Jensen
1999; Canzler 2000). Car sharing schemes are probably the most prominent practical
example of this development. Interestingly, both Canzler and Beckmann find that the
frequently evoked account of increasingly individualized transport strategies in light of
the complex travel requirements in post-industrial societies in fact does not mean that the
car necessarily has to be the most successful mode. Especially in urban areas, they argue,
automobility has long reached its efficiency limits. In these urban contexts, greater
individualization is likely to foster greater multimodality in the future. City dwellers
might continue to use their cars for weekend trips, for retail shopping and for out-of
town commutes, but if congestion and parking remain as problematic as they are at
present, many of them will gladly travel to work by public transport, and if convenient
and safe, possibly even ride to the transit station by bicycle.
Examples of these developments are already visible in several EU member states,
most prominently in the form of the integrated mobility services now offered by several
railways companies. For example, the recently privatized German national railway
25 The most common German acronym for car travel, for example, is “MIV”, which stands for “motorized
individual transport (Verkehr).”

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company Deutsche Bahn is now offering car sharing and bike rental services as part of its
company profile. 26
According to transport sociologists, another distinguishing feature of reflexive
automobility is that, in late modernity, the so-called “modern mobility paradigm” is
supposedly shaped by an increasing number of players. Beckmann (2001:51ff), for
example, argues that the exceptional power vested in the automotive industry and the
government to equip the populace with automobiles and to provide a pertaining
“modern”, i.e. functionally segregated and car-dominated transport system, is a thing of
the past. Instead of the two “big players,” industry and government(al planners), the
stage is now crowded with a host of additional “collective actors,” such as citizens’ and
environmental groups (e.g. Friends of the Earth - FOE, Greenpeace, European Federation
for Transport & Environment - T&E), rail associations (e.g. Community of European
Railways – CER), car and bicycle clubs (European Cyclists Federation - ECF), road and
industry lobby groups (European Road Federation, European Round Table of
Industrialists), as well as research institutes and think tanks (Centre for European Policy
Studies - CEPS). Interestingly, making a similar point as Mol (2000), Beckmann notes
the loss of radical voices within the environmental movement.
The network of actors within automobility also becomes denser and more tightly
woven. It is the collaboration between the former “enemies” that reforms the network.
Nowadays, car-manufacturers are working closely together with (ex-)grass-rootmovements
such as car sharing clubs. The old animosity … seems to be over. The
transformation of alternative clubs into established transport actors gains additional
impetus with the professionalisation of their services. [p.52]. 27
26
See http://www.bahn.de/konzern/holding/db_rent/dbag_call_a_bike.shtml and http://www.bahn.de/
konzern/ holding/db_rent/dbag_carsharing.shtml.
27 Beckmann links this phenomenon back to Beck’s overarching theory of reflexive modernization by
identifying the rise of these new institutions and organizations as an example of what Beck calls “the
disintegration of institutional power” which is in turn part of the “subpoliticization of late modern
societies”. Subpolitics is defined by Beck as a direct(er) form of politicking by means of “ad hoc
individual participation in political decisions, by-passing the institutions of representative opinion-

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It is true that the resulting policy discourses are indeed more professional and at
the same time largely de-radicalized and surprisingly consensual. Professionals and
experts from the governmental and non-governmental sectors are now discoursing
amongst themselves. Political differences of opinion remain relevant, but all actors take
recourse in scientific research and expert conclusions to back their arguments. Note, for
example the argumentation presented by the sustainable transport NGO T&E (2000:iii):
A recent overview by a panel of leading experts in this field has concluded that
there are in fact no automatic economic or employment benefits from [transport
infrastructure investments]. The assumptions and prejudices held by Europe’s
decision makers [with regard to the relationship between transport investments and
regional economic development] are, in fact, incorrect.
[Emphasis in the original.] 28
Such continued reliance on scientific experts runs counter to Beckmann’s
conclusion that decision-making is now significantly influenced by less privileged, nonexpert
decision-makers. So we are not witnessing the rise of the lay experts or, as
Beckmann calls them, “layperts” as additional stakeholders in environmental decisionmaking,
as much as an increasing reliance on privileged (academic) expert knowledge for
the solution of environmental problems. This is also congruent with Giddens’
interpretation of reflexive modernity as being dominated by expert systems. The
phenomenon is particularly apparent for discourses assessing the environmental risks
inherent in current auto-dependent transport systems. 29
formation (political parties, parliaments) and often lacking the protection of the law” (Beck 1992, as quoted
in Beckmann 2001:54). This observation is also relevant for my analysis of Pan-European transport policy.
28 For a more complete excerpt from this text, see the “cohesion” section of chapter 4 on transport policy
storylines.
29 Note that Giddens and Beck indeed provide different answers to the question of who the key medium of
the reflexive modernization is. As Beck clarifies (1994:175): “Unlike Giddens [who emphasizes scientific
expert knowledge], I assert the thesis … that it is not knowledge, but rather non-knowledge which is the
key medium of ‘reflexive’ modernization. To put it in another way: we are living in an age of side effects.”

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In related studies, car accidents appear as an individualized risk which directly
translates into a major social cost associated with this mode. The TERM reports
published by the European Environmental Agency are a perfect example of such
awareness-raising scientific “objective” reporting. Figure 4.1 shows a graph taken from
the 2001 TERM report (European Environment Agency (EEA) 2001) that is clearly
making the point that the risk of car accidents imposes exorbitant external costs on
society. The credited sources are INFRAS and IWW, two major European research
institutions which conducted an external cost study on behalf of the International Union
of Railways. The resulting policy recommendation is without doubt a decreased
dependence on individual car transport. This example illustrates how complex arguments
related to the environmental impacts of transport are effectively short-circuited through
the implicit assumption that standard cost benefit methodologies developed by major
research institutions correctly and objectively capture environmental risks and costs
associated with the different modes, even if the relevant research is clearly initiated and
paid for by a stakeholder with a vested interest in demonstrating problems associated
with car transport. 30
In sum, society has become dependent on experts to quantify, assess
and ultimately remedy the environmental and social risks associated with modern
transport systems. This prospect is disempowering to laypersons who are often
confronted with contrasting “scientific” assessments.
30 Note that I personally do not think that the INFRAS/IWW assessments are politically biased. I
nevertheless agree that it is important to point out that, in the end, all environmental cost calculations are of
course socially constructed. What exact value we attach to qualities such as equal mobility rights, clean air,
unservered landscapes and good public health is ultimately a matter of societal consensus-building and
political argumentation. Economics remains a social science.

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Figure 4.1 Environmental Costs/Risks of Transport as presented by the EEA
Source: EEA (2001)
4.4 Communicative Rationality
If there is one theme that runs through all the discussions and debates on planning, it
is that of rationality.
John Friedmann (1987:97)
Power has a rationality that rationality does not know.
Bent Flyvbjerg (1998:225)
4.4.1 Introducing the Framework
The overarching theme of the discursive framework of communicative rationality
is simply rationality itself. The unit of analysis is not really society as a whole, but rather
people and institutions. The relevance for policy lies in the elaboration of the concept of
“communicative action.” “Communicative rationality” concepts have only rather
recently been applied to the realm of transport policy and planning. As Richard Willson

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(2001:2) recently summarized: “Communicative rationality has not been reviewed in
transportation journals; planning theory research seldom links to transportation
planning.” Since, thanks to Willson and a few others, there is now an emerging literature
on communicative rationality in transport planning, I decided to recognize it as a distinct
and policy-relevant development approach for the specific area of European transport
policy, even if there are currently no transport practitioners discernable at the EU level
who consistently practice such an approach. Nevertheless, I argue that it is important to
recognize “communicative rationality” as a distinct discursive framework with its own
distinct policy preferences, regardless of whether or not these policy preferences are
presently actualized or not. After all, since “ecological modernization” is so clearly the
dominant approach to EU transport policy and planning, most of the policy preferences
resulting from the other discursive frameworks are not being implemented at present
either. Note that there are some parallels between the increased currency the concept of
communicative rationality is gaining in planning and public policy circles and the current
debate over the future of European Governance, which culminated in the publication of
the EU’s White Paper on European Governance (also see Chapter 5).
The term “communicative rationality” inevitably evokes the name of Jürgen
Habermas. There is now an extensive literature entirely devoted to the elaboration of the
concept of communicative rationality and its application to planning and public policy,
variously presented under the label of communicative planning (Forester 1989; Sager
1994), communicative action (Innes 1995), argumentative planning (Fischer and Forester
1993), or collaborative planning / planning through debate (Healey 1992; Healey 1997).
It has even been interpreted as the new dominant “paradigm” for the sub-field of planning

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theory (Innes 1995) and a potential one for transport planning (Willson 2001), although
Muller (1998) and Taylor (1999) rightfully question the applicability of the term in this
context. Willson (2001:2) states that “the global aim of communicative rationality is to
create a rational basis for constructing ends and means in a democratic society, by
enriching public and political discourse.” In pursuing this aim, however, the
communicative approach is often selective in its application of Habermasian theory. At
its core lies a notion of reason that is historically situated and created through intersubjective
mutual understanding. Communicative theorists aim to establish knowledge
claims through processes of argumentation that are interactively carried forward by a
given set of people at a given time and place, thus creating a system that is not (or at least
considerably less) dependent on validation from “experts” or other outside influences.
Within these processes, planners are to become mediators among stakeholders, rather
than stakeholders themselves. (Note that the respective role of a bureaucrat or policymaker
is less clear). According to Healey (1997:29), the central tenets of the
communicative model are its inherent social constructivist understanding of knowledge,
its focus on social interaction, its openness towards alternative forms of knowledge and
reasoning (e.g. storytelling, subjective statements), and finally, its call for public policy to
constitute itself by drawing upon and making available a wide range of knowledge and
reasoning from different sources. 31
As an analytic method for studying planning and policy processes, the
communicative rationality framework no doubt deserves credit for contributing many
31 Note that although they are supposedly rooted in Habermasian discourse theory, i.e. a theory still
working within the Enlightenment tradition, the tenets which Healy identifies are, of course, fully
congruent with postmodern ideals of knowledge-seeking. Consequently, the “communicative turn” in
planning is regarded by many primarily as a post-modernizing, rather than a re-modernizing trend.

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excellent, discourse- and rhetoric-focused micro-level case studies that are very useful for
understanding how exactly decision-makers go about doing their work (e.g. Forester
1989; Healey 1992; Throgmorton 1992; Healey and Hillier 1996). It is only when the
analyses turn from critique to recommendation that the model runs into problems. Here,
many communicative theorists display a tendency to be overly idealistic about preexisting
power relationships, which are particularly relevant when dealing with large
scale infrastructures (as is certainly the case with the EU TENs). Taken together, Susan
Fainstein’s and Tim Richardson’s critiques present a concise summary of the model’s key
deficiencies from a political economy perspective. Fainstein (2000:455) notes that
in its effort to save planning from elitist tendencies, communicative planning theory
runs into difficulties. … Although their roots, via Habermas, are in critical theory,
once the communicative theorists move away from critique and present a manual for
action, their thought loses its edge. Habermas posited the ideal speech situation as a
criterion by which to register the distortion inherent in most interactions. … But when
instead ideal speech becomes the objective of planning, the argument takes a
moralistic tone, and its proponents seem to forget the economic and social forces that
produce endemic social conflict and domination by the powerful. There is the
assumption that if only people were reasonable, deep structural conflict would melt
away. Although unquestionably many disagreements can be ameliorated through
negotiation … persistent issues of displacement as a consequence of modernization
and siting of unwanted facilities proximate to weak constituencies are less susceptible
to resolution.
And, one might add, as scores of local activist groups fighting unwanted
motorways all over Europe will confirm, such “weak constituents” are often only able to
make their voice heard if they are able to frame their opposition within solid
environmental arguments, i.e. arguments backed by scientific evidence and couched in
legalistic language that allows them to take their arguments to court. Consequently, as
Richardson (2000:13) points out, communicative rationality theorists’

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analyses and prescriptions suffer a credibility gap. The analytical work focuses only
on certain parts of planning activity – principally communicative exchanges – and the
normative work relies on a leap of faith … which goes beyond the experience and
convictions of many practicing planners.
The discursive framework of communicative rationality also distinguishes itself
through its assumption that people do not have fixed interests (see especially Healey
1997) and that overarching power structures do not predetermine outcomes. 32 This is a
recurring and ongoing point of contention that we will revisit especially when we discuss
the importance of storylines in constituting and influencing policy processes.
In terms of the key activist proponents, those elements of the communicative
rationality discourse that point to increased participation and equal access to decisionmaking
are frequently championed by environmental NGOs.
Contrary to the
communicative ideal, however, these are typically groups with inadequate access to
dominant power structures. Their obvious claim is that they defend the interest of civil
society and the environment against capitalist market interests and biased financial
institutions and governments. Regardless of the necessity of such work and the validity
of their claim, this certainly precludes any non-existence of fixed interests on the part of
the NGOs. Environmental and civic NGOs are not as much interested in being
moderators as monitors of planning and policy processes. A good example is the CEE
Bankwatch Network, which has done several detailed case studies on EU transport
32 Also note that different proponents of communicative action-inspired methodologies subscribe to this
view only to a certain degree. Willson (2001:13), for example develops a model for a “transformed”
planning process which is still clearly “influenced by societal values, public opinion, stakeholders and
institutions, but [where] the process in turn may change societal values, public opinion, stakeholders and
institutions.” In the end, instead of debating over “fixed” interests, it might indeed be preferable to say that
interests are context-driven. If a group’s key interest/context is profit, its alliances are likely to vary, since
money can be made both by exploiting and by protecting the environment. Other structural positions are
less subject to opportunistic change, however.

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investments in Central Europe. 33
Bankwatch's mission is “to prevent environmentally
and socially harmful impacts of international development finance, and to promote
alternative solutions and public participation” (see www.bankwatch.org). While pursuing
typical environmentalist aims like “stopping environmentally and socially destructive
policies and projects of International Financial Institutions in Central and Eastern Europe,
and promot[ing] alternatives,” Bankwatch also stresses goals such as the following (ibid):
To create public awareness about International Financial Institutions activities in
Central and Eastern European countries and their social and environmental impacts.
To promote public participation in the decision making process about policies and
projects of International Financial Institutions, on the local, national and regional
levels.
To help non-governmental environmental organisations and citizen groups to monitor
what the International Financial Institutions are doing in the Central and Eastern
Europe.
Transparency and democracy in decision-making thus represent concepts of the
communicative rationality approach that resonate with practitioners far beyond the
confines of communicative theorizing. In Europe, the UN ECE Aarhus Convention and
the EU White Paper on European Governance remain the most important official policy
documents recognizing the importance of access to information on the environment and
public participation.
4.4.2 Communicative Rationality as a Framework for EU Transport Policy
As noted above, the literature on communicative rationality as a framework for
transport policy is still somewhat inchoate. One explicit attempt to “contribute to the
expanding literature on communicative and rhetorical practices by connecting these
33
See especially the “Billions for Sustainability?” Briefings on EU pre-accession funding which
Bankwatch now puts out annually together with Friends of the Earth Europe (all three existing reports
downloadable under http://www.bankwatch.org/publications/index.html).

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approaches to the field of transport planning” (p.669) is Tore Langmyhr’s (2000) article
“The Rhetorical Side of Transport Planning”. Based on a case study of transport
planning in the Norwegian medium size city of Trondheim, Langmyhr discusses different
rhetorical arguments over the construction of a bypass road and over the introduction of a
road pricing scheme. Although Langmyhr’s abstract promises an outline for “normative
framework based on communicative planning theory”, the core of the case study in fact
consists of an evaluation of planners’ (largely successful) use of opportunistic rhetoric in
order to assure a political majority for the projects. At one point Langmyhr ambitiously
reverts to Forester’s (1989) four “critical pragmatist,” Habermas-inspired, abstract
concepts of “comprehensibility”, “sincerety”, “legitimacy”, and “truth” as guiding posts
for “good communication,” only to immediately retract from the ideal of distortion-free
information as “unreachable” (p. 680). In the end, Langmyhr ends up promoting rather
than critiquing privileged transport decision-makers’ increasing use of rhetorical
strategies since, as he argues, with “a larger transportation land-use system than before
[and] an expanded set of societal values … planning authorities are in need of persuasion
competence to justify their expertise” (p. 684, my emphasis). This might be true, yet a
persuasive, retroactive justification of expert decisions is likely not what Habermas had
in mind with regard to ideal speech situations.
In a related piece, Langmyhr (2001) discusses the overall rationality of transport
investment packages, arguing that such package policies involving several modes “entail
some specific possibilities and traps in planning and decision-making processes” (p.157).
In this article, Langmyhr again uses Norwegian national transport policy to compare “the
instrumental rationality approach” focused on means-end rationality and efficiency with

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the “communicative rationality” approach which emphasizes interaction and process.
This time, Langmyhr aims to demonstrate how a communicative rationality perspective
ends up with a different set of pros and cons regarding the issue of investment packages
than a traditional perspective emphasizing instrumental rationality. This aim is both
interesting and relevant. In the article itself, however, Langmyhr then surprisingly
categorizes the cunning practice of using investment packages to couple unpopular
measures (e.g. road pricing and fees) with popular ones (e.g. local expansion of
infrastructure with national funds) in the “pro-category” of the communicative rationality
perspective – simply because “the potential for consensus building is enhanced” by this
practice. So it seems to me that some proponents of the communicative approach have to
distinguish more clearly between genuinely “communicative” settings where supposedly
unbiased actors shape policy processes, and bastardizations of such ideal typical
situations in which planners, public officials and/or bureaucratic decision-makers simply
better sell (and thus ultimately achieve) largely preset agendas through opportunistic
packaging of arguments and resources.
In a wide-ranging assessment of communicative rationality as a possible
alternative to conventional transport planning approaches, Richard Willson (2001)
presents a sophisticated analysis of the current state of transport planning in developed
countries, making several excellent points that cannot be recounted in detail here.
Ultimately, his answer to whether communicative rationality represents a promising
model for transportation planning is that “the promise is substantial” (p.25) but also that
the promise alone “is insufficient to displace the traditional model” (p.23). At the outset
of the article, Willson, like others before him, posits the communicative approach in

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square opposition to the orthodox approach of instrumental rationality, which is
supported by an epistemology of scientific objectivism. Willson is aware that his critique
of the technocratic, systems-analytical roots of planning, and of transport planning in
particular, is neither new nor original. The real starting point of Willson’s argument is
therefore not based on the obvious and now widely noted failures of instrumental
rationality and the related scientific methodologies, but rather on the observation that the
real-life expressions of the supposedly “scientific” transport planning rationalities are
much more selective and strategic than true instrumental rationality would allow for. So
ironically, following this line of argumentation, communicative rationality is in part
about bringing the kind of “good” (i.e. unstrategic) rationalism back into the transport
planning process that current practice has lost by not more strictly adhering to its
scientific rationalist roots. In Willson’s (2001:6) words:
Conventional transportation planning practice reflects a tension between the espoused
theory [of instrumental rationality] just described and a theory-in-use of strategic
rationality. By strategic rationality, I mean a form of rationality that is oriented toward
achieving political action.
Unfortunately, Willson ultimately leaves this tension unresolved. He has read
Flyvbjerg and is therefore aware of the argument that “the context for rationality is power
– power that turns rationality into rationalization.” (p.24). He nevertheless maintains that
“communicative rationality is a desirable and practical approach to transportation
planning” (p.25). As sketched out in the article, communicative rationality mainly
amounts to a conflict-solving strategy which is already in part “employed by effective
transportation planning practitioners” and which he admits has a potential limited
applicability to “a ‘blank slate’ planning exercise undistorted by power and constrained

145
by government regulation and funding formulae,” rendering it essentially useless for the
complex context of EU policy making (quotes from pp.24-25). Nevertheless, his attempt
to apply a communicative rationality form of transport planning to the specific transport
policy of parking provision for rail transit station areas remains an interesting exercise
that might be applied to the European context as well. Moreover, table 4.2, taken from
his article, provides a useful summary comparison of traditional (“instrumental”) and
communicative rationality approaches.
Table 4.2 Comparing Instrumental and Communicative Rationality
Issue Instrumental Rationality Communicative Rationality
1. Role of the
Planner
2. Purpose of
planning
3. Planning
Process
Expert/analyst. Often a specialist
(e.g. modeling, community affairs,
finance, etc.). Official role is
objective, but usually plays a
political role
Problem solving and optimization,
with a rational decision-maker as
the client. Finding the best solution
for a fixed and known set of ends.
A sequence of linear steps (with
feedback). Assumes that facts and
values can be addressed separately.
Action follows knowledge.
4.Communication Planners’ communication is
assumed to provide accurate
representation of facts and values;
has standard meaning outside of
action.
5. Problem
framing
6. Analysis /
Modeling
Source: Willson (2001:14)
Problems can be defined and
bounded in a single frame; problems
can be broken into pieces and
recombined; problems can be
defined in the absence of solutions:
problems can be solved.
Reductionism, reliance on data and
models as forms of inquiry.
Knowledge is empirically
established.
Communicative expert with technical
knowledge and skill. Plays multiple
roles – process design, activist
mediation, education and technical
roles. Self discloses roles.
Reaching an understanding that
facilitates action. Increasing capacity
for reasoned deliberation and
democratic decision-making.
Recursive process: fact, value and
discovery are interlinked. Emphasizes
learning and consensus building. Is
invented/modified as part of the
planning activity. Action and
knowledge are simultaneous.
Communicative processes produce
meaning and linguistic “action”.
Planners seeks to improve the validity
with which claims are made, e.g.
truthfulness, legitimacy and sincerity.
Multiple problem definitions and
frames are acknowledged; problems are
broadly bounded. Planning actively
engages multiple problem frames, seeks
creative redefinition.
Quick-response models used along with
other forms of knowing. Modeling
claims are part of discourse.

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4.5 Political Economy
Only through critical re-engagement with political-economy … can we hope to reestablish
a conception of social justice as something to be fought for as a key value
within an ethics of political solidarity built across different places.
David Harvey (1996:360)
4.5.1 Introducing the Framework
In the discursive framework of political economy, the overarching theme or goal
is not the “sustainable” growth of the economy or the preservation of the Earth’s
ecological balance but simply and plainly “equity.” Equity is interpreted most commonly
in terms of social (and, slightly more problematically, environmental) justice. The key
unit of analysis is thus society. In the following sections, I also recognize several
political economy approaches that are more concerned with spatial distributional aspects
than with social ones, since the respective spaces are ultimately connected to different
populations. The key relevance for policy lies in political economy’s focus on
redistributive action.
Like renunciation approaches (and, to a lesser extent,
communicative rationality), political economy approaches are to be understood as
alternatives, not complements, of the dominant approach of ecological modernization,
and most political economy approaches are explicitly anti-capitalist.
David Harvey’s (1996) much debated Justice, Nature and the Geography of
Difference provides a useful example for an academic study written within the discursive
framework of political economy. In the book, Harvey in fact provides an explicit critique
of the ecological modernization framework (pp.382-3):
As a discourse, ecological modernization internalizes conflict. …. It can be
appropriated by multinational corporations to legitimize a global grab to manage all of
the world’s resources. Indeed, it is not impossible to imagine a world in which big

147
industry (certain segments), big governments (including the World Bank) and
establishment, high tech big science can get to dominate the world even more than
they currently do in the name of “sustainability,” ecological modernization and
appropriate global management of the supposedly fragile health of planet earth.
Against this threat, Harvey is sympathetic to the environmental justice movement
– a key variant of political economy approaches – because it “advances a discourse
radically at odds with the standard view and ecological modernization.
Putting
inequalities at the top of the environmental agenda directly challenges the dominant
discourses” (p.385). Unlike green environmental groups like WWF, NRDC or
Greenpeace, who fight for the protection of wild land and endangered species, the
environmental justice movement, as Harvey points out, “puts the survival of people in
general, and of the poor and marginalized in particular, at the center of its concerns”
(p.386). Harvey is more skeptical, however, of the movement’s so-called “militant
particularist” tendencies that overemphasize doctrines of local cultural autonomy and
place-bound politics to the point where “not-in-my-backyard” politics simply mutate to
generalized “not-in-anyone’s-backyard” principles. 34
Yet as an urban theorist, Harvey is
practically forced to theoretically engage with the environmental justice movement, since
it is one of the few movements that explicitly refocus environmental problem perception
away from emission, pollution and biodiversity issues towards issues that directly affect
local communities, such as health impacts, noise or economic affordability. Political
economy approaches more generally and the environmental justice movement in
particular are thus representative of what is sometimes called the “brown agenda” of
34 To provide a perfect, very self-aware European example of this: On their web-page, the European activist
NGO ASEED advertises their “Map on Activities on Transport in Europe” (MATE) materials with the
following words: “With the p. booklet, you will be able to find out about new transport plans in your part of
the continent, and also who to contact in case you might not like a six lane motorway in your backyard (or
anybody else’s backyard)” (http://www.aseed.net/publications/publications.htm#mate, assessed May 2002).

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environmental policy. Table 4.3 (below) provides an overview of the key differences
between so-called “brown” versus “green” agenda environmental policy. Central issues
such as the redistribution of both positive growth benefits and negative environmental
impacts are not addressed to the same extent in any other discursive framework. 35
Power
struggles over environmental resources, especially at the local level, are key themes in
the political economy framework.
Given the strongly local activist roots of most larger environmental organizations
fighting against further transport infrastructure expansion in Europe, it is not surprising
that most of them employ a mix of both “green” and “brown” arguments (sometimes
mixing them to a point where it obfuscates their overall argument). The same is true for
the EU, whose Commission continually produces policy statements applicable to both,
brown and green agendas, with an eco-modernist emphasis on the latter. Of late, the
Environment Directorate’s urban policies have emphasized land use and brownfields
issues, as well as more standard green environment themes (see Commission of the
European Communities 1998a; Commission of the European Communities and Expert
Group on the Urban Environment 2001g). Meanwhile, the EU’s general Urban Agenda
(Commission of the European Communities 1997a) also emphasizes “brown” issues such
as unemployment and social exclusion. More generally, the EU is of course also quite
conscious of the need to consider distributive aspects of environmental problems.
Typically, these aspects are (more or less implicitly) subsumed under mentions of “social
sustainability” or “social cohesion.”
35 Note that a process-oriented framework such as communicative rationality can in principle not be faulted
for failing to pre-specify negative substantive outcomes such as inequality or environmental destruction.

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Table 4.3 “Brown” Agenda versus “Green” Agenda Environmental Policy
“Brown Agenda”
“Green Agenda”
Problem perception
regarding
- First order impact Human health >> “Society”
- Timing
Immediate
- Scale
Local
- Worst affected Lower-income groups
- Economy Focus on problems related to
poverty (affordability)
Attitude towards
- Nature
- People
- Environmental
Services
Aspects emphasized in
relation to transport
Manipulate to serve human
needs
Work with
Provide more
Local Pollution, Noise
Traffic Accidents
Access & affordability problems
Ecosystem health,
Biodiversity >> “Nature”
Delayed
Regional and global
Future generations
Focus on problems related to
affluence
(over-consumption)
Protect and work with
Educate
Use Less /
Use more efficiently
Impact of infrastructures on
natural habitats and species
Global warming,
Global emissions
for disadvantaged groups
Typical Proponent “Urbanist” “Environmentalist”
Discursive Framework Political Economy Radical version: Renunciation
Managerial (weaker) Version:
Ecological Modernization
Source: Adapted and expanded from McGranahan and Satterwaite (2000)
4.5.2 Political Economy as a Framework for EU Transport Policy
To researchers and theorists coming from a society-oriented political economy
perspective, the differential access and mobility constraints of people depending on
income, age, class, race or gender are crucial aspects of sustainability analyses. A few
examples from the general transport literature serve to illustrate the approach. For one,
many studies show that poor people are typically also transport-poor, i.e. either
dependent on inadequate public transit or walking. Even for Los Angeles, the epitome of
the 20 th century car-city, Meyerhoff, Micozzi and Rowen (1992:153) found that “for the
very poor, accessibility to transportation is a major factor influencing the capacity to
satisfy even the most rudimentary needs, such as food, shelter, employment, and medical

150
care.” 36
Schaeffer and Sclar’s (1980:111ff) classic account Access for All strove to
illustrate how reliance on automobile transport has severely restricted the mobility of
youth and the elderly. More recently, environmental justice-oriented scholars such as
Bullard and Johnson (1997:1) have reminded us that “transportation development policies
did not emerge in a race- and class-neutral society.” In the same volume, Holmes
(1997:22) shows how “poor people and people of color … pay the highest social,
economic and environmental costs and receive the fewest benefits from an automobiledominated
transportation system.”
In addition to this, a large number of studies have pointed to gender-imbalances in
transport, showing how women have less access to cars, and are thus also more likely to
be captive transit riders, i.e. passenger with no other modal choice. 37 Meanwhile,
women’s domestic care-taking responsibilities typically require more localized, off-peak
trip-making – a need very poorly met in most communities (for an overview of the
gender and transport problematique see Grieco, Pickup et al. 1989; Hamilton, Jenkins et
al. 1991; Levy 1992; Rosenbloom 1993; Turner and Fouracre 1995; Wachs 1998;
Hamilton 2000; Peters 2000).
In pointing out these differences, political economy-oriented scholars are mainly
interested in the distributional effects of transport infrastructure investments. The typical
research questions they ask point to the unequal benefits accruing to various social
groups or, if more spatially-oriented, to different regions. A standard criticism by
environmental NGOs is that international development institutions like the World Bank
36 Eric Mann (1997) further illustrates how Los Angeles’ heavily subsidized new rail system is largely
benefiting white suburban commuters, while the proposed fare hikes and service cuts for the much more
extensive inner-city bus systems were to disproportionately affect poor minority households.
37 Interestingly, according to Black (1995:302), the now widely used distinction between “choice” and
“captive” riders was first made by Louis Keefer in a Pittsburgh Area Transportation study around 1960.

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or the European Investment Bank favor efficiency and growth over equity concerns, and
this certainly also applies to the EU’s transport agenda. International lending criteria give
priority to transport projects for so-called ‘strategic’ infrastructures for high-speed modes
and longer-distance links at the expense of more local, lower-speed, accessibility
enhancing interventions that are more relevant to the life situations to the poorest
segments of the population (for some summary accounts, see Dimitriou 1992; Barter
1998; Hook 1998b). This bias certainly also holds true for the European Union’s
ambitious Trans-European Transport Network program. Kai Lemberg’s (1995) case
study on the decision-making process concerning fixed transport links across the Baltic
Sea in Scandinavia is a perfect example of a political economy approach to EU transport
policy. Lemberg finds that
when analysing benefits and costs of a transportation project or (alternative) networks
we must always ask: to the benefit of whom? and at the cost of whom? Unfortunately
these questions have not generally been put in the public reports on the three [Trans-]
European links in Denmark.
(p. 281)
Interestingly, Lemberg’s case study shows that a political majority for (more
environmentally sustainable) bored railway tunnels was converted into a majority for
combined motorway/railway bridges mainly through the effective lobbying efforts of the
European Roundtable of Industrialists. He documents how this organization of large
European companies, with the support of the EC commission, the Danish motor lobby,
and powerful trade union leaders was able to use its resources and connections to
influence the decisions in the Danish national parliament in their favor, although “no
proof has been given that the Great Belt Bridge and the Sound Bridge constitute the most
economical use of resources in transport policy” (Lemberg 1995:284). In the opinion of

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equity-oriented political economists, Trans-European Networks are thus largely designed
to support the interests of powerful, trans-national private sector interests. Since the socalled
“missing links” are largely intended to eliminate “bottlenecks” (also see Chapter 6)
and improve international through traffic, the benefits to the local economies in which the
links are to be built are likely to be relatively minor. Nevertheless, political economists
point out, the local and regional governments are still expected to shoulder a major part
of the financial burden of constructing the infrastructures.
Political economists increasingly use discourse analysis to point to persisting
inequalities and discrepancies between rhetoric and reality in the transport sector. 38
A
concise presentation of a such a discourse-oriented political economy perspective in
transport was recently published by Guy Baeten in his article Tragedy of the Highway:
Empowerment, disempowerment and the politics of sustainability discourses and
practices. Chapter 2 already quoted his political-economy definition of sustainable
transport. His overall argument, summarized in the abstract, is the following:
The orthodox sustainable transport vision leads to the further empowerment of
technocratic and elitist groups in society while simultaneously contributing to the
further disempowerment of those marginalized social groups who were already
bearing the burden of the environmental problems resulting from a troubled transport
system. … The issues of transport inequality and transport poverty should be reinserted
into the dominant transport polity [sic] debates and practices.
(Baeten 2000:69)
There are several important aspects to this transport-oriented political economy
argument, which is why I shall discuss the article in some detail here. For one, Baeten is
one of the few European advocates for an environmental justice perspective to
38 Clearly, I would include myself in this category.

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sustainable transport. Quoting Bullard (1990), 39 he criticizes the fact that “ the simple
fact that environmental inequalities reinforce and are reinforced by social inequalities is
hardly taken up by current debates on sustainable transport” (p.71). Quoting Sachs
(1993), Baeten subsequently attacks “globalized environmentalism” as an undemocratic,
technocratic endeavour “run by an international elite” that has little interest in addressing
environmental problems at the local level. He also reinserts the issue of “class” into this
debate, ultimately classifying (and rejecting) middle class environmentalism as “a
conservative movement, in the sense that it does not challenge capitalism: […] it allows
capitalism to adjust to its ecological contradictions.” Most importantly, he concludes that
“such a stance, clearly, is highly compatible with [mainstream] sustainability rhetoric”
(p.72). In the end, only the left is left to reveal the “’bourgeois character’ of
contemporary environmentalism” (p.73). 40
To Baeten, exclusion is a central problem in
transport planning, and it is one that is ignored by mainstream sustainability discourses.
To him, sustainable transport in its current rhetorical form is an unjust concept, since it
privileges policy measures designed to further advance the mobility needs of the rich and
powerful:
39 Note that while Bullard’s 1990 book Dumping in Dixie is in fact not explicitly focusing on transport
issues, Bullard subsequently edited (with Glenn S. Johnson) Just Transportation: Dismantling Race and
Class Barriers to Mobility, which at least to my knowledge is the only full length book exclusively
dedicated to the topic of environmental justice in the context of transportation, albeit written in a North
American context.
40 Baeten uses Gare (1995) to further differentiate his class argument. Drawing upon Bourdieu, Gare
describes a breakdown of modernist class relations into a post-modern constellation in which previously
powerful classes (i.e. the domestic bourgeoisie) are increasingly being subordinated to the influence of a
‘new international bourgeoisie’ and its pertaining new ‘service sub-class’ adhering to “a modern version of
social Darwinism.” The supposed “ideological spearhead” of the new international bourgeoisie is post-
Keynesian neo-classical economics “characterized by supply side economics, dismantling social welfare
provisions, the deregulation of markets, the reduction of trade barriers and the rapid expansion of
econometrics and computer modeling” (Baeten p.77). The new service sub-class – thought by Baeten to
include service providers in the widest sense, including academics and consultants – shares the
international consumer tastes and interests of the new bourgeoisie, despite the fact that this class has failed
to gain any significant political power in the new system.

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Neither economists nor spatial planners have seriously addressed the matter of sociospatial
polarization between the mobile wealthy and the immobile poor. On the
contrary, current transport policy discourses and practices widen the gap between the
mobile wealthy and the immobile poor, because they fail to take into account the
socio-economic consequences of proposed policy measures.
Unfortunately, Baeten’s description of the plight of the “immobile poor” remains
vague and it is not clear how exactly their policy requirements differ from those of the
“mobile wealthy.” He apparently interprets Swyngedouw’s (1993:322) statement that
those “trapped in place, stripped of their capacity to move across space, will suffer in an
age in which mobility has become an even more profitable and extremely powerful
commodity” to mean that poor people are always less mobile than wealthy ones.
In my view, this is a grossly oversimplified view. The “political economy of
mobility” is infinitely more complicated. Socio-spatial polarization certainly exists. Yet
a simple dualistic differentiation between “mobile wealthy” and “immobile poor” renders
a disservice to the overall cause of political economy, because it does not represent the
experience of many disempowered people. So we need to expand on Baeten a bit here.
Firstly, a distinction needs to be made between the distances various social groups
travel, and their means of travel. Secondly, the two are intricately linked. Housing and
transportation are two key capital expenses for any household, and individual locational
decisions and mode choices involve complicated trade-offs that vary greatly according to
local contexts. A few general examples from around the world should suffice to make
the point. In most developing country cities, the poor live in sprawling, often informal
settlements far from the city center, and they spend up to six hours every day getting to
and from home to work, thus traveling much greater distances than their middle class
counterparts (cf. Gannon and Liu 1997). So here it is the poor who continually have to be

155
“on the move” while the wealthy can afford to be more immobile. 41
Mobility in the sense
of daily commuting habits is a burden rather than a luxury. In these cities, only the
middle class and the rich own cars, but normally there is a wide variety of both formal
and informal public transport providing relatively high mobility to all but the very poor.
Meanwhile, in extremely congested cities such as Sao Paulo or Bangkok, around-theclock
gridlock affects everyone. 42
In the end, the problem is less one of mobility within
the city than of access to certain spaces, in particular gated communities and walled in
office complexes. In socialist cities, by contrast, mobility patterns were centrally planned
and neither housing nor employment were allocated according to market principles. And
with the exemption of a very small elite, everyone took public transport and mobility
patterns were less related to income. (This is now quickly changing, of course.) In
Western industrialized cities, which are the focus of Baeten’s article, (auto)mobility is
also less and less a matter of affordability, and congestion makes reduced mobility a
desirable option. Given the attractiveness of many central city neighborhoods, many
higher-income young urban professionals make a conscious choice to live close to their
place of employment, sometimes even selling their cars. Finally, in the US, unmistakably
the most automobilized country in the world, the mobility situation of the rich and the
poor is quite contrary to the one in less developed countries, and housing-transportation
trade-off work in almost opposite directions. Like everywhere else, higher-income
households can make more flexible housing decisions, choosing, for example, a large
single-family home close to a suburban rail-line or a gated penthouse apartment next to
41 Note that “work” in most cases does not mean formal employment here. Yet even informal economy
activities tend to be concentrate in the city center.
42 Baeten is certainly right, however, as far as the exceptional mobility of the super-rich is concerned: in
Sao Paulo in particular, high-level executives escape urban gridlock and violence by door-to-door
commuting via helicopter. See Faiola (2002)

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(safe and clean) public transport. Poor minority households have rather limited housing
choices, however. The cheapest housing is typically located in inner-city neighborhoods.
Many job opportunities for low-skilled workers, by contrast, are in locations which are
not adequately served by public transport. The poor thus incur a “spatial mismatch”
between their low-income inner city residence and their best opportunities for
employment, namely low-paid service sector jobs in suburban office parks, edge cities
and malls that are only accessible by car. 43
The upshot is that even the poor in the US
tend to be individually mobile car owners.
Baeten’s account also ignores gender differences in mobility. In the end, Baeten,
whose key point is that “sustainable transport rhetoric does not address the deeply
conflicting character of transport planning,” is himself partially guilty of not more clearly
spelling out conflicts between environmental and social issues in transport. It seems
dishonest to end with environmental justice/racism arguments that show that the poor are
more affected by pollution. For obviously reasons, the poor also often lead less
environmentally conscious lives in the sense that environmentalism is a luxury they
cannot afford. Poor people drive older, more polluting cars, and they buy fewer ecofriendly
products. 44
Higher levels of environmental awareness typically correlate with
43 The “spatial mismatch” hypothesis is of course still a hotly debated topic in American academia and
beyond. For a historical perspective on the debate, see Kain (1968) and then Kain (1994). For some recent
contributions, see Ilanfeldt and Sjoquist (1998), Taylor and Ong (1995), and McLafferty and Preston
(1996) as well as Wyly (1996) and McLafferty and Preston (1992) for a gender perspective on spatial
mismatch.
44 This does not necessarily mean that poor people necessarily have a more negative overall impact on the
environment than middle class people, however. Given that higher-income households typically also have
higher levels of consumption, they still end up “polluting” more than lower-income households. Compare,
for example, the yearly CO 2 emissions of a poor family of four that owns a smoke-belching old Ford but
can barely afford to go on a few weekend trips with it with those of an environmentally conscious DINK
couple that owns a modern low-emission car, goes on eco-tourist trips to Costa Rica and Nepal and
occasionally flies off to London or Paris for weekend shopping trips. Frequent international long-distance
travel indeed remains a privilege of the better-off.

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higher levels of education and income.
This is an ongoing challenge for
environmentalists and social activists both in Europe and elsewhere.
Other political economy arguments are more framed in terms of a European coreperiphery
divide, building on the implications of the different spatial metaphors related to
European space. 45
A common interpretation of the famous Blue Banana, for example,
was that agglomerations outside the banana were “doomed to failure” in the competitive
European hierarchy. While this is of course an overstatement, there is now strong
empirical evidence confirming that European integration has been of much greater
benefit to central regions than to peripheral regions in the South and the North (Cheshire
1990). Goldsmith (1993:686) further reports that “falling transport costs have a
significant effect on who performs well or badly.” So whatever the precise outline of the
central European geopolitical powerhouse, there has long been a consensus that EU’s
more peripheral regions are likely to be the losers. Spatially-oriented political economy
concerns have also received much additional support through empirical evidence
presented in the new national and regional development studies questioning road
building’s positive effect on growth (also see the discussion under 2.5.4). In the end,
these researchers then argue, the TENs are likely to increase regional disparity in Europe,
rather than foster overall integration and cohesion (as modernizationists like to believe).
Turning attention from academic scholars to local activists, one finds in the
radical anti-capitalist group ASEED a most radical defender of social justice values.
ASEED, a group of young leftist activists who have mounted an extensive network of
45 Such spatial political economy approaches typically strongly rely on the concept of cohesion. Cohesion
is one of the key “storylines” of EU decision-making, and it is analyzed in much more detail in chapter 5.

158
resistance against the Trans-European Networks, gave itself the following mission
statement (see http://www.aseed.net/about.htm), worth quoting in full:
Action for Solidarity, Equality, Environment and Diversity (A SEED) Europe is
against the exploitation of both people and nature. We believe the fundamental causes
of ecological destruction and maldevelopment are patterns of domination and control.
These stem from patriarchy, colonialism, scientific reduction, imperialism and the
more recent imposition of a ruthless, "free" market globalisation. This globalisation
process is being driven by the increasing mobility of capital. Transnational
corporations and their institutional aides such as the World Trade Organisation and
international financial institutions concentrate global wealth and power by breaking
into and destroying local markets and taking away local decision making. Economic
globalisation intensifies inequity on all levels, concentrates resources in the hands of a
shrinking proportion of the world's population. Competition for profits becomes the
main determinant of society. Globalisation leads to every region and individual
competing against each other, creating a vicious downwards spiral where the worst
social and environmental conditions become dominant. Our current economic system
regards nature as a resource to be exploited, which stands in sharp contrast to the
symbiotic relationship of humans as a part of nature. A SEED Europe strives towards
cultural and biological diversity. We reject and work to end discrimination on the basis
of age, class, disability, ethnicity, gender, race, religious belief and sexual preferences.
We support the right of individuals and communities to determine their own lives.
Vital tools towards these aims are: promoting grass root organisation, education,
mobilisation and non-violent direct action such that people are able to act for social
and environmental justice from local to global level. (Lyon, October 1996)
Most political economy approaches are much more moderate, of course. For
example, the goal statement of the European Federation for Transport and Environment
(T&E), the umbrella organization of (alternative) traffic clubs in Europe, also centers its
mission around societal factors of transport, but the organization is much more willing to
work within current societal and political structures, even stressing “efficiency” aspects
(see http://www.t-e.nu):
Transport affects everyone; it must function efficiently while causing minimum
damage to the environment and human health. However, this damage seems to be
increasing rather than diminishing. For this reason T&E speaks out for sustainable
transport in Europe.

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In sum, political economy arguments are both varied and wide-ranging, but
always united in their ultimate focus on the quadruple question “Who benefits, who
suffers, why and how?”.
4.6 Renunciation
4.6.1 Introducing the Framework
In many ways, the renunciation discursive framework is the classical
environmentalist discourse, criticizing the over-consumption and depletion of natural
resources and urging a return to a less resource-intensive way of living. The overarching
theme is ecological balance, and the key unit of analysis is nature. Renunciation
approaches, the most radical of which are also anti-modern, are based on the fundamental
insight that it is impossible for all economies in the world to keep growing and thus
produce environmental impacts in the same way that Western industrial nations have in
the past century. Supporters of the Renunciation discourse do not share ecological
modernization scholars’ (or practitioners) faith in technology’s ability to ensure that
future growth is clean and ecological. The policy dimension for the framework is
protective, eco-centric action.
The most important, and also most stereotypical example of a globally relevant
renunciation discourse is the Deep Ecology / Ecosophy approach. Deep Ecology has a
strong moralistic, and even fundamentalist overtone. Deep Ecology principles are broad
and not easily translatable into one concrete political program. However, in 1984, Deep
Ecology leaders Arne Naess and George Sessions developed an eight-point platform for
supporters of the movement that has become a frequently-cited reference for Deep

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Ecology’s core values and beliefs. Table 4.4 presents this Eight-Point Platform of Deep
Ecology.
A key difference between Deep Ecology and many other environmental
approaches is that Deep Ecology’s starting point is not the value of nature to humans, but
rather the intrinsic, essential value of nature and all beings. Also, Deep Ecology is
committed to action, but not so much at the political as at the individual, personal level.
This includes a “deep questioning” of personal lifestyles and experiences, “self
realization” and the need for each individual to think out his or her “ecosophy”. The
founding father of Deep Ecology, 46 the Norwegian philosopher Arne Naess, is rather up-
front about the normative, fundamentalist nature of such an approach (quoted in
Drengson and Inoue 1995:8):
By an ecosophy I mean a philosophy of ecological harmony or equilibrium. A
philosophy as a kind of sofia (or) wisdom, is openly normative, it contains both norms,
rules, postulates, value priority announcements and hypotheses concerning the state of
affairs in our universe. Wisdom is policy wisdom, prescription, not only scientific
description and prediction. The details of an ecosophy will show many variations due
to significant differences concerning not only the ‘facts’ of pollution, resources,
population, etc. but also value priorities. 47
46 Note that in his 1972 talk that coined the movement’s name, Naess quite explicitly differentiated between
a “long-range deep ecology movement” which deeply questioned fundamental values and a “shallow
ecology movement” which, translated into today’s context and terminology, is essentially the ecological
modernization approach. (A 1973 article based on Naess’ foundational talk is reprinted in Drengson and
Inonue 1995.)
47 Naess emphasizes that supporters of the eight platform principles can hold a wide range of “ultimate”
viewpoints that make up their own, individual ecosophy. Naess’ calls his own ultimate philosophy
“Ecosophy T”, and it is on this basis that Naess supports the Deep Ecology platform. Drengson (1999)
characterizes Naess’ “Ecosophy T” as a philosophy incorporating elements from the Norwegian outdoorliving
movement friluftsliv, from Gandian non-violence, from Mahayana Buddhism and from Spinozan
pantheism.

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Table 4.4 The Eight Points of Deep Ecology
1. The well-being and flourishing of human and non-human life on Earth have value in
themselves (synonyms: intrinsic value, inherent worth). These values are independent
of the usefulness of the non-human world for human purposes.
2. Richness and diversity of life forms contribute to the realization of these values and
are also values in themselves.
3. Humans have no right to reduce this richness and diversity except to satisfy vital
needs.
4. The flourishing of human life and cultures is compatible with a substantially smaller
human population. The flourishing of non-human life requires a smaller human
population. 48
5. Present human interference with the non-human world is excessive, and the situation
is rapidly worsening.
6. Policies must therefore be changed. These policies affect basic economic,
technological, and ideological structures. The resulting state of affairs will be deeply
different from the present.
7. The ideological change will be mainly that of appreciating life quality (dwelling in
situations of inherent value) rather than adhering to an increasingly higher standard of
living. There will be a profound awareness of the difference between bigness and
greatness.
8. Those who subscribe to the foregoing points have an obligation directly or indirectly
to try to implement the necessary changes.
Sources:
multiple, e.g. Devall and Sessions (1985:70-73), Sessions (1995), Drengson (1999)
Deep Ecology is critical of mainstream “industrial culture” that creates
monocultures in agriculture and forestry, destroys indigenous cultures and habitats and
inflates desires to inspire consumption beyond what is vitally necessary. In their place,
the movement’s ecocentric supporters often praise the place-specific, vernacular
technology practices of aboriginal and indigenous people. Deep Ecology also sees itself
compatible with Christian eco-theologies “based on a reverential spirit for Creation”
(Drengson 1999), with Buddhist thought, Ghandian philosophies of non-violence, and
with activist movements such as Bioregionalism. Deep Ecology is also broadly
48 The Deep Ecology literature I have read is remarkably silent in its discussion of this problematic Neo-
Malthusian principle which implicitly bases the foundation of a more ecological society on population
reduction.

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compatible with the Gaia hypothesis, which also presents an all-encompassing outlook on
life as one interconnected whole. 49
The Institute for Deep Ecology is a useful example of an organization that has
attempted to translate such an ecocentric, low-impact approach to human life into
guidelines for daily decision-making (see www.deep-ecology.org/ide_values.html):
We humbly acknowledge our place in the web of life that sustains us. … We commit
ourselves to living more lightly and less violently on Earth in the energy and natural
resources we consume. … Our intention is to reduce, re-use, recycle,…. participate in
or contribute to an ecological restoration activity, … seek affiliations and collaborative
projects as a means to reduce consumption and increase effectiveness, select locations
and plan for programs in ways that minimize travel, especially the solo use of
automobiles, and increase the use of sustainable, local products. [emphasis added]
Traditional conservationist movements aimed at wilderness and wildlife
protection are of course also complementary to the Deep Ecology project. The basic
“protect nature for nature’s sake” argument is an implied, albeit now largely unstated
feature of most current environmental activism.
Most large environmental organizations active in the European Union and in the
accession countries are much less radical in their formulations than the Deep Ecology
platform. The following goal statements of some of the most influential NGOs active in
Europe illustrate how conservation and biodiversity issues are now typically framed
within a larger agenda of environmental and civic activism. Euronatur and BirdLife
49 The Gaia Hypothesis, championed by the British chemist James Lovelock, views the planet as a giant
self-regulating organism (Lovelock 1979; Lovelock 1988). For Lovelock (1988:206, 212) “Gaia is a
religious as well as a scientific concept” meaning that “God and Gaia, theology and science, even physics
and biology are not separate but a single way of thought.” The fact that it has been widely adopted as a
New Age tenet certainly has not helped the credibility of Lovelock’s hypothesis. Nevertheless, the general
concept of biotic regulation of the Earth has recently found some respectability among the biogeochemical
community (Kaiser 2000).

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International, for example, demonstrate how once classic conservationist movements now
have significantly broadened their horizons:
We can only conserve nature with people and not against them - this is one of the
fundamental ideas of the European Natural Heritage Fund (EURONATUR). Our
activities focus on the natural heritage in its diversity, which we endeavour to preserve
for ourselves and for future generations. … The preservation of traditional cultural
landscapes is one of EURONATUR's fundamental aims. Moreover, we want to initiate
a broad international dialogue to increase the quality of environment and life. 50
Many of the pressures that threaten birds, their habitats and biodiversity also have
adverse effects on local communities. Unsustainable use of natural resources deepens
poverty as essential resources are exhausted. … Conservation that excludes people can
lead to increased poverty, resentment and lack of co-operation. An alternative is to
link biodiversity conservation with measures to meet people's needs, through
sustainable economic development, poverty alleviation and improvement of local
livelihoods with bottom-up decision-making. Through the integration of conservation
and development, BirdLife International helps people to achieve a secure livelihood
that is sustainable. This allows the values of natural ecosystems to be realised without
damaging the resources on which human well-being depends. 51
Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth International exemplify the classical allround
perspective of activist environmental NGOs:
Greenpeace is an independently funded organization that works to protect the
environment. We challenge government and industry to halt harmful practices by
negotiating solutions, conducting scientific research, introducing clean alternatives,
carrying out peaceful acts of civil disobedience and educating and engaging the public.
Greenpeace seeks to protect biodiversity in all its forms; prevent pollution of the
earth’s oceans, land, air and fresh water; end all nuclear threats; promote peace, global
disarmament and non-violence. 52
Friends of the Earth International is a worldwide federation of national
environmental organizations. This federation aims to protect the earth against further
deterioration and repair damage inflicted upon the environment by human activities
and negligence; preserve the earth's ecological, cultural and ethnic diversity; increase
50
See www.euronatur.org/euro_engl/start_E.htm. Note that EURONATUR’s website might feature
conservationist principles but that its policies are certainly at odds with Deep Ecology approaches. Also,
given that key EURONATUR sponsors include Lufthansa and DaimlerCrysler, this NGO is far from being
anti-capitalist.
51 See http://www.birdlife.net/people/index.cfm
52 There is no specialized Greenpeace mission statement for Europe. The current quote is taken from the
Greenpeace Canada website (www.greenpeace.ca)

164
public participation and democratic decision-making. Greater democracy is both an
end in itself and is vital to the protection of the environment and the sound
management of natural resources; achieve social, economic and political justice and
equal access to resources and opportunities for men and women on the local, national,
regional and international levels; promote environmentally sustainable development
on the local, national, regional and global levels. 53
The German Branch of Friends of the Earth International, the Bund für Umwelt
und Naturschutz Deutschland (Alliance for Environment and Nature Protection Germany,
BUND) is a perfect example of how nature conservation “went mainstream” during the
1980s and 90s. The BUND itself summarizes its own evolution from a conservationist
movement to a broad activist organization as follows (see www.bund.net):
BUND was founded in 1975 as a federation of pre-existing regional groups. Some
local branches date back to 1913. BUND has its origins in the nature conservation
movement. Today the organisation is one of the most powerful environmental
organisations in Germany. BUND has 375,000 members and supporters. Members are
active in some 2,200 local and regional groups, which do everything from lobbying
work to practical nature conservation. BUND works on all of today's major
environmental issues and is a well recognized lobbyist with a high media profile.
Campaigning priorities are sustainable transport, fighting nuclear power, improving
nature protection laws, and greening the German tax system. Internationally, BUND
works on climate policy and is coordinating Friends of the Earth International´s
campaign on the Rio+10 summit in 2002.
Several large environmental organizations now specifically target the European
Union and its policy-making. None of these take a clearly identifiable eco-centric
renunciation perspective any more. For example, the European Environmental
Bureau’s (EEB) specific mission is “to promote environmental policies and sustainable
policies on the European Union level” (www.eeb.org). For the EEB,
Sustainability is not purely a matter of environmental policies. Social, economic and
cultural dimensions are relevant; the EU has a major influence beyond its own
territory. The environmental dimensions of enlargement, the direct relationships with
53 See http://www.foei.org/about/mission_statement.html.

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regions in the world and the general role of the EU in the global marketplace are areas
of concern for the EEB;
The European office of Friends of the Earth is also typical for the special lobbying
offices NGOs have opened to monitor EU environment activities. 54
FoEE is the largest environmental network in Europe working at grassroots level,
consisting of 31 independent national groups in 30 countries with over 3000 local
chapters. FoEE coordinates and supports the campaigns and projects of its member
groups, which deal with a large variety of subjects such as traffic, waste, EUenlargement,
EU structural funds, trade, tourism, climate change and biotechnology.
Through these activities, FoEE aims to raise public awareness, enhance the
participation of people and environmental citizens' organisations in political processes,
and influence political decision-makers, especially at the European level.
The European Policy office of the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) has even
launched a special Accession Initiative seeking to “raising awareness of the threats and
opportunities for nature conservation and sustainable development connected with the
historic enlargement of the European Union.” 55
Given these broadened agendas, we can conclude that the explicit eco-centrism of
the discursive framework of renunciation really has no direct policy outlet in the
European institutional landscape. Nature protection and conservation have mostly
become mainstreamed into human-centric environmental discourses. 56
What remains
strong among environmentalists, however, is the view that human resource consumption
has to be limited.
54 Also, Climate Network Europe (CAN), the European Federation for Transport and Environment, the
International Friends of Nature, WWF’s European office, the EEB, BirdLife International, Friends of the
Earth and Greenpeace have formed the so-called “Green G8”, an alliance formed by eight of the largest
European environmental organizations that have as many as 20 million individual members through various
national organizations in Europe. They coordinate joint responses and recommendations to EU decision
makers. For an overview brochure on their joint activities, see http://www.te.nu/Temp%20info/GreenG8Brochure.pdf.
55 See http://www.panda.org/resources/programmes/epo/accession/
56 This fits well with the historical explanation of the concept of ecological modernization Hajer presents.

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4.6.2 Renunciation as a Framework for EU Transport Policy
”El socialismo puede llegar sólo en bicicleta.”
José Antonio Viera-Gallo
Assistant Secretary of Justice in the government of Salvador Allende
With regard to transport aspects of the renunciation frameworks, the bicycle is
both the symbolic and real-life champion of this approach. Non-motorized transport
means zero-emission transport. More importantly, the production of bicycles is much
less resource intensive than the production of cars and other high-tech self-propelled
vehicles. One group within the ecology movement that has particularly focused on the
role of transportation and on the automobile in the industrial society is Ivan Illich and his
circle of friends. Widely regarded as one of the founding thinkers of the ecology
movement, Illich’s approach differs from purely eco-centric approaches in its explicit
focus on social and equity aspects of industrialization. Illich was convinced that “high
quanta of energy degrade social relations just as inevitably as they destroy the physical
milieu”. 57 He was also a fierce advocate of cycling, arguing that the bicycle is in fact a
much more efficient means of transportation than any other mode. His basic argument,
made in the mid-seventies and reiterated by countless sustainable transport advocates
since, is simple:
The model American male devotes more than 1,600 hours a year to his car …. to get
7,500 miles: less than five miles per hour. In countries deprived of a transportation
industry, people manage to do the same, walking wherever they want to go, and they
allocate only 3 to 8 per cent of their society's time budget to traffic instead of 28 per
cent.
57 This quote is from a series of text extracts from “Energy and Equity” available in the Ivan Illich Archives
of the University of Edinburgh’s Cognitive Science department under
http://www.cogsci.ed.ac.uk/~ira/illich/.

167
Man on a bicycle can go three or four times faster than the pedestrian, but uses five
times less energy in the process. … Equipped with this tool, man outstrips the
efficiency of not only all machines but all other animals as well. Bicycles are not only
thermodynamically efficient, they are also cheap. With his much lower salary, the
Chinese acquires his durable bicycle in a fraction of the working hours an American
devotes to the purchase of his obsolescent car. … Eighteen bikes can be parked in the
place of one car, thirty of them can move along in the space devoured by a single
automobile. 58
More importantly, however, Illich’s argument was also an anti-motorization plea
which asked people to renounce the temptation of increasingly accelerated lifestyles both
for environmental and social reasons (“Traffic nibbles away at lifetime”):
Every increase in motorized speed creates new demands on space and time. The use of
the bicycle is self-limiting. It allows people to create a new relationship between their
life-space and their life-time, between their territory and the pulse of their being,
without destroying their inherited balance. The advantages of modern self-powered
traffic are obvious, and ignored. That better traffic runs faster is asserted, but never
proved. Before they ask people to pay for it, those who propose acceleration should try
to display the evidence for their claim. 59
Illich was one of the first thinkers to focus on “the contradiction implicit in the
joint pursuit of equity and industrial growth.” Since then, many of Illich’s colleagues and
friends have produced ecological treatises important in their own right. Wolfgang Sachs,
for example, has published numerous books and papers on the ecological and social
failures of our current transport systems. More generally, he has also propagated the
“virtue of enoughness” against the dominant approach of efficient resource management
(Sachs 1999b). Sachs’ perspective is particularly interesting because it updates Illich’s
fundamental argument about the need to decelerate traffic in a way that it results in a
powerful mix of ecological modernization, reflexive modernization and renunciation
“rationalities.” With Sachs, the renunciation of high-speed transport options appears as a
58 Excerpted from the Chapters “The Industrialization of Traffic” and “Degrees of Self-Powered Mobility”
in “Energy and Equity,” see http://www.cogsci.ed.ac.uk/~ira/illich/.
59 Ibid.

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superior, intelligent solution which individuals are increasingly willing to consider
precisely because in developed country contexts, high-speed mobility now has become
the norm rather than the exception, and because fast-moving daily activity patterns have
become too hectic and exhausting to be enjoyable. The car has become the victim of its
own success, Sachs argues. As Sachs (1999a) summarizes: 60
‘Faster’ and ‘Further’ – alongside the principle of ‘More’ – can be considered as the
main leitmotifs of fossil-powered progress. … But in the setting of today's restlessly
high-speed society, such a Utopia easily becomes exhausted and stale. … Where
unceasing mobility turns into a stressful burden, a desire for leisureliness and
unharriedness is likely to grow. Quite apart from environmental problems, pleasure in
mobility is today increasingly intermingled with frustration. … With mass
motorization the situation has changed, and the relative advantages the car once
conferred have dwindled: the more cars, the less joy. Moreover, as soon as speed is a
general expectation, gaining time is no longer a pleasure, but becomes an obligation.
The power over space and time granted by transportation is becoming a duty rather
than a privilege.… This shift in the emotional base of motorization is an important
ingredient in the search for environ-mentally sound ways of transport. …
Contemplating limits to further growth is a rational strategy against systemic overdevelopment,
because restraint slows down the dynamics of expansion, avoids
additional financial and social burdens, and opens space for planning alternatives. Not
opting for further acceleration and interconnection will offer a range of opportunities
for creating a socially appropriate transport system for the twenty-first century.
Note that Sachs’ “virtue of enoughness” perspective is not strictly eco-centric or
anti-modern but rather anti-utilitarian and non-economic in the sense that it is deeply
conscious of alternative cultural meanings of “production” and “consumption”. Sharply
criticizing “the World Resources Institute and other eco-development agencies” Sachs
(1999b:14) argues that
The interpretation of the state of the world in terms of “resources,” “management” and
“efficiency” may appeal to planners and economists. But it continues to promote
development as a cultural mission…. The more their language is adopted round the
globe, the more difficult it will be to view nature with respect rather than simply as a
resource to be exploited. [emphasis added]
60 The following quotes are a much abbreviated version of the section “Lower Speeds and the Plurality of
Timescales” in Chapter 12 of Planet Dialectics.

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Policy arguments in favor for less long-distance travel have also been made in the
direct context of EU transport policy. For example, in their short article “Transport
Policy in the EU: A Strategy for Sustainable Development,” Sarah Wixey and Steve Lake
(1998) also stress the reduction of travel as the central aspect of any sustainable transport
policy. Moreover, Wixey’s and Lake’s article is useful in spelling out antianthropocentric
arguments for EU transport policy. In their definitional section (p. 2),
Wixey and Lake argue that
In practice, much of what passes for policy on ‘sustainable development’ has a much
narrower remit. The chief focus of much policy claiming to be ‘sustainable’ is on
issues more usefully placed under the category of ‘quality of life.’ [However,]
sustainable development goes beyond a shallow environmental approach or short term
concern for living standards. This paper is implicitly concerned with sustainability
which may in general underpin debates over quality of life, but which addresses a
global concern with limited resources and capacities. The differences are in matters of
scope, in that sustainable development deals with a broader range of issues not all
necessarily linked to questions of human welfare.
In their subsequent discussion of EU transport policy, they come to the same
conclusion I come to in this study, namely that “sustainable transport policy is largely
subordinated to issues of ‘economic growth’ [and that] this seems to be the current
approach taken to the issue of transport in the European Union” (p.3). In particular, they
argue that
Commitments to sustainable development declared in the Maastricht Treaty and the
Fifth Environmental Action Programme (5EAP) cannot be maintained with the EU’s
current TEN policy programme. The EU’s priority projects favour long distance
mobility, gained at the expense of shorter distance transport. [By contrast] even a
fairly basic appreciation of the notion of sustainable development would surely
involve a commitment to reduction of the need to travel.

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Note that while I tend to agree with many of Wixley’s and Lake’s criticisms
launched against EU transport policy, their article unfortunately leaves most of their
assertions empirically unsubstantiated. This is also true for the above-implied direct
trade off between long-distance and short-distance transport. 61
As we have seen in many
of the other sections of this chapter, scholars and practitioners working within other
discursive frameworks would simply disagree with Wixley’s and Lake’s assertion that
sustainable development necessarily includes a reduction in the need to travel. Even very
environmentally-minded political economists are still more likely to argue for a
sustainability definition that would include increased access and mobility of the poor
(which are then preferably to be achieved with less resource-intensive, lower-emission
modes of transport). Wixey’s and Lake’s article is thus a perfect concluding example of
a line of argumentation that is “locked into” a particular discursive framework, i.e. their
key argument is based on definitions, ideological beliefs and premises that are simply not
congruent with those of alternative discursive frameworks.
4.7 Addendum: The “Institutionalist” Focus on EU Space and Governance
Normally, this would conclude our discussion of the different theoretical
approaches to EU transport policy and planning. However, there are several researchers
whom I group under the somewhat awkward sub-heading “institutionalists” whose
contributions deserve at least a brief discussion at this point. These “institutionallyfocused”
researchers concentrate on the central importance of Pan-European transport
61 As we will see in Chapter 9, an argument made with regard to the Budapest ring road is that this EUsupported
local TEN node actually benefits local and regional road traffic more than international traffic,
and that instead the real sustainability problem is that the road capacity investments are not being
complemented by parallel investments into rail-based public transit, thus presenting a further strategic
disadvantaging of rail. Also see Lukács (2001).

171
infrastructures with regard to the EU’s spatial and political integration. They believe that
planning, policy concepts and institutional structures not only matter, but that they can be
shaped and used proactively to positively forge cohesion and integration. Several
specific sub-concerns can be distinguished. For one, most of these scholars are not so
much transport specialists as political scientists and/or planning scholars working on
governance issues, and they are much more concerned with long-term locational
decisions than with the daily movements of goods and people. They agree that largescale
transport infrastructures such as the Channel tunnel or other high-speed rail links
are key re-organizers of European space that have wide-ranging political and economic
consequences. But equally important to them are the locational decisions by the EU and
its member governments regarding their own institutions, notably the emergence of
Brussels as the “European capital” and the relocation of the German capital from Bonn to
the unified Berlin (Williams 1996:93). In emphasizing the need for supranational and
supra-regional planning, they also stress that European transport policy must necessarily
respond to, and be guided by a European-level spatial planning framework. In this
context, several spatial metaphors characterizing the new European landscape of
economic power appear in the literature (see e.g. Masser, Sviden et al. 1992:25; Banister
and Berechman 1993:12; Lemberg 1995:68; Kunzmann 1996; Williams 1996:96), but
Nijkamp (1993:12) warns that these “creative thought experiments ... need to be
substantiated with solid research and proper policy strategies.” 62
Yet another, related
problem with Pan-European transport planning these scholars are always conscious of
62 It should be noted that in relation to the spatial metaphor of a “Northern Arc” of Europe, the
corresponding Via Baltica route from Berlin to St. Petersburg was adopted as the No.1 non-EU TENextension
corridor at the last Pan-European conference of Transport Ministers in Essen in 1995.

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has to do with the very institutional nature of the EU, namely its make-up of independent
nation-states. Kirazidis (1994:116), for example, concludes his study on European
transport as follows:
The main argument of [my] book is that European transport policy rests on the
national transport polices of the twelve component parts and national governments are
still the pivots of political and economic activity. This does not provide an appropriate
framework for resolving dilemmas in transport with respect to economic efficiency,
social justice and environmental quality.
Similarly, Cole and Cole (1997:174) warn that “the EC has neither the legal nor
the financial instruments to guarantee the consistency and continuity of the various types
of specific local aid granted in the transport infrastructure sector”. (Nijkamp and Vleugel
1995:5) also point to the nationalistic and segmented character of previous European
policy making, and then distinguish between reactive, demand-oriented policies where an
increase in mobility is simply followed by an expansion of physical infrastructure, and
proactive, supply-oriented policies where infrastructure supplies are used as a tool to
manage influence and possible redirect transport demand. While clearly favoring the
latter approach, they find European transport policy has so far failed to adopt this
preferable approach mainly due to inertia in policy making and user behavior (i.e.
continued dependence on motor vehicles). From an institutional perspective, a more
long-term, pro-active approach to transport policy is therefore necessary, they argue. In
the end, institutional approaches view the European project much more from a
perspective of “building the European House” – a house in need of solid foundations and
fixed structures. This stands in clear contrast to very liberal modernization approaches,
which tend to favor additional deregulation to create a competitive, free Single European
Market. In the end, however, the institutional perspective is a cross-cutting, and often

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controversial, issue, since many ecological modernization scholars would still support
calls for new and improved governance structures in order to help overcome
environmental challenges.
4.8 Concluding Remarks
The key aim of this long and wide-ranging chapter was to present a description of
both the currently dominant environmental discourse of ecological modernization and of
complementing and contradicting discourses shaping potential transport policy
alternatives. Of course, some distinctions between the different discursive frameworks
sometimes appear somewhat stereotypical, especially when common sense tells us that
most of the relevant stakeholders influencing transport policy in Europe are in fact
employing a mixture of the above distinguished approaches. However, I would argue
that the existence of such multiple policy discourses is precisely the reason for the
enormous success that the discursive framework of ecological modernization has had in
shaping urban, regional, environmental and transport policy in the Europe Union:
ecological modernization offers a win-win perspective that is best poised to incorporate
wide-ranging environmental critiques into an overall, positive future vision of sustainable
development. In his concluding paragraph, Maarten Hajer (1995:294) mused that
the environmental dilemma of modern society will not go away. … It would be a great
improvement if ecological politics would shed its prevailing techno-corporatist format
and create open structures to determine what sort of nature and society we really want.
The evidence on EU transport infrastructure investment rationales presented in the
following chapters betrays Hajer’s hope: Growth and expansion-oriented discourses and
techno-corporatist influences still reign strong in this particular arena.

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Printed on September 21, 2002
Last revised on Sept 15, 2002
PART II: RHETORIC
EU Discourses on Transport Policy and
Transport Infrastructure Investments

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Last modified on September 20, 2002
Chapter 5:
EU Discourses on Sustainable Development,
Transport and Land Use
.
5.1 Introduction..................................................................................................... 176
5.2 EU Discourses on Sustainable Development.................................................. 178
5.2.1 Growth with respect for people’s needs and the environment................ 178
5.2.2 From the Treaty of Rome to the 4th Environmental Action Program .... 179
5.2.3 From the Maastricht Treaty to the Treaty of Amsterdam ....................... 181
5.2.4 The Decision on the Review of “Towards Sustainability” ..................... 184
5.2.5 The EU’s New Strategy for Sustainable Development........................... 186
5.2.6 The Gothenburg European Council ........................................................ 189
5.2.7 The EU White Paper on Governance...................................................... 189
5.2.8 EU Input to the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development....... 190
5.2.9 Summary Remarks and Prospects for Enlargement................................ 192
5.3 EU Discourses on Sustainable Transport........................................................ 194
5.3.1 The White Paper on the Common Transport Policy............................... 196
5.3.2 The White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment .......... 198
5.3.3 The Common Transport Policy Action Program .................................... 200
5.3.4 The Communication on “Sustainable Mobility”..................................... 200
5.3.5 The Green Paper on the Citizen’s Network ............................................ 201
5.3.6 The White Paper on Fair Payment for Infrastructure Use ...................... 202
5.3.7 Transport-specific Conclusions of the Gothenburg European Council .. 203
5.3.8 The White Paper “EU Transport Policy for 2010: Time to Decide” ...... 204
5.3.9 The DG TREN Website.......................................................................... 206
5.3.10 Pan-European Declarations on Sustainable Transport............................ 207
5.4 EU Discourses on Sustainable Urban Development....................................... 208
5.4.1 The Communication “Towards an Urban Agenda in the EU” ............... 209
5.4.2 Sustainable Urban Development in the EU: A Framework for Action .. 210
5.4.3 The European Spatial Development Perspective.................................... 211
5.4.4 The EU’s Input Papers to the 9 th UN CSD Conference in 2001............. 212
5.5 The EU’s Research Frameworks: Funding for the Eco-modernist Agenda ... 213
5.6 Conclusions and Open Questions ................................................................... 216

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5.1 Introduction
Previous chapters have presented a comprehensive outline and overview of five
different discursive frameworks for sustainable policy-making, claiming that EU policy is
influenced by an eco-modernist understanding of sustainable development that avoids a
radical confrontation of environmental and social issues. This chapter undertakes a more
text-oriented review of the most important documents defining the EU’s understanding of
sustainable development, transport and land use in order to support this claim. 1
The
following chapter will then present a more structural, comprehensive evaluation of the
central biases apparent in EU transport policy. 2
Of course, there are scores of EU documents providing definitions and inputs on
the topic of sustainability and sustainable development, but not all documents carry equal
weight. In this chapter, I mostly analyze official EU documents, focusing on various
legally binding EU treaties and acts, on Commission White and Green Papers, as well as
1 The methodology for the document review was as follows: Every paper (or webpage) was first reviewed
for general content. In the vast majority of cases, the documents were available electronically (either in MS
Word or Adobe PDF format), so that they could then also be systematically searched for occurrences of
phrases such as “sustainable development,” “sustainability,” “transport, “mobility,” “land-use” etc. The
extensive cross-referencing common in Commission materials reassured me that no crucial documents were
left out of the analysis. Meanwhile, I of course did leave out scores of EU transport policy documents that
are not explicitly centered around sustainability discourses – also see the note below. In addition to the
actual documents, I reviewed additional press releases, supplementary materials, as well as various
(supportive and antagonistic) lobby group reactions to the different Commission papers in order to
supplement my own reading of the central contents with what various stakeholders had identified as its key
statements. So while often starting off with very text-oriented analyses, I go beyond simple word-by-word
document review in almost all individual analyses and instead strive to capture the larger discourses that
emerged from a particular document.
2 To clarify: Contrary to the following chapter, the focus in this chapter lies on policy documents
expressing official EU rhetoric in the area of sustainability and sustainable transport and mobility. Almost
by definition, a review of these documents will not necessarily be sufficient for gaining a full
understanding of the conflicted general development objectives influencing EU transport infrastructure
investment decisions. Not all EU transport investment decisions even pretend to address sustainability
aims. This is why some of the documents analyzed in the following chapter are not discussed in this
chapter and vice versa.

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on EU Research Framework Program definitions and Commission Communications.
Tables 5.1 gives an overview of the key documents selected for review in this chapter. 3
Table 5.1 Key EU Statements on Sustainability, Transport and Spatial Development
Key statements on sustainable development and environmental policy:
o Communication “Ten Years After Rio: Preparing for the WSSD” (2002)
o Communication “Towards a Global Partnership for Sustainable Development” (2002)
o Gothenburg European Council – Presidency Conclusions (2001)
o European Union Sustainable Development Strategy – SDS (2001)
o The EU White Paper on Governance (2001)
o Sixth Environmental Action Program (2000-2006)
o European Commission Glossary on institutions, policies and enlargement (1999)
o Decision on the Review of the Fifth EAP (1998)
o Treaty of Amsterdam, Article 2 (1997)
o Fifth Environmental Action Program (1993-2000)
o Treaty of the European Union a.k.a. Maastricht Treaty, Articles 2-6 (1992)
o Fourth Environmental Action Program (1987-1992)
o Single European Act, Article 130r (1986)
Key EU statements on sustainable transport and sustainable mobility
o White Paper on European Transport Policy for 2010 – Time to Decide (2001)
o White Paper on Fair Payment for Infrastructure Use (1998)
o The CTP - Sustainable Mobility: Perspectives for the Future (1998)
o Green Paper on the Citizens’ Network (1996)
o White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment (1993)
o White Paper on the Future of the Common Transport Policy” (1992)
o Green Paper on the Impact of Transport on the Environment (1992)
o DG TREN webpage:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/dgs/energy_transport/index_en.html
Key documents on sustainable urban / spatial development and sustainable land-use:
o EU Transport-Sector Input Papers to the 9 th UN CSD Conference (2001)
o European Spatial Development Perspective – ESDP (1999)
o Sustainable Urban Development in the EU: A Framework for Action (1998)
o Communication “Towards an urban agenda in the European Union” (1997)
Source: own compilation
3 Note that not all of the documents received their own sub-section in this chapter. Instead, some of them
are discussed in context with general developments or as lead-in/follow-up to other important documents.

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Most of these documents underwent extensive review processes within the EU,
typically with repeated consultations not only between various Commission Directorate
Generals but also between the Commission, the Council and the Parliament. The
opportunity to carry out this particular type of analysis is especially timely. Over the
course of the last few years, several crucial documents have been officially released by
the Commission providing rather concise, up-to-date statements on the EU’s
understanding on sustainability and transport. Most importantly, the EU released both its
first-ever Sustainable Development Strategy (Commission of the European Communities
2001a) and its long-awaited new White Paper on Transport in 2001 (Commission of the
European Communities 2001f). Several additional papers on sustainable development
were released in preparation for the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development.
Additionally, I look at some more informal documents I was referred to during my
investigation, including the Transport and Energy Directorate’s self-presentation on the
World Wide Web.
5.2 EU Discourses on Sustainable Development
5.2.1 Growth with respect for people’s needs and the environment
In the 1999 European Commission Glossary on institutions, policies and
enlargement (Commission of the European Communities 1999a), sustainable
development is defined in a typical three-dimensional manner:
The concept of sustainable development refers to a form of economic growth which
satisfies society's needs in terms of well-being in the short, medium and - above all -
long terms. It is founded on the assumption that development must meet today's needs
without jeopardising the prospects of future generations. In practical terms, it means
creating the conditions for long-term economic development with due respect for the
environment. The Copenhagen world summit for sustainable [correct: “social”]

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development (March 1995) stressed the need to combat social exclusion and protect
public health.
[Emphasis added]
This definition is particularly interesting in several respects. Its middle section
contains a paraphrasing of the Brundtland definition, and the last two sentences once
again refer to the key dimensions of economy, environment and equity (“social
exclusion”), where we find the important additions of the time and public health
dimensions. Also note the interesting slip about the Copenhagen World Summit for
Social Development.
However, most revealing is the initial sentence, which
unequivocally privileges the economic dimension by defining sustainable development as
a sub-form of economic growth.
This definition thus also implicitly equates
“development” with “growth.” Comprised in a nutshell, we thus find the EU’s central
attitude towards sustainable development as a concept that places certain (environmental
and social) limitations on economic growth.
5.2.2 From the Treaty of Rome to the 4th Environmental Action Program
There is no mention of sustainability or environmental policy in the Treaty of
Rome which established the European Economic Community (EEC) in 1957. Rather, the
primary objective of the EEC was the “harmonious development of economic activities.”
The first EEC environmental action program was adopted on November 22, 1973 in the
wake of the first UN conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm in 1972. At
this time, environmental policy making remained both closed and technocratic, and issues
developed in an ad hoc and incremental fashion (Jordan 1998).

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It was the Single European Act (SEA) that provided environmental policy with a
firm legal basis for action. Article 130r of the SEA sets out the following objectives:
to preserve, protect and improve the quality of the environment;
to contribute toward protecting human health;
to ensure a prudent and rational utilization of natural resources
(quoted in: Collier 1996:6)
The Single European Act also introduced the polluter pays and the precautionary
principles, and introduced qualified majority voting for environmental measures. 4
After
this, EU environmental legislation increased exponentially. For example, in the two short
years between 1989 and 1991, the Environmental Council adopted more policies than it
had in the 20 years before that (Jordan 1998). Following the Single European Act, the
Fourth Environmental Action Program (EAP 1987-1992) marked an important shift from
a sectoral approach carving up environmental issues according to various subject areas
towards an integrated approach that took a more comprehensive view. It also began to
focus more on the key question of implementation.
4 Note that in ratifying the Rio Declaration, the EU had already de facto accepted the precautionary
principle. The Rio Declaration mentions and explains the concept in the following manner:
In order to protect the environment, the precautionary approach shall be widely applied by States
according to their capabilities. Where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full
scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent
environmental degradation.
The ‘polluter pays’ principle is also one of the key environmental principles of the EU Treaty. In 2000, the
Commission adopted a White Paper on Environmental Liability (COM [2000] 66 final) which explores the
details of how to implement the general principle, concluding that the best option was to issue a new
Framework Directive on Environmental Liability. Also see
http://europa.eu.int/comm/environment/liability (last accessed on Jan 10, 2002). Qualified Majority Voting
(QMV) is one of several formal rules of decision for the European Council, as contrasted with unanimity,
simple majority voting, or the co-decision procedure which includes the parliament. Decision rules have
been amended several times in successive treaty reforms. However, even in the latter revisions to Article
130r in the Maastricht Treaty, several significant areas of policy making remained exempted from QMV,
among them fiscal, town, country and land use planning, as well as energy measures (see Collier 1996:6).

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5.2.3 From the Maastricht Treaty to the Treaty of Amsterdam
Despite these important steps forward, sustainable development was still not yet
fully mainstreamed into EU policy. In the 1992 Treaty on European Union (TEU, or
Maastricht Treaty) the concept of sustainability is mentioned in the first substantial
paragraph, but, consistent with the glossary definition, the concept remains framed in a
context of economic growth, thus leaving issues of deep ecological challenges and social
conflict to be fought out in other arenas. The exact wording of Article 2 of the TEU is as
follows:
The Community shall have as its task […] to promote throughout the Community a
harmonious, balanced and sustainable development of economic activities, a high
level of employment and of social protection, equality between men and women,
sustainable and non-inflationary growth, a high degree of competitiveness and
convergence of economic performance, a high level of protection and improvement of
the quality of the environment, the raising of the standard of living and quality of life
and economic and social cohesion and solidarity among Member States.”
[my emphasis]
In Article 3 of the Maastricht Treaty, the EU sets out a series of policy goals for
itself, three of which are of particular relevance to this study:
[T]he activities of the Community shall include …:
(f) a common transport policy
…
(k) the strengthening of economic and social cohesion
(l) a policy in the sphere of the environment
Additionally, Article 6 of the Maastricht Treaty demands the following:
Environmental protection requirements must be integrated into the definition and
implementation of the Community polices and activities referred to in Article 3, in
particular with a view to promoting sustainable development.

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This article is frequently quoted by environmental groups working on both
transport and other substantive areas of EU policy such as market integration,
employment, or agriculture to point out that the EU is acting in violation of the
Maastricht Treaty whenever serious environmental protection requirements are ignored.
It was left to the Fifth Environmental Action Programme (EAP) of the EU to
more clearly define the community’s commitment to sustainable development. EAPs had
already been a key feature of EU environmental policy since the early 1970s. The Fifth
EAP covered the period from 1993 to 2000. Tellingly entitled “Towards Sustainability,”
the program provides the following, rather traditional definition of sustainability :
the word 'sustainable' is intended to reflect a policy and strategy for the continued
economic and social development without detriment to the environment and the
natural resources on the quality of which continued human activity and further
development depend. [my emphasis]
The Fifth Action Program signaled the Commission’s move away from a more
traditional “command and control” approach to environmental protection towards the use
of new instruments such as eco-audits, eco-labels, voluntary agreements and even
variants of eco-taxes, which can be summarized under the heading of “new marketinformation-based
elements” (Sbragia 2000:315).
In 1995, the European Environment Agency presented a rather critical report on
the state of Europe’s environment (European Environment Agency 1995), making it clear
that even increases and advances in environmental protection are no guarantors for a
move towards sustainable development: “The EU is making progress in reducing certain
pressure on the environment, though this is not enough to improve the general quality of
the environment and even less to progress towards sustainable development” (EEA, 1995
as quoted in Collier not dated).

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The 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam (ToA) then produced several important
amendments and revisions to the Treaty on European Union and made an even stronger
commitment to sustainability by explicitly and unequivocally referring to the principle of
sustainable development in its preamble and then calling for sustainable development in
its first substantive paragraph. Compare Article 2 of the 1992 Maastricht Treaty with
Article 2 of the 1997 Amsterdam Treaty:
The Union shall have as its basis the following objectives:
- to promote economic and social progress and a high level of employment and to
achieve balanced and sustainable development, in particular through the creation of an
area without internal frontiers, through the strengthening of economic and social
cohesion and through the establishment of economic and monetary union […].
[Emphasis added]
Particularly noteworthy is the conspicuous absence of the term “economic
growth” in the formulation of both this and the four other objectives. The term
“progress” fills in the blank here. Also of interest is the mention of the problematic term
“cohesion” next to the calls for market integration and monetary union. 5
Following the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED,
or ‘Rio Earth Summit’), the EU has been one of the most committed governments with
regard to promoting Agenda 21, which, together with the Rio Declaration, was the major
outcome of this international conference. Just in time for the Earth Summit, the
Commission also published a “Green Paper on Transport and the Environment” designed
to reflect the EU’s growing concern about transport’s impact on the greenhouse effect
and rising CO2 emissions (Commission of the European Communities 1992a). While
transport’s role in global environmental deterioration is thus widely acknowledged,
Agenda 21 still did not include a separate chapter on transport to reflect its importance.
5 Note that a more extensive discussion of the controversial term is provided in later chapters.

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However, energy – easily one of the most controversial topics both during the Rio
Summit and in the ensuing string of UN Conferences on Climate Change and Sustainable
Development - also did not receive its own chapter. The obvious explanation here is that
in view of the persistent disagreements on global energy or transport policy matters, the
drafters of Agenda 21 and its subsequent documents preferred to conceal this
embarrassing fact by mainstreaming the topics under different headings.
In the last few years, partly in light of the five-year review of the Rio Summit, the
EU has presented several important documents with regard to sustainable development.
Two key documents, the 1998 Decision on the Review of the Fifth EAP and the EU's
New Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS) both assign particular relevance to the
transport sector. They therefore deserve a quick introduction:
5.2.4 The Decision on the Review of “Towards Sustainability”
The Fifth EAP provided for a review of its measures and actions to be undertaken
before the end of 1995. With the 1998 Decision, the EU, somewhat belatedly, reacted to
this provision as well as the EAA's Dobris Assessment on Europe's environment
(European Environment Agency 1995) and the Commission's own progress report on the
Fifth EAP. Additionally, since both the adoption of Agenda 21 internationally, and the
adoption of the EU's White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment
happened after the adoption of the 5 th EAP, the Commission decided that a clearer
definition of key priorities and issues for the remaining two years of the EAP was needed
to speed up the EAP's objectives.

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The 1998 Decision is particularly relevant in that transport, together with
agriculture, energy, industry, and tourism, was one of five chosen “target sectors” whose
selection was to give “additional impetus” to the implementation in the two remaining
years of the program. While this is certainly commendable, actual listed priority
objectives within the transport sector were rather pedestrian and largely repeated previous
eco-modernist commitments and sound bites, e.g. “tighten provisions on emissions and
noise,” “achieve better internalisation of external costs in transport prices,” “promoting a
more integrated transport policy,” “better integration of land-use and transportation,”
“promoting demand-management measures,” “facilitating intermodality,” or
“encouraging public and/or collective transport and low-emission vehicles.” However,
the decision also mentioned the concrete aim to reduce the imbalances between different
transport modes by developing methodologies for Strategic Environmental Assessment
(SEA) 6 for the TENs and for corridor analysis. This concrete aim eventually translated
into several pilot studies in that area, as well as an entire handbook on SEA. However, to
date, there has been no SEA performed on either the TENs or TINA (also see Chapter 7).
Remarkably, the Decision does not contain a single mention of (the need to
promote) non-motorized transport, and apart from cursory mentions of the need to favor
public transport, the transport priority section is entirely silent on the topic of urban
transport. This is especially surprising given the fact that in a later section on priority
issue areas, Article 10 on the “promotion of local and regional initiatives” specifically
mentions that “particular attention will be given to [...] (b) developing a comprehensive
6 SEAs are sometimes also called Strategic Environmental Impact Assessments (SEIAs). SEA is the more
commonly used acronym that is used throughout this study. The actual phrase used in the decision is more
already cautious not to demand outright that an SEA on the TENs be performed - a long-term demand of
environmental NGOs - but rather aims at “developing potential methods of analysis with a view to strategic
evaluation of the environmental impact of the trans-European transport network.” Also see Chapter 7.

186
approach to urban issues ..., and (c) promoting the exchange of experience between local
authorities in relation to sustainable transport initiatives.”
5.2.5 The EU’s New Strategy for Sustainable Development
Just in time for the Gothenburg Summit in June 2001, the Commission presented
the Communication “A Sustainable Europe for a Better World: A European Union
Strategy for Sustainable Development” (Commission of the European Communities
2001a, henceforth abbreviated SDS). With this Communication, the Commission
responded to the European Council request at the 1999 Helsinki Summit “to prepare a
proposal for a long-term strategy dovetailing policies for economically, socially and
ecologically sustainable development to be presented to the European Council in June
2001” (p.2). In between Helsinki and Gothenburg, the Lisbon Summit had somewhat
amended the task by setting a new strategic goal for the Union “to become the most
competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world capable of sustainable
economic growth with more and better jobs and greater social cohesion.” Thus, it was
clear that the key EU development themes of the last few years, i.e. competition, growth,
information economy, employment and cohesion, all had to be worked into the SDS.
The SDS itself is a remarkable document in several respects. After a few
predictable introductory remarks with bold-printed reminders of how “economic growth,
social cohesion and environmental protection must go hand in hand” and of how
sustainable development offers a “positive long-term vision,” we find already the first
new important development theme on the first page: the call for “decoupling
environmental degradation and resource consumption from economic and social

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developments.” This de-coupling theme has emerged with particular force in the
transport sector, where discussions on de-coupling additional growth in transport activity
from economic growth has emerged as a new principal goal of European transport policy
(also see below).
The SDS subsequently identifies six major threats to sustainable development.
For two of them, “combating poverty and social exclusion,” and the “dealing with the
economic and social implication of an aging of the society” the SDS refrains from
proposing any new actions and measures since recent European Councils at Lisbon, Nice
and Stockholm supposedly already addressed these sufficiently. The four remaining
priorities, for which new measures and actions are proposed, are as follows:
?? Limit climate change and increase the use of clean energy
?? Address threats to public health
?? Manage natural resources more responsibly
?? Improve the transport system and land-use management
With regard to the first commitment, the EU thinks out loud beyond Kyoto (its
commitment to which the Union renews), aiming for a reduction in atmospheric
greenhouse gas emissions by an average of 1 percent per year over 1990 levels up to
2020. Moreover, the EU aims for a 7 percent share of alternative fuels for all cars and
trucks by 2010 and at least 20 percent by 2020, with a proposal to be adopted by the
Commission in 2005 (see p.10).
As for transport sector proposals, the aim to decouple transport growth from GDP
growth is stated as the first headline objective, complemented with a concrete proposal to
shift from road to rail, water and public transport “so that the share of road transport in

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2010 is no greater than in 1998” (p.12). Other noteworthy elements are the already
previously announced revision of the guidelines for the (financing of) the TENs, due for
proposal in 2001, and a “marked reduction in the share of finance given to road
transport.” Teleworking is also to be promoted. Even more interestingly, the
Commission proposes to “assess the coherence of the zoning of different Community
policies,” which responds to criticisms that geographical eligibility criteria for
Community funding programs often seem illogical, outdated or simply inappropriate. As
far as spatial policies are concerned, the SDS simply refers to and re-endorses the
European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) and avoids any clarification of the
problem of rural-urban divides by simultaneously proposing to both “diversify income
sources in rural areas” and “encourage local initiatives to tackle the problems faced by
urban areas” (all quotes from p. 13). Among the provisions for the implementation and
review of the SDS are the proposal to establish a ‘Sustainable Development Round Table'
of 10 independent high-level experts and plans to hold a two-yearly Stakeholder Forum.
As might be expected, reactions to the SDS have been mixed. In an Open Letter,
the Green G8, i.e. the eight largest environmental NGOs in Europe, released a concise
ten-point statement that welcome many of the elements in the strategy, particularly the
intention to progressively decouple resource use from economic growth, costing polluting
and removing ‘perverse subsidies,’ including in the transport sector (BirdLife
International, Climate Network Europe et al. May 29, 2001). However, the NGOs also
contend that the global dimension of the SDS remains weak, that consultation was
marginal and that there is no clear indication in the strategy of what constitutes firm
policy commitments and what general policy aspirations.
Predictably, the

189
environmentalists also strongly reject the strategy’s intention to support research, and
development of technology related to nuclear energy (or rather: nuclear waste).
5.2.6 The Gothenburg European Council
The Gothenburg European Council in June 2001 “agreed on a strategy for
sustainable development” (p.1) and, congruent with the SDS, selected four policy priority
areas in which to develop guiding measures and objectives: climate change, transport,
public health, and natural resources. Yet once again, the EU’s discourse is steeped in an
industry-friendly, technology-oriented rhetoric that emphasizes the win-win character of
integrating sustainability objectives into policy-making. The presidency conclusions do,
however, also reemphasize the necessity to achieve economic growth without
proportional increases in resource use (European Union 2001:4):
Clear and stable objectives for sustainable development will present significant
economic opportunities. This has the potential to unleash a new wave of technological
innovation and
investment, generating growth and employment. The European Council invites
industry to take part in the development and wider use of new environmentally
friendly technologies in sectors such as energy and transport. In this context the
European Council stresses the importance of decoupling economic growth from
resource use.
The transport-specific conclusions of this important Council are described in section
5.3. below.
5.2.7 The EU White Paper on Governance
The new EU White Paper on European Governance (Commission of the European
Communities 2001h) puts forth five general principles for good, democratic governance
in the EU which can be seen as stand-ins for what is usually considered “social

190
sustainability” in the widest sense: openness, participation, accountability, effectiveness
and coherence. The White Paper rarely uses the terms “sustainable” or “sustainability,”
however, and these references always links back to the Sustainable Development
Strategy. Yet there is one passage on policy coherence which makes direct reference to
transport and land use questions, emphasizing the need for enhanced dialogue between
different levels of government (p.13):
The territorial impacts of EU policies in areas such as transport, energy or
environment should be addressed. These policies should form part of a coherent
whole as stated in the EU’s second cohesion report; there is a need to avoid a logic
which is too sector-specific. In the same way, decisions taken at regional and local
levels should be coherent with a broader set of principles that would underpin more
sustainable and balanced territorial development within the Union.
Sustainability is thus also seen as having a strong institutional dimension.
5.2.8 EU Input to the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development
The EU released several papers in preparation of the UN World Summit on
Sustainable Development in Johannesburg (August 24 th
– September 4 th 2002). A
special webpage documenting the EU’s input and involvement in the WSSD
(http://europa.eu.int/comm/environment/wssd/index_en.html) was created presenting the
by-now typical, massive onslaught of downloadable related EU speeches, press releases,
fact sheets, reports, glossy brochures and other background materials, including the SDS
itself. Two Commission Communications summarize the EU’s approach to the WSSD.
Both are extremely broad in their agendas. The transport sector receives numerous
mentions in both documents, but neither one assigns an especially privileged role to the
sector. 7
This is not surprising in light of the fact that the WSSD agenda itself does not
7 The first Communication, released in February 2001 (Commission of the European Communities 2001o),
sets out four broad strategic objectives (“increased global equity and an effective partnership;” “better

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directly focus on transport issues. Instead, the WSSD plenary sessions are organized
around the six topics “health,” “biodiversity/ecosystems,” “agriculture,” “cross-sectoral
issues” (e.g. trade, technology, consumptions patterns, education), “water/sanitation,” and
“energy.” In the end, both the various EU contributions and the overall agenda of the
WSSD once again demonstrate that, ten years after the Rio Earth Summit, the term
“sustainable development” has largely lost its environmental(ist) focus and is now used
as a stand-in for any type of “good” development.
Interestingly, on the new WSSD-related EU website, one also finds a section on
“Frequently Asked Questions about the EU and its position on the World Summit on
Sustainable Development.” After presenting a slightly modified Brundtland definition,
the first question, “What is sustainable development?” is answered as follows:
Sustainable development focuses on improving the quality of life for all citizens
without increasing the use of natural resources beyond the capacity of the environment
to supply them indefinitely. … It is about taking action, changing policy and practice
at all levels, from the individual to the international. Sustainable development is not a
new idea. Many cultures over the course of human history have recognised the need
for harmony between the environment, society and economy. It is the articulation of
these ideas in the context of a global industrial and information society that is new.
There is an important horizontal nature of the sustainable development challenge: it is
not something you can neatly put into boxes - economic, social, environmental - and
then deal with each box individually. The links between the three main pillars of
sustainable development must be addressed. 8
integration and coherence at the international level;” “adoption of environment and development targets;”
and “more effective action at national level and international monitoring,” see p.2) and four key issues
(“protecting the natural resources base of economic development;” “integrating environment and poverty
eradication;” “making globalization sustainable;” and “enhancing good governance and participation,” see
p.3). The second Communication (Commission of the European Communities 2002b), released a year
later, is organized around six themes: “harnessing globalization: trade for sustainable development,”
“fighting poverty and promoting social development,” “sustainable management of natural and
environmental resources,” “improving the coherence of European Union policies,” “better governance at all
levels,” and “financing sustainable development.”
8 See http://europa.eu.int/comm/environment/wssd/qa_general_en.html#1, last accessed Aug. 16, 2002.

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The acknowledgement that “harmony between environment, society and
economy” is not easily ascertained “in the context of a global industrial and information
society” is noteworthy, as is the parallel dismissal of a sectoralized approach to
sustainability.
5.2.9 Summary Remarks and Prospects for Enlargement
Overall, it should be noted that within different EU documents, one can discern a
non-incidental, recurring distinction between the terms “sustainable growth” as it appears
in the Maastricht Treaty and also frequently in DG Transport and Energy documents, and
“sustainable development”, which is the more inclusive term, typically used in all DG
Environment documents, and more recently in the SDS. Interestingly, the Amsterdam
Treaty speaks of both “sustainable development of economic activities” and of
“sustainable growth” (also see Collier 1999:85).
Of course, despite being a relatively successful area of EU policy-making at least
in terms of the amount of legislation passed, environmental policy has often been
overshadowed by discussions on other all-encompassing topics such as competitiveness,
enlargement, subsidiarity and governance and democracy. Jordan (1998) identifies two
significant shortcomings of EU environmental policy. On one hand, there is an
implementation gap, which calls attention to the fact that especially in the early days,
much EU legislation was not appropriately enforced in the member states. On the other
hand, there is an integration gap, meaning that environmental considerations have not
been successfully integrated into all other areas of EU policy-making. An obvious
example is the EU agricultural policy, which has stimulated overproduction of unneeded

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foods and subsidized intensive farming methods whose fertilizers have been harmful to
natural soils and polluted groundwater reserves. We will see that EU transport policy has
been equally unsuccessful in consistently protecting the environment. Nevertheless, the
need for the integration and mainstreaming of environmental aspects is being repeated
almost like a mantra in all recent environmental and transport policy documents.
Eastern enlargement will most certainly be the biggest challenge to EU
environmental policy in the coming decades, and transport is a major aspect of that
challenge. Although an impressive amount of the CEEC legislation has already been
brought into compliance with EU laws and standards, this compliance presently largely
exists on paper. A frequent excuse is cost. Pollution prevention is to a large extent seen
as a matter of being able to invest in newer and cleaner infrastructures and technologies,
especially in areas such as waste water treatment or energy production. Nevertheless,
deficiencies in environmental protection, in the CEE states as well as in many of the EU’s
current member states, have more to do with non-enforcement, political unwillingness to
promote unpopular measures (such as restrictions on motor vehicle use) and a general
lack of awareness on ecological matters. The SDS includes a specific section on
enlargement, which includes the interesting observation that the future Member States
have much richer biodiversity that current ones. The strategy further calls for an active
integration of the Candidate countries in the implementation of the strategy (see p.9).
Note that the EU Commission is currently preparing its Sixth Environmental
Action Program (EAP, also see Chapter 4) and a new Green Paper on Urban Transport.
Overall, the new EAP proposal contained little innovative language, and most of the
concrete actions proposed are in the realm of more studies, reports, or best practice

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documentations. Moreover, the extremely vague and non-committal definition of
sustainable development provided in the original proposal for the Sixth EAP is somewhat
indicative of the overall de-evolution of the connotations of the term “sustainable
development”:
A prudent use of the world’s natural resources and the protection of the global
ecosystem are a condition for sustainable development, together with economic
prosperity and a balanced social development. Sustainable development is concerned
with our long-term welfare here in Europe and at the global level and with the
heritage we leave to our children and grandchildren.
(CEC 2001c:11, my emphasis)
Thus, certain ecological, economical and social aspects are now defined as a
condition, not a defining feature of sustainable development, which now appears as
connected to the two rather innocuous terms “welfare” and “heritage” with an important
focus on global reach.
5.3 EU Discourses on Sustainable Transport
Generally speaking, the use of the terms “sustainable transport” or “sustainable
mobility” has been quite inflationary in EU documents in recent years, with almost
every form and mode of transport from bicycling to driving to maritime shipping to
aviation suddenly being labeled “sustainable.” Typically this occurs by talking of
sustainable mobility rather than sustainable transport. Many scholars, and especially
environmental NGOs, have pointed out that by putting the emphasis on “sustainable
mobility” rather than on “sustainable transport,” the EU often ignores or neglects another
major issue in transport, namely accessibility. In emphasizing mobility one assumes the
need to travel as given, thereby implicitly establishing mobility as a goal in and of itself

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(as opposed to viewing transport as a means to an end). Also, while non-motorized
transport, public transit and rail are still referred to as “more” sustainable, few EU
documents categorize automobile or plane travel as outright unsustainable. Some even
do the opposite. For example, under the heading “Efficient and Sustainable Use of the
Infrastructure”, the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) 9 concludes that
“in sparsely populated peripheral regions … regional air transport, including short-haul
services, has to be given priority.” Baeten (2000:71) summarized EU transport policy
goals as follows:
?? Spatial planning to reduce transport demand and create opportunities for
alternative transport modes;
?? Construction of new infrastructures;
?? Improvement of public transport;
?? Technical improvement of cars and fuels;
?? Measures to induce changing travel behaviour;
?? [Endorsement of] the polluter pays principle. For transport policies, this means
that ‘external costs’ such as air pollution or congestion have to be integrated
into total pricing of transport generated by road users
He then argues that
It is immediately clear from these EC transport policy goals that the Commission
relies upon well-tested policy options which were common sense even before the
notion of sustainable transport came into vogue. Moreover, this commitment is so
vague that is [sic] does not curtail any traditional planning option, including the
construction of new roads.
While generally sympathetic to Baeten’s criticisms, I would argue that
introducing the notion of sustainable transport into EU policy has nevertheless had an
impact on at least the formulation of environmental policy goals. Also, as we will see in
later sections of this study, different parts of the Commission pursue different goals, use
9 Note that although published by the Commission, the ESDP is not an official EU document, but rather a
document agreed at the Informal Council of Ministers responsible for Spatial Planning (Potsdam, 1999).

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different rhetoric, and propagate different paths of implementation. In the end, I am not
content with a general critique of EU transport policy that simply states the
transformation and cooptation of sustainability arguments as a fact. Instead, I am
interested in uncovering the details of this transformation. As a first contribution towards
this aim, the following section takes a closer look at specific sustainable transport and
mobility references in some key EU policy statements.
5.3.1 The White Paper on the Common Transport Policy
This important 1992 White Paper (Commission of the European Communities
1992c) provided the basis for EU transport policy throughout the 1990s, and in particular
for the Action Program on the CTP (Commission of the European Communities 1998g).
It identified serious imbalances in Europe’s transport system, noting that road freight was
now almost double its 1970 volume, with road transport now accounting for 70% of all
transport activity (§ 14). The paper called for an “integrated approach to sustainable
mobility.” However, the crucial term “sustainable mobility” is never concretely defined
in the entire 123 page document. It is vaguely defined it as “efficient, safe transport
under the best possible environmental and social conditions” (§123, also see §38-40) but
the paper ultimately falls short of a truly new, original approach to EU transport
development in several ways. The limits for environmental maneuvering are always
clearly delineated. For example, the “trends and tendencies” section concludes that
“transport is a growth industry” (§ 10), and instead of a commitment to reduce transport
volumes, one finds then references to accommodate transport growth (§12). The paper
even admits that “the risk of the development of the transport sector being unsustainable

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in the medium to long term due to its broad environmental impact remains real” (§28).
Meanwhile, the first item on the Commission’s global program for sustainable mobility is
“the continued reinforcement and proper functioning of the internal market facilitating
the free movement of goods and persons throughout the Community” (§40a). Overall,
the White Paper’s mainstream, eco-modernist faith in win-win solutions is best captured
in §92, where the Commission finally concludes that
The challenge for the Community’s transport system is how to provide, in the most
efficient manner, the services that are necessary for the continued success of the single
market and the mobility of the individual traveler, while continuing to reduce the
inefficiencies and imbalances of the system and safeguarding against the harmful
effects that increase transport activity generates. It is possible to meet this challenge,
while respecting the basic tenets of the free market, by the introduction of
economically efficient transport policies. [Emphasis added]
Bowers (1992), who provided a useful, environmentally-oriented section-bysection
explication of the White Paper, points out that “the bicycle [side by side with the
electric car] finally gets a mention in §176, but walking is never mentioned as a means of
transport.” In the road sector, the Commission places much optimism in new pricing
mechanisms (see §76), thus already foreshadowing elements of the 1998 White Paper on
infrastructure pricing (see below). Similarly, the documents makes repeated references to
the “Citizen’s Network” and other planned initiatives.
However, the paper also addresses the key environmental problems of “energy
consumption and operational pollution,” “congestion,” “land-use” and “carriage of
dangerous goods” and explicitly discusses reactions to the Commission’s previously
published Green Paper on Transport and Environment (Commission of the European
Communities 1992a). Here, two quotes are important to keep in mind for later sections of
this study. First, the White Paper notes that “although land-use and spatial planning are

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primarily a national and/or local matter, there is a Community dimension.” Secondly, we
find a surprisingly engaged call to “take [twofold] action in order to deal more
specifically with the congestion caused by the use of the private car [through the]
promotion of collective and environmentally friendly modes of transport and at the same
time the dissuasion of private car use” (§174, for additional details see §175-177). Note
that this is a rather different discourse from the infrastructure expansion-oriented anticongestion
rhetoric which we will find in both the 1993 White Paper on Growth and the
2001 White Paper on Transport (see below).
Finally, the 1992 White Paper of course also dedicated numerous paragraphs to
the establishment and development of the Trans-European Networks (TENs). By then,
the creation, upgrading, expansion and optimization of the TENs had emerged as one of
the most hotly debated issues within the challenge of creating an ever-expanding
(sustainable?) Europe. The same TENs also played a key role in another key
Commission White Paper on competition and growth released only a year later.
Although not a transport policy paper per se, this influential paper nevertheless deserves
a quick glance.
5.3.2 The White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment
The EU White Paper on Growth, Competitiveness and Employment contains two
major sections that refer to the TENs. The document is listed here not because these
sections contain particularly interesting references to sustainable transport but because of
the complete and utter absence of the concept of sustainability in the document. This

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document stands out in that it is steeped in competitive language that presents transport
networks as “the lifeblood of EU competitiveness:”
Traffic jams are not only exasperating, they also cost Europe dear in terms of
productivity. Bottlenecks and missing links in the infrastructure fabric; lack of
interoperability between modes and systems. Networks are the arteries of the single
market. They are the life blood of competitiveness, and their malfunction is reflected
in lost opportunities to create new markets and hence in a level of job creation that
falls short of our potential.
(Commission of the European Communities 1993:Section 3.1) 10
This document is light-years away from the EU’s current SDS that calls for a
decoupling of transport and GDP growth. Arguing quite the contrary, this White Paper
argues that “by developing the movement of people and goods Europe has been able to
marry economic prosperity, quality of life and commercial efficiency” (CEC 1993,
Development Theme II, p.1). The gist of this White Paper is that faster and more travel is
unequivocally better – better for economic development and better for the EU.
Environmental and safety concerns appear as but an afterthought. In the section
‘Development Theme II: Trans-European transport and energy networks – Why?’ the
Commission placed the following framed sentence in special print: “Making traffic
faster, safer and more environmentally compatible, facilitating and boosting trade, and
bringing Member States closer to their Eastern and Southern neighbours would herald the
advent of the European Union..” Clearly, speed, increased trade and connectivity are key
themes in this paper. In sum, the paper is remarkable mainly in its lack of sustainability
rhetoric just one year after the Rio Earth Summit.
10 The online version of the document is divided into several html files that are each individually numbered.
See http://www.europa.eu.int/en/record/white/c93700/ch02_1.html

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5.3.3 The Common Transport Policy Action Program
From 1995 to 2000, the Common Transport Policy was enacted via an Action
Program which was organized around strategic objectives concerning market
liberalization; improved integration of transport systems across Europe; fair and efficient
pricing within and between transport modes, and an enhanced social dimension. After
the first two paragraphs, the term “sustainability” never again appears in the document,
and there are few explicit references to environmental matters. One notable exception is
the summary section III A 2, where under the heading “Environment,” we suddenly find
a short statement that “strategic environment assessment of the Trans-European network
will be important for decisions about individual projects.” There is, however, no context
provided for this claim.
5.3.4 The Communication on “Sustainable Mobility”
In December 1998, the Commission published its Communication “Sustainable
Mobility – Perspectives for the Future” (Commission of the European Communities
1998g) in which the Commission reviewed the performance of the Action Program and
laid out its future approach. The communications insists that “the principles established
in 1995 should remain the basis for completing the CTP” (p.10) and then proceeds to set
out an ambitious updated action program covering all aspects of transportation. Almost
half, namely nine of the 20 pages in the Communication are dedicated to a two annexes
that list the Commission’s main actions for the period 1998 to 2000 and possible
proposed tasks up to 2004. Both the annexes and the document body are somewhat
rigidly organized around the three goals of “improving efficiency and competitiveness,”

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improving quality,” and “improving external effectiveness.” The term “sustainability” is
rather extensively used in body of the Communication, especially in the sub-headings on
environment. In particular, the Communication insists that
The development of transport systems must not be at the expense of the quality of life
of citizens or the destruction of the environment. The indefinite continuation of current
trends in transport in certain modes (road, air) would be unsustainable in relation to its
environmental impact, in particular as regards climate change. The development of
sustainable forms of transport is therefore one of the key priorities of the Commission.
[p. 7, emphasis in the original.]
Ultimately, however, the new program is as ambitious as it is non-committal in
terms of true priority setting. Issues of market access, systems integration, pricing and
technological upgrading feature somewhat too comfortably next to questions of
environmental protection and climate change. The difficult relationship between
transport and urban and regional development is also not tackled head-on, but at least
mentioned as an area worthy of further investigation. 11
5.3.5 The Green Paper on the Citizen’s Network
The EU Green Paper “The Citizen’s Network” (Commission of the European
Communities 1996a) was mostly focused on the promotion of public transport in urban
areas. In the document, the Commission promises a refocusing of its research and
11 Regarding the ESDP, the Communication notes that “an examination will be needed of the Common
Transport Policy in relation to the evolving European Spatial Development Perspective” (p.9, emphasis in
the original). No specific Communication on Transport and the ESDP exists, however. Regarding
economic and social cohesion, the Communication notes the following (p.5):
Efficient and sustainable transport systems play a key role in regional development. Structural policies
and the CTP complement one another and therefore promote a more balanced and sustainable
development of the Union's territory, particularly by improving accessibility and the situation of weaker
regions and disadvantaged social groups. The Commission will set out how these two policies can
achieve maximum synergies in a communication on Transport and Cohesion.
For further details on the notion of “cohesion” and the Commission’s important 1998 Communication on
Transport and Cohesion, see Chapter 6.

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development work on transport towards policies and programs that improve public
transport and promote door-to-door service. The executive summary specifically talks
about the relationship between public transport networks and the TENs, calling them the
basis for a network “which is environmentally sustainable.” Specifically, the Green
Paper claims the following:
The TENs obviously related to long distance links, but equally clearly these long
distance routes must link into local transport systems. The Commission will favor
those TENs links which interconnect with local systems and which promote public
transport.
(Commission of the European Communities 1996a, Executive Summary)
As we will see in later chapters, this claim stands in direct contrast to EU-related
funding in the case of the Central Eastern Europe candidate states in general, and the case
of ring road funding in particular. The most significant current grant source of transport
infrastructure funding in CEE is ISPA, and ISPA specifically focuses on TEN priority
corridors in the road and rail sectors but it thereby explicitly excludes public transport. In
the particular case of Budapest, detailed in Chapter 8, the M0 ring road provides a classic
example of a road infrastructure that indeed interconnects with local transport systems,
but which, by receiving large sums of international funding from the EU and its related
funding institutions (in this case the EIB), is further accelerating car use and inducing
sprawl, putting local transit systems at a further disadvantage.
5.3.6 The White Paper on Fair Payment for Infrastructure Use
Many of the key contents in this paper already appeared in the controversial 1995
Green Paper on Fair and Efficient Pricing (Commission of the European Communities
1995). The premise of this important White Paper is that “the great diversity of

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infrastructure charging systems across modes of transport and Member States undermines
the efficiency and the sustainability of Europe’s transport system” (§1, Executive
Summary). The key proposition of the paper is to introduce the marginal social cost
charging principle to “enhance both the efficiency and the sustainability of the transport
system” (§3, executive summary). The paper is quite indicative for the Commission’s
eco-modernist rhetoric on sustainable transport in the sense that it aims to set a new
agenda for the removal of current biases in infrastructure charging, yet ultimately
downplays the central argument made by environmental advocates that the internalization
of external (environmental) costs should be recognized as a policy goal in itself, and not
simply as a matter of pricing efficiency and a readjustment of market distortions (for a
more extensive elaboration of this point, see T&E 1999).
5.3.7 Transport-specific Conclusions of the Gothenburg European Council
As noted above, transport was listed as one of the four priority areas singled out
by the EU’s Göteborg Council in June 2001 to target environmental priorities for
sustainability. More specifically, the presidency conclusions provide the following
important definition of EU sustainable transport policy (European Union 2001:6-7):
A sustainable transport policy should tackle rising volumes of traffic and levels of
congestion, noise and pollution and encourage the use of environment-friendly modes
of transport as well as full internalisation of social and environmental costs. Action is
needed to bring about a significant decoupling of transport growth and GDP growth,
in particular by a shift from road to rail, water, and public passenger transport. To
achieve this the European Council:
- invites the European Parliament and the Council to adopt by 2003 revised guidelines
for trans-European transport networks on the basis of a forthcoming Commission
proposal, with a view to giving priority, where appropriate, to infrastructure
investment for public transport and for railways, inland waterways, short sea
shipping, intermodal operations and effective interconnections;

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- notes that the Commission will propose a framework to ensure that by 2004 the price
of using different modes of transport better reflects costs to society.
[Emphasis added].
This statement represents an unequivocal commitment on the part of the European
Union to move away from a purely market-demand driven transport action framework
that simply assesses future transport infrastructure needs on the basis on current mode
shares and GDP growth forecasts. If it were to be translated into concrete policy action,
this commitment would in fact bring about extensive adjustments to EU transport-sector
decision-making and financing, essentially replacing current growth-accommodating
strategies of transport infrastructure provision with an entirely new, goal-oriented
approach that specifically targeted investments into particular modes over others.
However, key Commission documents issued in the wake of the Gothenburg summit
quickly retracted from this ambitious commitment.
5.3.8 The White Paper “EU Transport Policy for 2010: Time to Decide”
Published in September 2001, this document represents the Commissions latest
and most comprehensive statement on transport policy, with sustainable mobility still
featuring as the stated central aim. The paper has not been well-received by interest
groups, however. The paper is comparatively long (over 100 pages excluding annexes)
and organized according to various transport issues and modes, with a heavy overall
focus on congestion as a central problem. The term “sustainable” is used extensively
throughout the entire document, but again, no truly new or innovative concepts are
introduced. Most importantly, the EU’s call for a decoupling of transport growth from
economic growth voiced in the Gothenburg Summit is watered down or even ignored.

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For example, the new White Paper is explicitly calling for extensive new airport
infrastructures to “cope with growth.” Overall, the gist of the paper stands in significant
contrast to the EU’s new Sustainable Development Strategy (SDS) presented only a few
months earlier. Where one would expect the Commission to focus on the problem of
rising volumes of traffic, one finds calls for the additional funding of infrastructure
instead. This is moderated by multiple calls for shifting between modes, but modal shifts
in an of themselves of course do not decrease traffic. The pro-investment approach is
flanked by a strong focus on “bottlenecks”, i.e. a rhetoric which rather limits policy
discussions to the subject of congestion relief, and inappropriately skews vision away
from environmental problems arising from rising transport volumes (also see Chapter 6).
NGOs are particularly critical of not only the content but also the process by
which this paper was produced. They see an increasing trend towards less openness and
greater secrecy under the new Commissioner for Transport and Energy, Loyola de
Palacio. In fact, the only consultation of interested parties with regard to the White Paper
took place under the previous Commission prior to the merging of the transport and
energy directorates, when Neil Kinnock was the responsible transport commissioner.
The paper was extensively redrafted internally, resulting in numerous delays.
Significantly, as the European Federation for Transport and Environment (T&E) reports
in an October 18, 2001 news release, “the White Paper when adopted was immediately
viewed as inadequate by the Joint Informal Council of Transport and Environment
Ministers, falling short as it does of the political demands of EU leaders made at

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Gothenburg in June 2001.” 12
For additional information on the 2001 White Paper,
particularly its emphasis on bottlenecks, see Chapter 6.
5.3.9 The DG TREN Website
The gist of the statements on the current DG Transport and Energy Website
stands in sharp contrast to the many much more wide-ranging definitions of sustainable
transport. DG TREN has recently extensively revamped its website, providing short
sound bites of information on every major transport topic. Couched in over-simplistic
language, the current administration is thus presenting a capsule outline of EU transport
policy to the interested public. In stark contrast to above presented comprehensive
definitions, but concurrent with the 1993 White Paper on Growth, transport is frequently
referred to as the “life-blood of our economy” implying that to stymie transport is to
stymie growth. Under the sub-heading “Rethinking transport: ‘sustainable mobility’” DG
TREN outlines its vision for a move towards “sustainable mobility,” presented partially
in a question-and-answer format. The main problem according to this introduction is not
the environmental impact of transport but congestion. The following paragraph seems
indicative of DG TREN’s current growth-oriented stance:
In a word, our transport systems are in danger of grinding to a halt. Increasingly they
are synonymous with pollution and danger. And if transport seizes up, the whole of
the economy will pay the price. So what can be done? Can the volume of transport be
reduced? No – the demand for mobility is ever-increasing, and any prohibitive
measures would seriously hamper the working of our society.
[CEC, DG TREN 2001]
12 As a partial response to DG TRENs lack of openness and consultation, transport- and energy-oriented
European environmental groups decided to boycott the Commission’s First Annual Conference on Energy
and Transport in Barcelona in October 2001.

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This online refusal to consider strategies to reduce the volume of transport is not
only out of touch with much state-of-the-art thinking on sustainable transport as
presented in this chapter, it also flies in the face of the EU’s current pursued goal to
decouple transport growth from economic growth in general, most publicly stated at the
Gothenburg summit. The analogy presented here remains stuck in old thinking schemes
that regard any reduction in transport volumes as an impediment to growth.
5.3.10 Pan-European Declarations on Sustainable Transport
Outside of official EU documents, EU Transport Ministers, as well as their CEE
counterparts, made rhetorical commitments to sustainable transport in two key Pan-
European documents. For one, the 1997 UN-ECE Regional Conference on Transport and
the Environment resulted in the “Vienna Declaration on Transport and the Environment.”
The document reaffirms both the Rio declaration and recent European initiatives (United
Nations Economic Commission for Europe 1997). 13
Secondly, the June 1999 WHO
Conference Transport, Environment and Health resulted in an ambitious Charter signed
by European health, environment and transport ministers, together with the relevant
13 The declaration recalls the importance of the Sustainable Transportation Principles developed at the 1996
OECD conference in Vancouver, urges remaining states to ratify the Convention on Long-Range
Transboundary Air Pollution and the related protocols, and draws attention to increasing pollution from air
and maritime transport. The declaration also encourages phasing-out leaded fuels and considers providing
ECE member countries in transition with appropriate assistance in restructuring the vehicle and oil-refining
industries. It refers to the ESPOO convention in encouraging more effective environmental impact
assessment of transport infrastructure projects in transboundary contexts and calls for further development
of SEA methodologies. It also promotes several more radical measures such as the establishment of
national environmental and health targets in the transport sector within national strategies, dedicated cycle
networks, and road pricing. Yet it also cautiously warns that “the different geographic and economic
circumstances of [UN-ECE] member states may necessitate differentiated approaches and flexibility of
choice within that framework [of sustainable development]” and therefore recognizes “the special
circumstances and priority needs of ECE member countries in transition” [para (g) and (n)]. The annex to
the declaration contained a detailed Programme of Joint Action (POJA) in the fields of transport and
environment, listing possible measures and solutions at the international and national level. Also note that
in July 2002, UN ECE, in collaboration with the WHO, launched the “Transport, Health and Environment
Pan-European Programme (THE PEP).” Also see http://www.unece.org/poja/

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WHO representatives (World Health Organization 1999). The charter highlights the
specific and wide-ranging impacts of transport activities and infrastructures on human
health. The spirit and approach in the Charter aims at effectively integrating existing
efforts into future action plans. 14
5.4 EU Discourses on Sustainable Urban Development
Sustainable development cannot be achieved without a major focus on cities. This
is particularly true for Europe and North America, where already over three-fourths, or
76 percent, of the population live in urbanized areas. This figure is expected to rise to
83.5 percent by the year 2030 (UNFPT 2001). About one in five Europeans lives in a
conurbation larger than a quarter million inhabitants (CEC 1997:4). In 2000, almost half
of the world's population lived in cities, and by 2030 this percentage is expected to
increase to over 60 percent (UNFPA 2001). 15
Responding to this challenge, the EU has
begun to more explicitly voice its own urban strategies in recent years. Of course, there
is no single one working definition of urban sustainability within the EU. As
everywhere, there is a great variety of definitions. Yet the following review of key EU
statements on urban sustainability demonstrates how much transport and land-use issues
14 A first annex provides up-to-date scientific evidence on key issues (e.g. the quantifiable positive effects
of cycling and walking and the enormous social costs of motorized transport from accidents, noise and
pollution). A second annex then provides a detailed overview of existing relevant international actions,
differentiating between legally binding documents (e.g. the Convention on Transboundary Air Pollution)
and non-binding efforts and declarations. Also see http://www.euro.who.int/transport
15 Although 90 percent of this growth is likely to be in less developed countries, mature economies in
industrialized countries likewise have to contend with the challenge of making their settlement structures
more sustainable. However, the frequently presumed positive relationship between urban compactness and
sustainability remains controversial even in the recent literature on the subject, especially when it comes to
discussing the sustainability aspects of dense and crowded developing country cities in comparison to
developed country cities with more dispersed settlement structures (see e.g. Jenks 2000, Burgess 2000).
Richardson et al. (2000:32) correctly note that discussions on the application of sustainability in an urban
context have been inconsistent and often been limited to non-automobile dependence and ecological
footprint discussions.

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are seen as being intimately related and in need of being treated in more integrated ways,
particularly in urban areas. Note that “urban sprawl” emerges as a central concern in
these EU policy statements – something to keep in mind for our discussion of EUfunding
for the Budapest ring road in Chapter 9 (which also defines the term concisely).
5.4.1 The Communication “Towards an Urban Agenda in the EU”
In 1997, partly in follow-up and reaction to the 1996 UN Habitat II Conference in
Istanbul, the Commission presented a Communication entitled Towards an urban agenda
in the European Union (CEC 1997a) that outlined the challenges facing European cities.
It acknowledged Europe’s towns and cities as the primary sources of wealth creation but
also focused on the problems facing urban areas. Interestingly, the terms sustainable or
sustainability do not appear in any of the headlines or subsections of the report.
However, the document emphasizes the strong relationship between urban and transport
policy matters by ultimately highlighting
the impact of some key actions in four policy areas which have a particular bearing on
the growth and development of Europe’s cities:
policies which promote economic competitiveness and employment
policy in favor of economic and social cohesion
policies which help the insertion of cities into transEuropean networks
policies promoting sustainable development and the quality of life in cities”
(CEC 1997:8)
The fact that the relationship between urban developments and EU cohesion
strategies is clearly acknowledged and dealt with extensively in the Annex is important,
but we reserve our discussion on cohesion objectives to later chapters. What interests us
here is the fact that the Commission, in its section Transport and transEuropean
Networks, presents the TENs as crucial for urban development and urban policies. There

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is mention of the need to “alleviate the problems of peripheral areas by linking them to
the core of the Community as well as linking these areas together through improved
infrastructure.” However, the role of the TENs is entirely defined as an accessibility
issue, without reference to sustainability questions:
TransEuropean Transport Networks (TETNs) are also instrumental in terms of
improving access to cities, generating employment and allowing exchanges between
cities and regions. More generally the TENs have the potential to open up Community
territory, generating new opportunities for cities connected to the network. … Cities
themselves form the nodal point which conncets modal networks and are therefore
essential elements of the TETNs.
Of course, urban sustainability discussions are amply provided in other recent
Commission documents, and, indirectly, even in other parts of this document, with
transport elements usually concentrating on the need to ease urban traffic congestion,
promote public transport and non-motorized means of travel, improve intermodality and
better integrate land use planning and transport.
5.4.2 Sustainable Urban Development in the EU: A Framework for Action
Published on the heels of the 1997 Agenda, this Framework for Action
(Commission of the European Communities 1998a) aimed at “a better coordinated and
targeted community action for urban problems” and set out a Community rationale for an
examination of EU policies from an urban perspective. Of its four strategic
interdependent policy aims, one actually explicitly targets sustainability (“Protecting and
improving the urban environment: towards local and global sustainability”). The
framework was discussed at a large “Urban Forum” which the Commission organized in
Vienna in November 1998. However, while pointing to the urban dimensions of several

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transport-related policies, the Commission ultimately resisted making any commitments
in this particular arena but instead remained wary of the subsidarity principle.
5.4.3 The European Spatial Development Perspective
Both the European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) adopted in Potsdam
in 1999 in its final version by all EU Ministers responsible for Spatial Planning and the
related CEMAT guidelines, contain many principles and recommendations designed to
develop more sustainable land use structures. In its section two, “Spatial Development
Issues of European Significance,” the ESDP (EC 1999:64) contains a special sub-section
on Continuing Urban Sprawl which warns that
uncontrolled growth results in increased levels of private transport; increases energy
consumption; makes infrastructure and services more costly; and has negative effects
on the quality of the countryside and the environment.
Finding it “necessary to work together to find sustainable solutions for planning
and managing urban growth” the ESDP makes explicit reference to the Dutch “compact
city approach,” “land recycling” in Germany and to “target group” approaches (EC
1999:66). 16
16 Despite this rhetoric, it is certainly possible -- although not appropriate for this particular study -- to
make the argument that the ESDP's core policy aims have themselves very problematic implications with
regard to land use in major agglomerations, since the ESDP philosophy is often partial to the deconcentration
of core economic areas and an overall de-densification of European territory. More
concretely, the ESDP section on “Policy aims and Options for the Territory of the EU” calls for the
development of a “polycentric and balanced urban system,” for “overcoming the outdated dualism between
city and countryside” and for “parity of access to infrastructure and knowledge” (EC 1999:19-20). Even
without venturing deeply into incinerating debates over the nature of polycentricity and polynucleated
regions in Europe (also see Chapter 6), it should be pointed out that this approach is not necessarily
congruent with an active promotion of compact city approaches in major urban capitals.

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5.4.4 The EU’s Input Papers to the 9 th UN CSD Conference in 2001
Official EU inputs to the 2001 United Nations Commission on Sustainable
Development Conference on Transport and Energy mention urban sprawl as a key trend
and reason for concern, finding that it has encouraged longer trips, pushed people further
out of urban centers and discouraged people from walking and cycling (EU 2001:4).
Another short Issues Paper by the EU (EU 2000) for the CSD session of the previous year
“sets out some of the main points and recommendation for action” of the EU on the
sectoral theme of Integrated planning and the management of land resources. Here, we
find the EU urging that “land use and urban planning should be better integrated with
transport planning in order to achieve spatial structures which will reduce the need for
travel and traffic.” The EU also wants to:
encourage governments to adopt integrated policies in order to minimise unplanned
urban sprawl and avoid the [sic] urban congestion.
encourage governments to co-operate in order to share knowledge, to implement best
practices and to develop common strategies at different levels
emphasise the responsibility of all sectors for sustainable land use management as
well as the importance of co-ordination of cross sectoral co-operation in land use
planning, including effective stakeholder participation and public/private partnerships.
[Emphasis added.]
These are ambitious EU recommendations which we should keep in mind when
analyzing EU funding for transport infrastructures in CEE (see esp. Chapter 9).

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5.5 The EU’s Research Frameworks: Funding for the Eco-modernist Agenda
In the previous chapter, I identified the European Science Foundation’s NECTAR
transport research network as a prime example for a group of transport experts united by
a moderate ecological modernization perspective that is currently the dominant approach
to transport policy and planning in Europe. It is important to understand, however, that
research networks of course do form themselves out of a void. Within Europe, it is
increasingly the European Union itself which shapes the member state’s transport
research agendas through its various Research Programs (RTD Framework Programs).
These programs are worth as much as 13 billion Euros in research monies over a fouryear
time span. Interestingly, the thematic makeup of these research agendas quite
clearly demonstrates the EU’s overall discursive framework of ecological modernization.
Table 5.2. provides an overview of the thematic limitations under which (sustainable)
transport and mobility research is supported under the current EU Framework Program.
As we can see, the EU’s research agenda has been both firmly set within the key terms of
growth and competitiveness and undoubtedly friendly to government-funded, yet
industry-led science.
At the end of 2002, the EU will then present the Sixth Framework Program 2002-
2006. The EU plans a complete overhaul of the overall structure such that one will not be
able to extrapolate from the Fifth Framework to the Sixth Framework program (see
CORDIS News 4-2002). Although extensively reshuffled and rearranged, the currently
emerging thematic priorities remain dominated by an ecological modernization approach.
For example, under the general heading “sustainable development, global change and
ecosystems,” for example, we find what amounts to textbook lists of ecological

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modernization policies. First, the EU defines its priorities for “sustainable energy
systems” which are in turn to be divided research into short-term impact research into
“clean energy,” “energy savings and every efficiency,” and “alternative motor fuels,” and
medium- to long-term impact research into “fuel cells,” “new technologies for energy
carriers/transport and storage, in particular hydrogen,” “renewable energy technologies,”
and “cleaner fossil fuel plants.” Secondly, EU research for “sustainable surface
transport” is currently introduced in the following manner: 17
The White Paper “European transport policy for 2010: time to decide” forecasts a
transport demand growth by 2010 in the European Union of 38% for freight and 24%
for passenger transport (base-year 1998). The already congested transport networks
will have to absorb the additional traffic, and the trend suggests that the proportion
absorbed by the less sustainable modes is likely to grow. The objective is
consequently to both fight against congestion and to decelerate or even reverse these
trends regarding the modal split … while supporting European industry’s
competitiveness in the production and operation of transport means and systems.
In other words, increasing mobility and related impacts are to be accepted as part
of competitive growth, and the main aim of transport research and policy is to de-congest
and shift traffic to lower impact, lower emission modes. The ensuing research priorities
are thus not designed to actively restrain transport growth in Europe, but instead focus on
“developing environmentally friendly transport systems and means of transport,” and on
“making surface transport safer, more effective and more competitive.” In sum,
sustainability once again appears as subservient to growth.
17 All quotes taken from the 180-page “Amended proposals for Council Decisions concerning the specific
programmes implementing the Sixth Framework Programme of the European Communicty for research,
technological development and demonstration activities,” (Commission of the European Communities
2002e).

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Table 5.2
Transport-relevant Research funded under the EU Fifth Framework Program 18
Research
Theme
Objectives Sub-Themes Relevant for Research on
Transport & Mobility
To realize the benefits of “New methods of work and electronic
IST the information society for commerce”
Creating a
user-friendly
information
society
Europe both by
accelerating its emergence
and by ensuring that the
needs of individuals and
enterprises are met.
“Essential technologies and infrastructures “
“Future and Emerging Technologies”
GROWTH
Promoting
competitive
and
sustainable
growth
ESSD
Energy,
environment
and
sustainable
development
To support research
activities contributing to
competitiveness and
sustainability, particularly
where these two objectives
interact.
Industry's role will not
only be to identify areas
for collaboration but also
to bring together and
integrate projects,
especially cross-sectoral
projects along the value
chain, so that technology
uptake and innovation are
more effectively ensured
across Europe.
To contribute to
sustainable development
by focusing on key
activities crucial for social
well-being
and economic
competitiveness in
Europe.
“Sustainable mobility & intermodality:
(a) a regulatory & accountable framework
reflecting socio-economic objectives;
(b) an interoperable infrastructure which allows
the operation of attractive, environmentally
friendly and efficient transport means;
(c) modal and intermodal systems for managing
operations and providing services”
“Land transport & marine technologies:
(a) the development of critical technologies and
(b) their integration and validation around
advanced industrial concepts in order to attain
the following main deliverables:
(i) improved fuel efficiency and reduction of
emissions ;
(ii) improved performance and
(iii) improved system competitiveness”
“Global change, climate and biodiversity“
“The city of tomorrow and cultural heritage,
concentrating on:
(a) city planning and management,
(b) cultural heritage,
(c) built environment,
(d) urban transport”
“Study of socio-economic aspects of
development of environmental change”
Source: Selected and compiled from http://www.cordis.lu/fp5/home.html
18
The EU’s Fifth Framework Program runs from 1998 to 2002 and consists of four general research themes
(“Thematic Programs”) worth about € 10.85 billion and three horizontal programs worth about € 2.12
billion. The horizontal programs were omitted from the above table. Also, since the fourth theme,
“Quality of Life and management of living resources,” worth about € 2.41 billion did not include any
directly transport-relevant research agendas, it was also dropped from the overview table.

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5.6 Conclusions and Open Questions
EU documents referring to sustainable development and sustainable transport exhibit
a clear tendency to adhere to the underlying rationales of ecological modernization, i.e.
they express confidence that economic growth, environmental protection and social
equity are somehow complementary goals. When forced to set general priorities, EU
policy-makers emphasize growth before ecology and equity.
However, we also have to conclude that, in the end, the EU is not always strictly
adhering to the discursive framework of ecological modernization in its formulation of
policy objectives. Instead, the EU borrows rather freely from a variety of rationales, be
this the result of intentional strategizing or unintentional multifaceted rationalizing on the
part of EU decision-makers. So in the end, EU policy statements on sustainable transport
remain inconsistent. Statements coming out of the DG Environment are often more
environmentally ambitious than formulations coming from DG Transport and Energy.
Some formulations are openly contradictory, and the exact nature of these internal
contradictions needs to be more closely investigated in ensuing chapters.
Moreover, in the real world, actual transport infrastructure investment decisions bring
forward not only theoretical but also practical controversies. Baeten (2000) made the
important point that throughout Europe, many examples of large scale transport
investments can be found that demonstrate the “deeply contested ways and means
through which transport infrastructures are being planned and developed.” So at times,
overly optimistic sustainability discourses even render a disservice to the opposing
factions. Often, diametrically opposed mobility interests are at work which cannot, and

217
perhaps should not, be united into a common sustainability definition. Baeten’s
(2000:70) key insight is worth quoting at length here:
The conflicting character of transport planning is remarkably absent in the sustainable
transport discourse. The harmonious and conflict-avoiding vocabulary of the
sustainability agenda is unable to cope with material processes that shape and
transform infrastructure networks. Yet, sustainable development and sustainable
transport are policy concepts which are currently widely accepted at international,
national and local policy level. It has generated a new optimism among transport
planners, since it seems to provide them with a fresh theoretical platform from which
to launch new pragmatic planning measures, backed up be a brad, almost globally
constructed consensus about the necessity of its implementation. At the same time,
however, it is not difficult to observe the remarkable discrepancy between, on one
hand, the legitimacy of sustainable transport concepts, and, on the other hand, the poor
theoretical elaboration of these concepts.
Whitelegg (1993:34) presents a very similar assessment. In particular, he points
to the discrepancy between supposedly ‘sustainable’ EU policy initiatives and actual
investment plans:
Sustainability, if it is to amount to more than rhetoric, must be associated with clear
goals and measures that have some potential to achieve these goals. This is not the
case with the European Commission (EC) pronouncements on sustainability [as
outlined in CEC 1992a]. The EC has invoked the rhetoric of sustainability at the same
time as advocating the construction of 12500km of new motorway standard roads
(costed at 130 billion ECUs) in Europe [CEC 1992b] and without any evaluation of
alternative strategies to solve transport problems. The publication of road plans in
advance of a major White Paper on transport policy [CEC 1992c] is further evidence
of a clear disregard for environmental issues and the transformation of sustainability
into an argument to support traditional policies.
We thus return to our core theme of rhetoric versus reality. More importantly, we
once again see opposing discursive frameworks at work. In turn, these discursive
frameworks often seem to be linked with material interests and decision-making claims
different stakeholders have with regard to particular types of transport investments. That
is: policy formulations typically appear as rationalizations and reflections of real-life

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power relationships. This is also where the Flyvbjergian dimension of Realrationalität
enters the picture. But if this is true, then Whitelegg’s accusation that the EU simply
“disregards the environment” is too simple. In comparison to both road industry
lobbyists and environmentalists, Commission officials would seem to have fewer
personal, material interests at stake. Rationalizations must thus be shaped at a more
abstract, conceptual level.
So who and what really influences these EU decision-makers when it comes to
the actual formulation of transport sector investment strategies? Is there really just an
obvious discrepancy between stated sustainability goals and unsustainable deeds? This
chapter has shown that the EU is in fact not binding itself to any radical interpretation of
sustainable transport the same way that political economists or environmentalists do. So
measured within its own discursive framework, the EU appears less hypocritical than
seen from without. Whether we like it or not is a different matter – and arguing against
this status quo belongs into the realm of normative theorizing and political activism.
What interests me in the following chapters, however, is the complex, mutual relationship
between the EU’s eco-modernist formulation of sustainable transport strategies on one
hand, and actual investment plans and programs on the other hand. In order to carry out
this type of analysis, I will take a more thematic discourse analytical approach.

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Printed on Thursday, October 31, 2002
CHAPTER 6
Three Leitbilder and Four Spatial Storylines for
EU Transport Infrastructure Investments
6.1 Introduction..................................................................................................... 220
6.2 Three Overarching Leitbilder for EU Decision-Making ................................ 222
6.2.1 Defining Leitbilder (Guiding Visions).................................................... 222
6.2.2 Integration (Deepening).......................................................................... 225
6.2.3 Enlargement (Widening)......................................................................... 227
6.2.4 Sustainability........................................................................................... 228
6.3 Four Spatial Storylines For EU Transport Infrastructure Investments ........... 231
6.3.1 Defining “Spatial Storylines” ................................................................. 231
6.3.2 The Context: The Trans-European Transport Networks (TENs) ........... 233
6.3.3 Cohesion ................................................................................................. 236
6.3.4 Polycentricity.......................................................................................... 247
6.3.5 Missing Links.......................................................................................... 254
6.3.6 Bottlenecks.............................................................................................. 262
6.4 Conclusions: The Challenge of Prioritizing Investments ............................... 265

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6.1 Introduction
So far, I traced the contradictions and biases in key EU documents seeking to
define sustainable development, sustainable transport and sustainable mobility and
thereby demonstrated the conflicted nature of the concept of sustainability. I also
pinpointed the EU’s general, growth-oriented, eco-modernist approach to transport
policy-making and set it in relation to other, alternative discursive frameworks. The
previous chapter then provided a text-oriented discourse analysis of key EU policy
statements on transport, sustainability and land use. This present chapter will continue
this discourse-focused analysis by exploring how growth and efficiency-oriented
arguments play out in the more specific arena of EU transport infrastructure investment
policies and programs.
Given the challenges of multi-level governance and multi-location politics, it is
always quite difficult, if not to say impossible, for any one stakeholder or group to push
through their particular decision-making agenda without first forging alliances with other
groups. This present chapter will elaborate on the topic of the EU’s power-knowledgenexus
by taking a thematic approach. Rather than concentrate on particular stakeholders,
I will instead focus on particular visions and themes that have been formulated with
regard to transport-sector infrastructure support at the European level. I identify three
overarching visions, or Leitbilder, and four “spatial storylines” justifying EU transport
infrastructure investments. The key insight, taken from Foucauldian discourse theory, is
that the investment-related “storylines” most likely have not been formulated by any one
identifiable author / stakeholder alone, but are instead to be understood as the result of

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longstanding, ongoing and mutually inspiring, yet often contradictory discourses related
to the objectives of transport and land-use development in Europe.
Over the course of the last few years, Tim Richardson and Ole. B. Jensen have
published several articles applying a discourse theoretical approach to European Union
policy in the areas of transport and spatial development (Richardson 1996; Richardson
and Jensen 2000; Jensen and Richardson 2001). They employ Foucauldian discourse
analysis and declare their intellectual affinity with Bent Flyvbjerg’s work on rationality
(or rather: Realrationalität) and power in planning. This present chapter is in many ways
complementary to their ongoing research, although it is overall somewhat less explicitly
Foucauldian than their work. The other obvious influence is Maarten Hajer’s work on
environmental discourse and storylines (also see below). The central proposition of this
chapter is what I term the “Conflicting-Storylines” proposition. It assumes that
1) EU decision-making for Pan-European transport investments lacks consistence
and sustainability due to the existence of several, partially complementary, but
also partially competing EU development objectives, and
2) these objectives are in turn expressed through several, partially conflicting
Leitbilder and spatial storylines. 1
So this chapter focuses on identifying the specific discursive practices by means
of which the European Union advances its underlying eco-modernist transport investment
rationales. Note that this chapter is deliberately limited in scope in the sense that there is
an explicit focus on infrastructure investments, thus excluding discourses that are more
1 A Leitbild (guiding vision) can be very broadly understood as an overarching storyline. For more precise
definitions, see below.

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focused on regulatory or managerial aspects of European transport policy. 2 Interestingly,
the identified storylines do not only exemplify eco-modernist rationales, but sometimes
also evoke various other discursive frameworks.
The rest of the chapter is organized as follows: In the section following this
introduction, I introduce the German concept Leitbild in order to differentiate the EU’s
overarching (history-making) “guiding visions” of enlargement, integration and
sustainability, from second-order (policy-setting and –shaping) concepts (i.e. storylines)
such as “polycentricity” or “bottlenecks”. 3
I briefly discuss the three above-named
Leitbilder for EU decision-making before moving on to the core concept of “spatial
storylines.” I subsequently analyze what I identify as four main spatial storylines for EU
infrastructure decision-making: “cohesion,” “polycentricity,” “missing links,” and
“bottlenecks.” I also discuss their relationship to the EU’s eco-modernist understanding
of sustainable development. A concluding section summarizes the theoretical findings
and their implications for decision-making.
6.2 Three Overarching Leitbilder for EU Decision-Making
6.2.1 Defining Leitbilder (Guiding Visions)
There is no direct translation for the German term Leitbild (pronounced lite-bild).
As a compound noun, its most literal English translation is “guiding image.” I use the
general term Leitbild here in the same sense that Meinolf Dierkes and his colleagues at
2 It would be quite possible, for example, to do detailed discourse-theoretical analyses of eco-modernist
storylines such as “Intelligent Transport”, “Interoperability” or “Fair Payment for Infrastructure Use” or
“Safety”. These are beyond the scope of my project, but certainly present worthwhile areas for further
research.
3 This now commonly referred to three-level typology of EU decision-making (i.e. history-making / policysetting
/ policy-shaping) was introduced by Peterson and Bomberg (1999, see especially Chapter 1, p. 12).
They do not, however, develop a typology of pertaining discursive concepts the way I do here.

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the Social Science Research Center Berlin (Wissenschaftszentrum für Sozialforschung
Berlin - WZB) utilize it, namely to connote a trend-setting and action-guiding notion
about a viable and desirable future that acts as a common orienting, motivating and
coordinating frame of reference for representatives from different cultures of knowledge
(Dierkes, Hoffmann et al. 1992; Hoffmann and Marz 1992; Dierkes and Marz 1998;
Hoffmann and Marz 2000). In the German-language literature, Leitbilder are normally
regarded as serving rather specific functions. In planning, Leitbilder are central
categories demarking the goal-oriented governance of planning schemes. Initially, these
(spatial) Leitbilder are often coined without particular actions in mind; but due to their
imagery and linguistic content they typically end up providing implicit and intuitive
guidance throughout the planning and implementation process, be it with regard to the
overall conceptualization, or with regard to the planning, the operationalization, the
implementation or even the evaluation of a decision-making process. In short, Leitbilder
connote a particular vision for a desirable urban or regional future.
To briefly illustrate the point: German discussions on urban, regional and spatial
planning have been dominated by three main urban Leitbilder in the last 50 years, all of
which are also applicable to the wider European context: 1) the car-oriented
(“autogerechte”) City, 2) the Compact City, and the 2) Network City or Zwischenstadt.
Beginning in the 1970s and 1980s, the modernist Leitbild of the car-oriented city, which
was to be functionally separated and dispersed (“gegliedert und aufgelockert”),
prompted a backlash call for the Compact European City. While this alternative vision of
a walkable, transit-oriented city with a dense urban core is still held in high esteem by
most planners (including many New Urbanists, who have simultaneously reified and

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perverted it), urban theorists increasingly argue that the Leitbild of the Compact
European City is inevitably a conservative, backward-looking notion that no longer
conforms to the spatial reality of today’s German cities (Siebel 2000). Nevertheless, it
serves to uphold the ideal of a multi-functional, mixed-use urban environment that is not
dominated by private cars. By contrast, Sieverts (1998) proclaimed the rise of the
Zwischenstadt (literally: In-Between City) or Network City which rejects notions of
hierarchy and centrality in favor of a vision of an expansive, urbanized landscape that is
functionally interconnected and interdependent. Critics, however, see in it no more than
a legitimation of sprawling tendencies and unfettered suburbanization (cf. Kühn
2000:22).
To conclude, Leitbilder are formed through the interaction of stakeholders. In
turn, a Leitbild functions to structure and organize action and decision-making, so that the
relationship between a Leitbild and the persons and institutions applying it is
interdependent and mutually reinforcing. It should also be noted that while they are
generally intended to be guiding rather than prescriptive, Leitbilder, such as the Network
City, are sometimes overextended and simultaneously applied on the analytical,
normative and prognostic levels. 4
As far as the difference between Leitbilder and spatial storylines is concerned, the
relationship between the two concepts can be summarized as follows: I limit the
application of the term Leitbilder to the discussion of overarching, sector-independent
4 Unfortunately, similar to their English language counterparts, many Germans scholars use the terms
Leitbilder and Paradigmen (paradigms) almost interchangeably, especially with regard to spatial concepts.
Please revert to section 3.4.1 in Chapter 3 for a full explanation of why I object to such a “lose” application
of the term “paradigm” and why I therefore consciously seek to avoid its (over)use. To me, the term
Leitbilder much more appropriately connotes the idea of broad, co-existing, partially competing frames of
reference for decision-making.

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contradictions of EU decision-making objectives. By contrast, I use the term “spatial
storylines” to I discuss notions that are second-order concepts which more specifically
impact transport infrastructure decision-making and investments.
Generally speaking, EU decision-making is always torn between the twin forces
of enlargement and integration, i.e. decisions aiming at extending the borders of the
current union on one hand, and decisions that foster a deepening of the Union and the
completion of the Single Market on the other hand. EU transport policy is also torn
between these objectives. More recently, there has been the addition of (environmental)
sustainability Leitbild, which competes with development objectives related to
enlargement and integration.
6.2.2 Integration (Deepening)
Manuel Castells (1998:338) observed that “European integration is, at the same
time, a reaction to the process of globalization and its most advanced expression.” The
Treaty on European Union (TEU) marked “a new stage in the process of creating an ever
closer union among the peoples of Europe” (Article 1, TEU). 5
This ever closer union is
envisioned as a progressive force that has been present since the earliest beginnings of
European unification. As the EU Glossary on Institutions, Policies and Enlargement of
the European Union 6 notes:
Deepening refers to the integration dynamic present from the outset of the European
venture. Through the customs union, the common market, and then the Euro zone, the
5 Unless otherwise noted, quotes from the TEU are taken from the consolidated version that includes
provisions included in the Treaty of Amsterdam. See http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/en/treaties/index.html for
an overview and changes in organizational structure and content in the Treaty of Amsterdam compared to
the Maastricht version.
6 The Glossary is available online: http://europa.eu.int/scadplus/leg/en/cig/g4000i.htm (last accessed on
September 3, 2002).

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European Communities have grown into what aspires to be an “ever closer union”
among the peoples of Europe (Article 1 of the EU Treaty). Deepening is a process
parallel to, and often viewed as a necessary step prior to, enlargement.
With regard to the aim of integrating Europe and working towards a single
market, the Common Transport Policy (CTP) was regarded by the Community’s initiators
as an essential pillar for the achievement of the internal market and the free flow of
goods, services, labor and capital across national borders.
Until the signing of the Maastricht Treaty, emphasis lay on non-spatial, regulatory
issues concerning the harmonization and taxation of transport services. It was only after
the Maastricht commitment to develop Trans-European Networks that the spatial
dimensions of European integration were directly addressed by the Community through
infrastructure funding. 7
Integration then also came to be understood not only as a spatial,
but also as a modal objective. In his foreword to Turró’s TEN study, ex-Transport
Commissioner Neil Kinnock explicitly appreciates “the emphasis he gives to integration
– within modes, between modes, and across borders – as the leitmotiv of TENs
development” (Turro 1999:foreword).
In the end, however, European integration remains a complicated vision that
attempts to unify economic, political and social forces that often seem irreconcilable.
And, as Graham and Hart (1998:259) remind us, “European integration is largely a
political process being orchestrated primarily through economic policies, which are often
incompatible with the processes that defined the contested meanings of belonging in
contemporary Europe.” The EU’s options of political intervention in the face of global
competition and internal cultural diversity are thus clearly fraught with difficulties.

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6.2.3 Enlargement (Widening)
The end of the Cold War, symbolized by the fall of the Berlin Wall, meant that
the European Union had to radically rethink its prospects for further enlargement. The
EU started to provide technical and financial assistance to the former Eastern Bloc
countries almost immediately. The Europe Agreements, the first ones of which were
signed with Poland and Hungary in late 1991, provided the basis for political, legal and
trade-related issues as well as and other areas of cooperation, including environment and
transport. Since then, Eastern enlargement has been a three track process, consisting of
1) the pre-accession strategy focusing on reform in the ten candidate countries, 2) the
preparation of Agenda 2000 and the opening of actual accession negotiations (with the
first five in 1998, with the rest in 2000), and 3) the publication of the Communication
Strategy for Enlargement in May 2000. The EU is well aware that further enlargement
will mean adjustments to the current EU structure of governance:
Enlargement was originally the term used to refer to the four successive waves of new
members joining the Community. […] With the growing number of applicants for
membership … , the concept of enlargement has taken on a very special significance.
[…] To ensure that enlargement does not hinder European integration, any further
accessions must be accompanied by reform of the institutions and of some Union
policies.
(Commission of the European Communities 1999a).
The much lower infrastructure endowment of the candidate countries has led to
the institution of the so-called pre-accession funds. Much of the focus in the transport
sector is not only about expanding infrastructure, but also about harmonizing regulations
and bringing existing networks up to EU standards. Overall, the rhetoric at both the
7 Although the European Investment Bank (EIB) had of course already provided many millions of transport
infrastructure loans aimed at promoting European integration.

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Commission and the Parliament is aimed at expanding European markets and improving
interconnections throughout Europe, albeit always with a view to privileged high-speed
routes:
Within the framework of a system of open and competitive markets, action by the
Community aims to establish and develop trans-European transport networks by
promoting the interconnection and interoperability of national networks as well as
access to such networks. In the area of transport the Community has identified
transport routes whose expansion and coordination are intended to lead to a stronger
network of links across the European continent. In this context, we should mention the
construction of high-speed routes linking the metropolises of several Member States.
As well as seeking to improve transport infrastructure, the trans-European networks
are primarily intended to integrate Community transport systems by expanding and
linking networks.
(European Parliament 1999:4).
Regardless of its difficulties, enlargement today is an EU Leitbild that has set in
motion an irreversible process of accession for the Eastern European candidate states.
The borders of the Union will likely keep moving eastward for some time to come.
6.2.4 Sustainability
Chapter 5 already traced the EU’s rhetorical commitment to sustainability, so
there is no need to repeat the relevant EU documents here. The most important thing to
remember is that it was only with the Treaty of Amsterdam that an explicit reference on
sustainable development was written into the recitals of the EU Treaty. Chapter 5 also
demonstrated that sustainability is not explicitly defined as a limiting factor on growth
and productivity in the key documents that define the EU’s sustainability commitment.
Some examples of such a more rigid interpretation can be found in other EU documents,
however. The Second Report on Economic and Social Cohesion which the European
Commission released in early 2001 contains a particularly interesting reminder that

229
sustainability is necessarily both intergenerational as well as overarching concept. As the
report notes in its “Conclusions and Recommendations” section in the beginning
(Commission of the European Communities 2001e):
Efforts to raise productivity and promote growth for one generation must not,
however, be at the expense of the next. In other words, the development path followed
must also be a sustainable one, a general point which needs to be reflected in all
investment decisions.
[Emphasis in the original.]
Optimistically speaking, one might discern here the first mainstreaming effects of
the EU’s new Sustainable Development Strategy, at least as far as rhetorical commitment
is concerned. In the end, however, sustainability is indisputably only the most recent
addition to the EU canon of Leitbilder. Both enlargement and integration are to be
achieved in a “sustainable” manner, but this mandate remains operationally weak. For
example, so far, the Maastricht sustainability mandate has not succeeded in bringing
about the demanded shift towards funding for more environmentally friendly modes of
transport. It is true, for example, that 9 out of the EU’s 14 TEN priority projects
(described below) were high-speed rail projects and that over 60% (827 out of 1344
million ECU) from the TEN special budget line went towards rail. But as figure 6.1
indicates, the vast majority of transport spending under the more sizeable EU Cohesion
and EDRF Funds went towards roads, tipping the overall balance about two-thirds in
favor of roads and highways.

230
Figure 6.1 Transport Grants within the EU-15 by Mode
ERDF 94-99, TEN budget line 95-98,
Cohesion Fund 93-97
Airports &
Ports
8%
Railways
21%
Other
5%
Total funds disbursed:
21460 MECU
Roads and
highways
66%
Source: own compilation, using data from the European Commission
Figure 6.2 Cohesion Fund Transport Grants by Country and Mode (1993-1997)
Million Ecu
3500
3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0
Other
Airports & Ports
Rail
Road
SPAIN PORTUGAL GREECE IRELAND
Source: Own compilation, using data from the European Commission
Also, the rail funds were all dedicated to high-speed projects that also have large
environmental impacts. From 1994-1999, over 2/3 of all available EDRF Objective 1
funding went to roads. 8
The imbalance was equally pronounced in the case of the
Cohesion Fund. From 1993 to 1999, TEN-related priority transport investments to the

231
four poorest member states (Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain) accounted for over 5
billion Ecu, of which 69% went to roads (see figure 6.2).
Enlargement in and of itself is increasingly used as a general justification for EU
financing for Pan-European infrastructure investments, but this general argument lacks
specificity. In order to gain a fuller understanding of the various rationales and
rationalizations for EU involvement in transport infrastructure financing in the context of
Eastern enlargement, it is therefore necessary to first trace in some detail the various,
contradictory spatial storylines that have been advanced to justify EU involvement in
transport infrastructure projects in the past.
6.3 Four Spatial Storylines For EU Transport Infrastructure Investments
6.3.1 Defining “Spatial Storylines”
The principal conceptual innovation of Maarten Hajer’s book The Politics of
Environmental Discourse consists in its focus on what he calls “storylines.” Hajer arrives
at this emphasis after a careful and critical review of Foucault’s theory of discourse,
which he finds wanting in one central aspect: “the role of the discoursing subject remains
ambivalent” (p.51). Well-aware that in the Foucaultian post-positivist worldview,
“discourse is not to be seen as a medium through which individuals can manipulate the
world,” but that it “is itself part of reality, and constitutes the discoursing subject,” and
that consequently, in this framework “interests cannot be taken as given a priori but are
constituted through discourse,” Hajer ultimately finds that “there is still a conceptual gap
between Foucault’s abstract work and the study of concrete political events,” which to
8 Objective 1 funding is designated for the least developed regions of the EU, i.e. regions where GDP per
capita is below 75% of the EU average.

232
him points to “a need to devise middle range concepts through which [the] interaction
between discourses can be related to the role of individual strategic action in a nonreductionist
way” (pp.51-52). Hence his focus on discourse coalitions and storylines.
These concepts are partly about bringing a certain amount of agency back into the
picture. Rules and practices are only imbued with meaning as long as they are exercised
by a particular person, and there is always choice involved in picking between different
routines and in precise way in which these are exercised. In other words, rather than
simply note the existence of certain linguistic practices or conventions through rhetorical
analysis, what should interest us when looking at political and bureaucratic decisionmaking,
is the use, re-use, and transformation of particular images, phrases or storylines,
and who benefits from them.
Originally an idea taken from Davies and Harré (1990), Hajer (1995:56) redefines
a storyline as follows:
A storyline, as I interpret it, is a generative sort of narrative that allows actors to draw
upon various discursive categories to give meaning to specific physical or social
phenomena. The key function of storylines is that they suggest a unity in the
bewildering variety of separate discursive components parts of a problem.
Hajer also immediately adds the following key statement:
Political change may therefore well take place through the emergence of new
storylines that re-order understandings. Finding the appropriate storyline becomes an
important form of agency.
Interestingly, although somewhat reluctantly admitting the term “agency” into his
discourse vocabulary, Hajer seems ready at several points in his study to admit a
necessary focus on what one might call the makers of a storyline. Other than in the world
of creative writing, however, Hajer does not attach any importance to being the original

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creator of an idea or storyline. Rather, the key to discursive success in the world of
communicative competition is the successful constitution of consensual meaning through
adapting and re-defining a universally appealing storyline. 9
Storylines cluster
knowledge, position stakeholders and, ultimately, create coalitions. In identifying four
major spatial storylines which have provided justifications for EU infrastructure
assistance in the transport sector, I adapt Hajer’s concept of storylines to the particular
case of transport infrastructure decisions in the European Union.
6.3.2 The Context: The Trans-European Transport Networks (TENs)
The idea of developing a coherent map of Trans-European Transport
Infrastructure pre-dates the European Union and was already actively discussed in several
other international forums, especially within the UN Economic Commission for Europe
and within the OECD/European Conference of Ministers of Transport (ECMT). The
concept of the so-called international E-routes was developed in the 1980s, but this was
9 Note that Hajer especially turns his attention away from agency when he defines his second key element
to his “argumentative approach” (a phrase borrowed from Forester and Fischer, 1993): discoursecoalitions.
The concept is somewhat ambiguous (p.65):
Discourse coalitions are defined as the ensemble of (1) a set of storylines; (2) the actors who utter these
storylines; and (3) the practices in which this discursive activity is based. … Discourse coalitions are
formed if previously independent practices are being actively related to one another, if a common
discourse is created in which several practices get a meaning in a common political project.
According to this definition, discourse coalitions are an amalgam of language, of people and of the rules
governing people’s behavior at the same time. Note the use of the passive voice in the second part of
Hajer’s definition, indicating that in contrast to typical uses of the term coalition, referring to groups of
actors, the emphasis in Hajer’s definition is not on the people who make up the coalition, but rather on the
storylines that are “seen as the discursive cement that keeps a discourse-coalition together” (p.65). Hence
“storylines, not interests, form the basis of the coalition” (p.66). Nevertheless, Hajer subsequently
recommends “searching for politics in new locations, looking for the activity of the actors who produce
storylines” (p.66). He proceeds to use ecological modernization as an example to illustrate the concept of
discourse coalitions. Yet in the end, the relationship between the developed discourse and the discoursing
subjects remains unclear in Hajer’s definition of discourse coalitions. Most importantly, the role of the
creators of a storyline are left ambiguous inasmuch as it is uncertain whether the creators of a particular
storyline consciously develop this story line for use in a particular political (or social) context, or simply
happen to come up with it “by chance.” As we will see in our example of different discourses surrounding
EU transport infrastructure decision-making, both is possible.

234
not connected to any idea of common funding schemes. The Trans-European Networks
(TENs) of the European Commission, however, were always intended to be at least partly
financed by the European Community/Union. The idea of coordinating and financing a
series of priority infrastructure links first emerged in the early 1990s. The development
of the TENs was always closely linked to the creation of the European Single market. In
their most ambitious form, the complete TENs master plans foresaw public and private
investments in the amount of 220 billion ECU until the year 2000 alone, of which the EU
itself was prepared to supply about one tenth in grant funding. 10
TEN infrastructure investments can be categorized into two main categories:
network investments in underprivileged regions disbursed through the regular structural
funds, and priority investments funded though the TEN budget line. Additionally, the
European Investment Bank has provided funding for both types of investments.
The TENs were not only the first spatial concept in European policies (Buunk
1999:) but also the EU’s first large scale infrastructure policy. Although the TENs are
frequently dismissed as simply expressing Member state preferences for national network
connections that were yet to be completed, Piodi (1997:24) presents an important
alternative interpretation:
10 The development of the Trans-European transport networks has been assessed in much detail in the
literature. In particular, there are four book-length manuscripts exclusively dedicated to the TENs, so it
cannot be the place of the present study to reassess the entire process here. For a (now already outdated)
account examining key TEN themes for the not only the transport, but also the energy and
telecommunications sectors, see Debra Johnson’s and Colin Turner’s (1997) Trans-European Networks.
For a policy-oriented account that (too) neatly divides the discussion over trans-European transport
infrastructures into different sectors, see John Ross’ (1998) Linking Europe. For an engaged, prointegrationist
and pro-multi-modal plea for the future development of the TENs, see Mateu Turró’s (1999)
Going Trans-European. Finally, Tim Richardson’s Ph.D. thesis (2000) presents the kind of critical,
discourse-analytical and planning theory-inspired assessment on the TEN process which is closest to my
own study. Even his thesis, however, only marginally touches on the development of the Pan-European
(Helsinki) Corridors and the TINA Process which I discuss in more detail Chapter 6.

235
The 1990s saw the start of the European Union's involvement in infrastructure
policy.... This innovation was far more radical than has generally been suggested by
politicians, researchers or journalists. Historically, the role of public works in the
Member States has far exceeded their specific function … [T]hey also function as a
symbol of the tangible reality of power, which is of crucial importance even in the
modern age. The fact that responsibility for this sector has been conferred on the
Union means that the prospects for the political legitimization of the Union have been
enhanced. … Its new responsibilities mean that it now plays a major role in the
decision-making process at all levels of government in the Member States.
In short, the rise of the TENs also has much to do with the emergence of a
consensus among Member states that their competitiveness is intricately tied to that of the
emerging European Union, and that this Union needed to be vested with additional
powers in order to ensure this ongoing competitiveness at a global scale. The following
discussion of four key spatial storylines surrounding EU transport infrastructure policy in
the 1990s shows how growth and competitiveness considerations continue to win over
redistributive and environmental aims. Some of the identified storylines – Cohesion and
Polycentricity; as well as Missing Links and Bottlenecks, - are partially complementary
and mutually reinforcing. Others are contradictory. Consequently, some of the storylines
end up privileging opposite types of investments. It should also be noted that the
different storylines roughly correspond to different policy directorates within the
Commission. While the Cohesion and Polycentricity storylines are closely aligned with
policies that fall within the competency of DG Regio, the Missing Links and Bottlenecks
storylines are more closely aligned with policies coming out of the DG TREN. Table 6.1
gives an overview of the storylines and the key related policy arenas. The following
sections discuss each storyline in more detail.

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Table 6.1 Overview of EU Transport Infrastructure Investment Storylines
STORYLINE POLICY ARENA RESPONSIBLE
DIRECTORATE
“Cohesion”
“Polycentricity”
“Missing Links”
“Bottlenecks”
Structural Funds
European Spatial
Development Perspective
Trans-European
Networks,
especially priority projects
DG REGIO
DG TREN
Source: Own compilation
6.3.3 Cohesion
Transport plays a key role in efforts to reduce regional and social disparities in the
European Union and in the strengthening of its economic and social cohesion.
(CEC1999b:1) (Communication from the Commission: Cohesion and Transport)
Cohesion is perhaps the most important spatial storyline in EU policy making. It
represents policy-makers’ recognition of the need to pro-actively counterbalance the
negative effects of increased inter-European competitiveness brought about by the Single
Market and globalization more generally. As a storyline devised to appease the losers of
European integration and enlargement, it represents a formidable challenge that has had
limited success.
Cohesion can be interpreted in various ways, most commonly referring to varying
levels of (economic) stability and/or a process of convergence. Cohesion as a spatial
concept was first written into the Single European Act (SEA) in 1985. It signified a
commitment to promote the development of poorer regions in the EU in order to persuade

237
the poorer member states to agree to the development of the single European market.
The two measures which have received primacy in EU cohesion policies are GDP per
capita and unemployment. Consequently, national and regional cohesion has frequently
been defined in terms of the degree of parity in GDP per capita (also see DIW 2001:9).
So the origins of cohesion policy lie in the realization that the Community should
pay some sort of “integration subsidy” to lower-income regions. EU cohesion policy has
also been characterized as the “flagship of European regulated capitalism” (Hooghe
1998:457). Economic and social cohesion is now one of the fundamental objectives of the
European Union, at least in rhetoric. In Article 2 of the TEU, the Union sets itself the
objective
to promote economic and social progress and a high level of employment and to
achieve balanced and sustainable development, in particular through the creation of an
area without internal frontiers, through the strengthening of economic and social
cohesion and through the establishment of economic and monetary union.
[Emphasis added.]
Cohesion is therefore seen as subservient to achieving progress and sustainability.
In the Treaty on the European Community (TEC), the cohesion objective was been
defined more explicitly as having a very clear spatial dimension (Article 158 TEC, ex
Article 130a):
In order to promote its overall harmonious development, the Community shall develop
and pursue its actions leading to the strengthening of its economic and social cohesion.
In particular, the Community shall aim at reducing disparities between the levels of
development of the various regions and the backwardness of the least favoured regions
or islands, including rural areas. 11
11 Note that this is the very formulation (except for of the mention of the islands) that had been introduced
by the Single European Act in 1985. Back then, however, cohesion was to be achieved through EIB loans,
common Community policies and the coordination of member states policies, i.e. not primarily through the
structural funds, but free market, member state-directed activities supplemented by structural policies
(Allen 2000:249)

238
Note that the terms “development” and “backwardness” are not specifically
defined, however. The Commission has since interpreted the concept as a triple axis
encompassing the physical environment, the business environment and human/social
capital. The main instruments for promoting cohesion within the EU territory have been
the so-called structural funds. They were to address gaps within member states, between
regions, and between social groups. The two funds in this “family of funds” most
important with regard to transport infrastructure investments are the European Regional
Development Fund (ERDF) and the Cohesion Fund. 12
Under the ERDF, the EU provides
funding for transport infrastructures in the EU’s so-called least developed regions
designated as Objective 1. 13 Its overall rationale, laid out in Article 160 TEC, does not
include a specific mention of transport investments:
The European Regional Development Fund is intended to help to redress the main
regional imbalances in the Community through participation in the development and
structural adjustment of regions whose development is lagging behind and in the
conversion of declining industrial regions.
Nevertheless, in practice, the ERDF has provided financial contributions to the
relevant Trans-European Transport Network routes in that area. The Cohesion Fund, by
contrast, was specifically designed to provide assistance in the areas of transport and
environment in the poorest EU countries. (As such, the Cohesion Fund must be seen as a
direct precursor to the pre-accession instrument ISPA). Article 161 of the TEC specifies
that
12 The term “structural funds” was adopted in the late 1980s as a “shorthand term” (Allen 2000) for the
European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the European Social Fund (ESF), the Guidance Section of
the European Agricultural Guidance and Guarantee Fund (EAGGF). Since their respective addition in
1992 and 1993, respectively, it also includes the Cohesion Fund and the Financial Instrument for Fisheries
Guidance (FIFG).
13 Meaning, as a general rule, that GDP per capita is below 75% of the EU average.

239
A Cohesion Fund set up by the Council … shall provide a financial contribution to
projects in the fields of environment and trans-European networks in the area of
transport infrastructure.
Eligibility under the Cohesion Fund was always determined according to national
economic criteria based on GDP performance, so the future of Cohesion Fund assistance
to Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain is threatened by the prospects of Eastern
enlargement. A complex deal was struck in Agenda 2000 by the member governments to
ensure the continuation of both cohesion and enlargement funding from 2000 to 2006.
Allen (2000:264) provides a realist, intergovernmentalist interpretation for the deal.
Bordering on outright cynicism, he notes:
This bargain was probably possible because the structural funds have rather less to do
with real economic cohesion or the eradication of regional disparities than to do with a
modest budgetary redistribution to facilitate the continued development and smooth
running of the EU.
Nevertheless, the official rationale for funding transport infrastructures in the
context of cohesion was the idea that better infrastructure endowment would
automatically make these lagging, often peripherally located, regions more competitive
within the EU territory. That this investment-for-cohesion storyline clearly misrepresents
and oversimplifies the complex effects of transport infrastructure investments on regional
development has already partially been demonstrated during the general discussion over
the relationship between transport and economic development in chapter 2. The
following paragraphs will further elaborate on the contestability of the notion,
concentrating more specifically on the political background of the cohesion storyline. 14
14 Note that the assumption of a straight correlation between transport investment and economic
development is also contradictory to the ambitions of the EU’s new Sustainable Development Strategy,
which explicitly aims at decoupling transport growth from GDP growth.

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Resources for regional policies from the EU increased almost tenfold from 3.7
billion ECU in 1985 to 33 billion in 1999, amounting to 0.45% of the EU’s total GDP (P.
Martin 1999:11). Although many beneficiary member states nevertheless continue to
argue in this vein, investment-for-cohesion arguments have not been backed this up with
credible results. None of the member states demanded to see these credible numbers,
however, since cohesion funding was not really based on economic development
rationales but on political reasoning. Since deepening integration, i.e. a progressive
implementation of the Single Market, provides an economic threat to the less competitive
regions in the EU, political intuition demanded that subsidies and other economic
incentives be provided for them in order to “sweeten” the deal. Given this political
nature of structural funding at the EU, cohesion policy was therefore never based on any
precise estimations of the true costs for poorer regions of accepting the EMU or further
enlargement (cf. Allen 2000:263). The accession of several lower income countries into
the EU in the 1980s simply made it politically necessary to institute a system of regional
transfers.
Despite this enormous financial commitment, the actual economic justification
behind cohesion policy remains deeply contested. Neo-classical theorists, for example,
since they assume perfect competition, argue that policy interventions in favor of lagging
regions are not necessary because 1) the process of integration itself will sufficiently
accelerate convergence between regions, and 2) even regions with lower levels of
productivity will still gain from trade based on comparative advantage.
This argument is contradicted by new theories of economic geography stressing
endogenous growth (see especially Krugman 1991). These theories emphasize the

241
importance of economies of scale, imperfect competition and the localized nature of
spillover effects. Yet ironically, this new economic geography ends up challenging the
validity of regional transfers in a much more troubling manner, because it implies that
spatial redistribution will diminish competitiveness. The question then becomes whether
cohesion, i.e. a more equalized distribution of economic activity across European space,
is still a desirable goal if it might jeopardize European competitiveness in the long run.
This forces decision-makers to clarify their objectives. Philippe Martin’s (1999):12)
recent EIB prize winning essay poignantly summarizes the key dilemma for economists:
If economies of scale and localized spillovers explain phenomena of increased
regional inequalities, this necessarily implies that efficiency gains … accrue from the
existence of economic agglomeration. The existence of these beneficial effects of
agglomeration suggest rather that, in certain respects, Europe’s economic geography is
insufficiently agglomerated and specialized (for example in comparison with
American geography). It is therefore illogical to claim that the diminution of regional
inequalities supposedly facilitated by regional policies will generate efficiency gains at
pan-European level. To oppose concentration and geographical specialization is also
to renounce their beneficial effects.
According to this rationale, pursuing cohesion ultimately means foregoing the
very benefits that urban and regional agglomerations provide. In other words, although
hugely problematic from an equity perspective, the argument is that Europe as a whole
may be better off (macro-)economically if it keeps concentrating infrastructure
investments in the Blue Banana core of Europe, with certain peripheral exceptions.
Martin is thus making an interesting efficiency argument that the EU, for political
reasons, could never officially heed. 15
15 It should be noted, however, that current rethinking of regional policy as a whole does not necessarily
challenge the sense of using road and rail investments as tools for economic development, since neither
market-led economic integration nor diversification can be achieved without first physically linking the
infrastructures of countries or regions. What it does, challenge, however, is previous simplistic assertions

242
For the last ten years, arguments for the financing of TEN transport networks
have been based on a dual strategy of increasing EU competitiveness and economic and
social cohesion. Unfortunately, this strategy is based on a economic reasoning that is
both internally contradictory and, as is increasingly being pointed out, empirically
dubious. Under the heading “competitiveness and jobs”, the Commission’s 1998 report
on the implementation of the TEN transport guidelines (Commission of the European
Communities 1998d) summarized the TEN strategy as follows:
The rationale for the Community’s Trans-European Network Policy is twofold:
?? Efficient jobs for transport is vital for EU competitiveness, and thus long-term
growth and jobs. EU industry needs efficient transport systems both to keep costs
down and to allow it to provide a good service;
?? To enhance economic and social cohesion by ensuring that peripheral regions are
well connected to EU Networks. Work done for the Cohesion Fund points to a
positive correlation between spending on TEN and private business investment
suggesting a very favorable impact from new infrastructure investment, including
a strong positive effect on employment in the long run.
Based “on very cautious assumptions by Commission services” the paper then
proceeds to estimate that the Transport TEN as a whole, consisting of an investment of
400 billion ECU 16 , could create “between 600.000 to 1.000.000 new permanent jobs, or
2.5. additional jobs per million ECU invested in TEN instead of the average alternative
investment.” The paper, prepared by the Transport Directorate, does not talk about where
exactly this private investment was located in relation to the TEN investments, so nothing
can really be implied as far as spatial cohesion is concerned.
Across town at the Regional Policy Directorate, and at around the same time, the
author(s) of the Commission’s Communication on Cohesion and Transport had much
(also made both by the Commission, see below) that improved road and rail connection automatically
reduce regional disparities.
16 The ECU was the (unminted, virtual) direct predecessor of the Euro, i.e. 1 ECU is equal to 1 €.

243
more precise, less optimistic analysis to offer than their colleagues at the Transport
Directorate, however. The conclusions offered in this Communication are unequivocal
about the possibilities of reducing interregional disparities through transport
infrastructure investments. Taking into account state of the art research about “pump
effects” 17 this report warns of using transport infrastructure investments in peripheral
regions as a panacea for regional development:
It is clear that investment in transport alone will not lead to the reduction of
development disparities. The success of improvements in transport depends on
complementary efforts to ensure that the disadvantaged regional economies are in a
better position to seize the opportunities created. The evidence suggests that in such a
context, carefully selected investments in transport infrastructure in Greece, Spain,
Ireland, and Portugal have had positive long-run effects on private investment and
economic development in the regions, although there may be wide variations in final
impact. [p. 4]
Regarding employment and the efficient operation of the labor market, the
Communication makes it clear that “the key concern here is often not the provision of
new transport infrastructure, but the provision of transport services (particularly public
transport)” (p.5). Ironically considering its title, the 1998 Communication therefore more
or less abandons the whole investment-for-cohesion rhetoric and instead reverts to
arguments in favor of completing the TENs based on a rhetoric of “integration” and
“accessibility.” Referencing two EU research from the mid-nineties, 18 the
Communication summarizes their overall findings as follows:
17 A pump effect is the (counterproductive) removal of resources from structurally weaker and peripheral
regions due to improved accessibility. As for state of the art research, the Communication specifically
refers to the “Study of the socio-economic impact of projects financed by the Cohesion Fund” done by the
London School of Economics (LSE) for the European Commission in 1997.
18 MCRIT. 1994. “Accessibility Study on the Peripheral Regions of the Community Territory: ICON
indicator 1995 and 2020.” Barcelona: MCRIT

244
The completion of TEN in transport clearly represents a necessary condition for
spatial integration and raising accessibility. However, studies confirm that to ensure
the maximum benefit from the TEN their development must be integrated into a
broader strategy.
- the medium-sized cities in centrally located regions and located on the TEN nodes
or corridors tend to obtain the major accessibility gains. Many cities on high-speed rail
and motorways networks can expect a significant improvement in their physical
accessibility;
- the main metropolitan areas are also major beneficiaries from TEN
implementation but to a lesser extent than the medium-sized cities. This reflects the
already well developed transport infrastructure in those regions.
- for peripheral and remote regions to gain the maximum benefit from the TEN,
complementary investment in secondary networks will be required.
(Commission of the European Communities 1999b:6, my emphasis)
Hidden in this paragraph is perhaps the frankest admission in official EU
documents that Trans-European Networks in and of themselves reinforce existing
distributions and tend to be localized around key nodes. Insightful as it is, one should not
overstate the importance of this Communication, however. Communications mainly
serve the purpose of clarifying Commission thinking on a particular issue at a particular
time, but there is no direct political commitment resulting from them, and its conclusions
are not necessarily shared by all members of the Commission. 19
Nevertheless its rhetoric
is indicative. The Second Report on Economic and Social Cohesion recently released by
the Commission also explicitly states that infrastructure endowment is “a necessary, but
not sufficient condition for the economic development and competitiveness of a region”
(Commission of the European Communities 2001e:49). So, in the end, the Brussels-
19 Also, since there was no normal transition from the last administration to the present one, but rather a
complete changeover resulting from allegations of corruption against many previous Commissioners, even
internal commitments to previous Communications within the Commission are weak in this case. In the
case of the 1998 Communication on Cohesion and Transport, it was already characterized as “mainly
forgotten” by DG Regio staff in the spring of 2001, although the person who wrote it has since become
more influential within DG Regio.

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based European Federation for Transport and Environment (T&E) is justified in accusing
EU regional policy makers of adhering to erroneous beliefs. As they summarize:
Investing in transport infrastructure is frequently assumed to provide large-scale
economic and employment benefits. So much so that large proportions of EU and
national budgets set aside for regional assistance or economic regeneration are devoted
to transport infrastructure. Empirical evidence to support this general assumption is,
however, notable by its absence. A recent overview by a panel of leading experts in
this field has concluded that there are in fact no automatic economic or
employment benefits from such spending on transport. Yet decision makers, and
the funding systems they have developed, continue to rely on the assumption that there
are automatic benefits. The Standing Advisory Committee on Trunk Road Assessment
(SACTRA) in the UK reviewed all the questions related to Transport and Economy.
They found that benefits from transport projects may be limited, they may go to the
already well off, or there may not even be any benefits. The assumptions and
prejudices held by Europe’s decision makers are, in fact, incorrect.
(T&E 2000:iii, all emphases in the original) 20
Accessibility has since often been used as a substitute term for spatial cohesion in
EU literature. Calls for parity of access provide welcome, intuitive justifications for
infrastructure investments in peripheral regions. More generally, putting an emphasis on
the territorial dimensions of cohesion is a convenient way for the Commission to sidestep
a decision for either more rural/peripheral or more urban/core investments, a touchy
and contested subject within the administration. And in the end, for many in the regional
policy directorate, both urban and regional infrastructure investments are no more
important to achieving cohesion than, for example, environmental protection investments
or gender programs.
In sum, cohesion as a general concept is an ongoing storyline within EU policymaking.
Whether the resulting EU programs preferably stress its spatial, economic, or
social aspects in part depends on political rationalizations of the moment. Over the
course of the last few years, the scale has tipped somewhat in favor of a social cohesion

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rhetoric, even within EU funding programs. 21 Rumford (2000:183), on the other hand,
makes a consistent argument that in the wake of neo-liberal policy-making in Europe, the
primary conceptualization of cohesion even “has become detached from its redistributive
origins and incorporated in a discourse of competitiveness and growth.” In the case of
transport infrastructure investments, investment-for-cohesion arguments attempting to
avoid the “competitiveness trap” are now most frequently put forth in conjunction with
calls for improved accessibility and for the “completion” of the TENs even in remote
regions. These aims are in conflict with neo-liberal macroeconomic efficiency
arguments, however, which would instead call for a greater differentiation of European
spaces based on specialized divisions of labor and regional competitiveness, and hence
for a subsequent concentration of resources in already competitive places. In the wake of
this line of argumentation, the emphasis of cohesion funding then shits from a focus on
peripheral, lagging regions within Cohesion countries (i.e. upgrading of rural roads and
general modernization of infrastructure inside an already underprivileged member state)
towards a modernization of key, national-level infrastructures so that these Cohesion
countries might be more competitive with regard to other EU member states. This
problem of these different geographical scales of under-privilege, and the related internal
inconsistency of the cohesion story-line, will come to haunt us once again when we take a
20 Note the reliance on expert opinion, which also makes this an exemplary statement for reflexive
modernization discourse. Also see Chapter 4.
21 For example, the Commission’s 1998 Social Action Programme asserts that:
The . . . programme's point of departure is that economic and social progress go hand in hand and that
the purpose of economic progress is to raise people's standard of living, against the background of a
balanced macro-economic strategy. Social policy should promote a decent quality of life and standard
of living for all in an active, inclusive and healthy society that encourages access to employment, good
working conditions and equality of opportunity. (CEC 1998, as quoted in Fainstein 2001:3).
There is a rapidly growing literature that uses the term cohesion in the sense of inclusiveness, stressing
issues such as social capital and governance. For an good overview of this literature, see Fainstein (2001).

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look at the situation in the Eastern candidate countries and the enlargement-related
funding.
6.3.4 Polycentricity
The concept of polycentric development has to be pursued, to ensure regionally
balanced development, because the EU is becoming fully integrated in the global
economy. Pursuit of this concept will help to avoid further excessive economic and
geographic concentration in the core area of the EU.
European Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) (1999h):20
The concept of polycentricity is intimately bound up with attempts to
reconceptualize and ultimately reshape the spatial structure of urban hierarchies in
Europe.
The difficulty to disentangle rhetorical vision, analytical content and
prescriptive policy elements connected to different concepts of polycentricity
(particularly with regard to the ESDP) has already been variously discussed in the
literature (e.g. Albrechts 2001; Bailey and Turok 2001; Copus 2001; Kloosterman and
Musterd 2001; Krätke 2001; van Houtum and Legendijk 2001; Davoudi 2001a). Like
cohesion, the polycentricity-storyline is based on the key insight that Europe needs a
more equal distribution of globalization and integration gains than is presently the case.
Richardson and Jensen (2000:505) correctly note that “the construction of EU spatial
discourse is conditioned by several mega trends: the globalized market, the emergence of
the competitive city, and the culture of mobility” and that the resulting reframing of cities
is guided by visions of “transcending spatial distances across Europe.” 22
In the late
1980s, researchers at the French spatial planning agency DATAR presented an image of
22 In the related article, Richardson and Jensen identify mobility and polycentric development as central
themes in the European Spatial Development Perspective. Note, however, that what they identify as a
“mobility discourse” is less directly related to infrastructure investments but more attributable to a general
“culture of mobility” that aims at “transcending spatial distances.”

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European space that has since become ingrained in the minds of many researchers and
decision-makers. They conceived of European space as being dominated by an economic
backbone reaching from London across the channel through the Benelux countries,
Northern France, Switzerland and Southern Germany to Northern Italy. This economic
backbone (dorsale), also variously defined as the heart of Europe, became known as the
Blue Banana (figure 6.3). 23
Blue Banana maps sometimes recognize other important
agglomerations in Europe, but they all they very clearly divide European space into a
core and several peripheries (finisterres), which are often shaded in dark. Ironically, the
catchy Blue Banana image was used by the French spatial analysts precisely in order to
point out the need to develop alternative, more polycentric structures. This desire to
indicate such core-periphery connections, and to indicate a hierarchy of linkages, is
clearly visible in some of the less publicized Banana representations (see figure 6.4).
Nevertheless, the main effect was rather antithetical to the supposed aim of promoting
polycentricity: cities outside the dorsale seemed suddenly doomed as losers simply
because of their location. The Blue Banana became the main metaphor for an
economically divided Europe. The image has proven very difficult to undo, in part
because there is some empirical truth to it. (The highest GDP per capita income regions,
for example, do indeed fall within the banana.)
23 What made the Banana blue? I assume that this was the color used in the original maps produced by
Brunet et al in their 1989 DATAR study, but I was unable to find the original, colored maps to confirm this
with certainty.

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Figure 6.3 The Blue Banana I: An Image Ingrained
Source: Brunet, (1989, as reprinted in NSPA 2000)
Figure 6.4 Blue Banana Maps Focusing on Peripheral Regions & Urban Linkages
Source: IGARUN, as reprinted in ECMT (1995a), and ECMT (1995a)

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Probably the most successful counter-image to the Blue Banana was developed by
Kunzmann and Wegener (1991) at the University of Dortmund. They argued that instead
of a banana, one should instead conceive of European space as of a “European Bunch of
Grapes” (figure 6.5). The image successfully evokes the notion of a polycentric Europe,
yet the metaphor does not deny that urban hierarchies will persist. To keep with the
metaphor: the individual grapes are part of a larger whole, but are not equally large, and
some are juicier and tastier than others. Kunzmann (1998:101) has since justified “the
normative concept of the European Bunch of Grapes as a mental vision for spatial equity
in Europe.”
Figure 6.5 The Blue Banana versus a European Bunch of Grapes
Source: Kunzmann and Wegener, as reprinted in NSPA (2000)
At the level of European policy-making, the storyline of polycentricity finds its
most concise, yet still contradictory, expression in a document that was published, but not
officially adopted, by the European Commission in 1999. The document, the European
Spatial Development Perspective (ESDP) carries the ambitious subtitle “Towards a
Balanced and Sustainable Development of the Territory of the European Union.” Agreed

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at the Informal Council of Ministers responsible for Spatial Planning in Potsdam in May
1999, it was the result of a multi-year, multi country effort at setting out a future vision
for the development of European space in light of current environmental, social and
economic challenges. The overall ESDP process has been meticulously documented by
Andreas Faludi and Bas Waterhout (, 2002 #1199, also see Faludi 2001a) and need not be
recounted here. What concerns us here are some of its key contents and rationales. The
ESDP was developed following the adoption of the so-called Leipzig Principles by
European ministers in 1994. The principles call for: a) development of a balanced and
polycentric urban system and a new urban-rural relationship, b) securing parity of access
to infrastructure and knowledge, and c) sustainable development, prudent management
and protection of nature and cultural heritage (ESDP 1999:11, also see Faludi 2000:8).
Interestingly, the ESDP does not fall into the trap of claiming that Trans-European
Networks will contribute to social and economic cohesion. The rhetoric is instead clearly
oriented towards urban competitiveness. The ESDP recognizes that a large part of the
EU transport investments are concentrated on high-speed railway lines connecting major
conurbations and that cities close to high speed stops will profit most from these
investments. The ESDP’s additional justification that “high-speed lines may offer an
incentive to shift increasing shares of traffic to the railways, thus helping to relieve road
congestion and improve the environment” is both highly speculative and overly
optimistic considering current trends. The ESDP does recognize, however, that
“increases in traffic can no longer be managed by expansion of road infrastructure alone”.
The ESDP insists that “spatial development policy and urban development measures have
a role to play” (all quotes on p.14). The presented perspective (its creators are adamant

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that the ESDP be not understood as a master plan!), however, remains problematic. Both
centrality and urbanity, as well as their complementary concepts peripherality and rurality
remain contested notions within the ESDP (Richardson and Jensen 2000; Copus 2001). 24
In the end, the greatest challenge is related to the fact that the storyline of
polycentricity entails very different visions at different levels of planning. 25
As Simin
Davoudi (2001a:2) concludes in her recent study on polycentricity in European spatial
planning: “Despite its widespread currency, the concept is not supported by clear
definition, robust theoretical framework and rigorous empirical analysis. Hence,
polycentricity means different things to different people.” Davoudi herself distinguishes
the use and adaptation of the concept at three different spatial scales: intra-urban, interurban,
and inter-regional. Which, however, is the most legitimate Pan-European
interpretation of polycentricity? This question still remains largely unresolved. Stefan
Krätke (2001:107) provides a basic definition of a polycentric system as a “system in
which a whole series of ‘high-ranking’ location centres exist side by side with a large
number of small and medium sized towns and cities,” and he finds that such a polycentric
urban system is “especially relevant in the pan-European perspective.” The difficulty,
however, as Krätke himself correctly asserts, is that “both polycentric and monocentric
24 Maps are conspicuously absent in the ESDP document, precisely because of their controversiality. In
particular, a map in the 1997 Noordwijk draft on “accessibility, infrastructure and transport” was removed
from the final draft because it was not strictly congruent with priorities indicated in the EU’s officially
agreed TEN network plans.
25 Note also the threefold definition of polycentric spatial development in the Study Programme on
European Spatial Planning, see SPESP (1999) and http://www.mcrit.com/spesp/SPESP_REPORT/
2.2.Summary.pdf):
The Concept of polycentricity has at least three meanings in the context of European spatial planning
and regional geography. At the scale of Europe as a whole (inter-regional), the possibility of developing
multiple dynamic growth zones across Europe, to challenge the tendencies for a strong core region to
which other part of the territory are peripheral. … At the scale of the territory (intra-regional), the
situation where there are multiple urban centers, often interconnected, rather than a single dominant
centre … At the scale of the urban agglomeration (intra-urban). This refers to the multiplicity of nodal

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urban systems are to be found in the individual member states and in eastern central
European countries [and that] the applicability of the notion … to the whole EU needs
further discussion” (p.107). Several Scandinavian countries, for example, are outright
sceptical of the concept (Bengs and Böhme 1998).
Without resolving the issue of choosing between multiple definitions, Peter Hall
(n.d.)nevertheless provides an excellent summary of the different possible interpretations
of the concept at the European, inter-regional, intra-regional and inter-urban levels:
The central word, polycentric, needs to be carefully defined: … At the global level,
polycentric refers to the development of alternative global centres of power. … Within
a specifically European context, therefore, one meaning of a polycentric policy is to
divert some activities away from "global" cities like London (and perhaps Paris) to
"sub-global" centres. … At a finer geographical scale, however, polycentricity can
refer to the outward diffusion from either of these levels of city to smaller cities within
their urban fields or spheres of influence. … Specifically, the general principle should
be to guide decentralised growth, wherever possible, on to a few selected development
corridors along strong public transport links. … In the more remote rural regions, …
the pursuit of polycentricity must have yet another dimension: to build up the potential
of both "regional capitals" in the 200,000-500,000 population range …, and smaller
"county towns" in the 50,000-200,000 range. … Again, but on a smaller scale, the
growth of such centres could be accompanied by a limited degree of deconcentration
to even smaller rural towns within easy reach. It is a complex strategy. 26
In sum, the storyline of polycentricity continues to hold something in stock for
everyone, which means that EU decision-makers wishing to justify high-speed rail
connections between national capitals are as justified to do so in the name of polycentric
urban development as are regional policy-makers arguing for improved road connections
between secondary cities. The storyline of polycentricity fits the EU’s general
framework of ecological modernization quite well. Its rhetoric is firmly set within an
points within large urban areas, which challenge traditional notions of cities focused around their city
centers.
26 Excerpted from Hall, Peter (n.d.), Christaller for a Global Age: Redrawing the Urban Hierarchy, Section
“Towards a spatially integrated approach,” available under http://www.lboro.ac.uk/gawc/rb/rb59.html

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overall context of competitive European cities and regions which each pursue individual
growth strategies.
6.3.5 Missing Links
TEN-T as a policy has been around for a long time, developed from the “missing
links” and the European Round Table, and all this kind of business, you know.
Brussels Bureaucrat, quoted in Richardson 2000
The Missing Link storyline is predominately industry-created and represents a
masterpiece in infrastructure investment lobbying. As preceding discussions have shown,
EU transport infrastructure funding was obviously not backed up by unequivocal
economic reasoning. So how could the TENs so quickly advance from a mere paper tiger
to a multi-billion Euro investment program? How is it that the EU was willing to commit
billions of Euros in funds to a program that did not guarantee economic returns? The
explanation is that decisions were highly political. But it was also not simply a matter of
income transfers, as was indicated by realist interpretations in the case of cohesion
funding. The rapid adoption of the TENs concept in the early 1990s is primarily due to
their timeliness and due to the ability of the concept to respond to urgent industry and
high-level political needs. The pro-investment infrastructure & construction lobby and
the EU joined forces on the idea of the TENs. In some ways, it may be even more
accurate to say that most official European Union transport infrastructure investment
proposals, and the priority Trans-European Network projects in particular, originated as
industry lobby proposals that were only later transformed into EU policy. There are
several key reports prepared for the European Roundtable of Industrialists (ERT) which
resemble future Commission proposals in startling ways.

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In particular, ERT’s 1984 report called “Missing Links – Upgrading Europe’s
Transborder Ground Transport Infrastructure: A Report for the Roundtable of European
Industrialists,” outlined three specific proposals for a “Channel link between England and
France,” a “Scanlink” plan for road and rail connections in Scandinavia, and a
“transEuropean network of high-speed trains.” This report urged the EU and private
partners to spend billions of dollar of investments on these TEN precursor projects, which
it claimed were economically highly justified projects. The glossy report (black and
white copies are available at no charge from the Roundtable’s Paris or London offices)
contains the following stunning note in an appendix:
The working group aimed to provide a concise and readable report. For this reason,
data sources and references are conspicuously absent from the text, charts and tables.
The group’s report is compiled from the following written [internally commissioned]
submissions and reports: [List reports] The “pedigree” of the facts and figures quoted
in the “Missing Links” report is finely detailed in the written submissions and reports
listed above. Questions on the pedigree of facts and figures should be addressed to
Michael Hinks-Edwards at the Roundtable Secretariat Paris Office (see address
below).
In other words: the bold ERT proposal was based on data that is neither
independently accessible nor verifiable. Upon request, the ERT is willing to answer
questions on the pedigree, but not provide hard copies of the document itself.
The similarity of even this early proposal with the list of TEN priority projects
adopted ten years later at the Essen Summit in 1994 is striking. Not only did the 1994
EU list end up including the Channel tunnel and the Oeresund road-rail bridge as
individual priority projects, but both were also integrated into a network of high-speed
rail links that picked up most of the connections originally proposed by ERT ten years
earlier (also see figures 6.6 and 6.7).

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Figure 6.6 Missing Links I: The ERT Vision (1984)
Source: Cover of European Round Table of Industrialists (1984)
Figure 6.7 Missing Links II: The EU TEN Priority Projects (1994)
Source: Map on the EIB website (www.eib.org)

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ERT soon created the myth that “not only are such projects desirable in terms of
their economic and social impact, but they are affordable, and can be profitable,
environmentally acceptable and financeable without heavy extra commitments to public
spending” (p.1). 27
Corporate watchdog organizations such as ASEED Europe
acknowledge the immense success of the ERT in influencing future EU transport policy.
As Doherty and Hoedeman (1994:137) note:
Through its intensive lobbying of European transport ministers, and also the support of
French Prime Minister Laurent Fabius, the ERT was astonishingly successful in
introducing European power brokers to its vision of a future infrastructure. In 1985,
Volvo’s Pehr Gyllenhammer could report to ERT members that the Italian
government, “on behalf of all the ministers of transportation within the community, is
referring to the Missing Links as a master plan for European infrastructure.”
Other researchers have made the same point. Tim Richardson (1997:337) also
provides a strong case that decisions were influenced by the privileged access that
industry decision-makers had to key Commission working groups:
Proposals for the Trans-European Road Network … were developed by the Motorway
Working Group (MGW) of the Commission’s Transport Infrastructure Committee
[which included] a number of private sector interests including the European Round
Table (ERT), the Association des Constructeurs Europeens d’Automobile, and the
International Road Transport Union. The Committee was overwhelmingly dominated
by transport and infrastructure interests, with a notable absence of environmental
interests. […] It appears that the debate within this key decision-making arena was
largely political. The institutional power of the infrastructure lobby demonstrated here
was strengthened by ready access to top-ranking EC and member-state politicians.
Dick Richardson (1997:55) chimes in almost verbatim. In reminding us that the
consequences of the TERNs are in direct contradiction to the EU’s own environmental
27 In fact, ERT claimed, some of the link projects:
could be financed in very large measure by the private sector. If governments were prepared to set the
right investment climate in terms of fiscal incentives and operating licences, the money could be raised.
… Although Europe has become culturally programmed to see large transport infrastructure projects as
the preserve of government, there is no reason why this should be so. (ibid)

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policy, he also takes the critique one step further, once again contrasting EU rhetoric
versus reality:
In reality, at the European level as well as at the global level, environmental policy is
made and implemented in terms of the vested interests in government and industry
who wish to consolidate their power and follow the path of economic growth. For
example, the TERN plan was based on proposals made by the Motorways Working
Group […]. The fact that the consequences of TERN, in terms of the production of
greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, can be considered to be in direct
contravention of the EU’s commitments in the Framework Convention on Climate
Change at Rio did not even enter the equation.
The industry lobby itself was somewhat divided between promoters of high speed
rail and old-fashioned automobile lobbyists. But since all of them were arguing for
stepping up infrastructure investments, the demands were not presented in a dissenting
fashion but rather as a multi-modal package. Nevertheless, the director of the German
automobile industry lobby, Dieckmann (1995:103-106) has a very clear slant to his
“missing links” storyline, worth quoting at length:
Missing links in the European road network impact most severely on national traffic
flows because this is where the bulk of the movements occur. … The TERN [Trans-
European Road Network] proposals are a first attempt to put pan-European road
planning on a rational basis. …. Nevertheless far greater attention seems to be given to
the creation of a European high-speed rail network. Though the creation of such a
network undoubtedly offers a number of advantages, it will only account for a fraction
of the movements of goods and people in Europe once it is completed. …. This
resurgence in rail-oriented investment contrasts sharply with rail’s share in traffic
volumes. As pointed out earlier it will have negative effects on the sustainability of
the transport system. This policy is not rational. It again raises the question how
serious governments are about reducing pollution, accidents and casualties on the
road. The problem of financing the missing links in the European road network could
easily be solved if railways in Europe succeeded in cutting their costs by about onethird,
thereby reducing the need for subsidies. Over a ten-year period these savings
would provide about 120 billion ECU, which is the sum needed to create a European
road network.

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Regardless of these different modal biases, joint ERT lobbying for the missing
links was heavily stepped up before the passing of the Maastricht Treaty, with three more
ERT publications further underlining previous calls for Trans-European networks.
Lobbying proved successful. Already two years after the ERT proposal, the European
Conference of Ministers of Transport published its sketch-like map of Europe showing a
list of “missing links” in European road and rail infrastructure (figure 6.8).
Figure 6.8 Missing Links III: The ECMT Version
Source: ECMT as reprinted in Turro (1999)
Around the time of the Maastricht Treaty, the OECD (OECD 1992:93) also
chimed in with efficiency arguments for completing key infrastructure links, linking the
“missing links” rhetoric with the follow-up storyline of “bottlenecks” but interestingly
also warning that it is also possible to create too much infrastructure:

260
A bottleneck or a missing link result in less efficiency for the whole network. One
small link investment can therefore have a dramatic effect on logistics efficiency,
while another one creates overcapacity.
Despite the serious objections to the TEN on both environmental and social, and
even on economic grounds, several important arguments worked in favor of the TENs
from the point of view of the Commission. Besides the strong pressures from the
industry in the form of the Round Table of European Industrialists, there was internal
pressure in the form of what Turro (1999:102) calls the “bicycle theory.” According to
this theory, the European Union is constantly forced to “keep pedaling to avoid falling
off” i.e. it has to push and explore new areas of cooperation and increase political and
economic cooperation in order to keep the union alive. And in the particular context of
the early 1990s, embarking on “Missing Infrastructure Links” and “Trans-European
Networks” served several strategic objectives for the Commission: First, it provided a
new “safe” field of cooperation at a time where it was too early to seriously push
common defense and foreign policy or monetary unification. Second and more
important, Trans-European infrastructures could be used to justify an important increase
in the Community budget and a reduction of the excessive share of the overall budget that
was spent on the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). Since the implementation of the
projects would remain a national responsibility, no substantial expansion of the EU
bureaucracy was needed. Turro (1999:103) also points out that
under these conditions, the transfer of investment from the national to the Community
budget could be of interest to Finance Ministers needing to improve the appearance of
their public debt and national deficit figures to comply with the EMU conditions. …
[T]he TENs concept had the rare virtue of combining national and common interests
and to be timely and mostly non-controversial. … This explains its quick progress in
relation to the normal pace of European policy-building.

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Once the “Missing Links” storyline was in full force, its promoters did not have to
even bother pretending to work towards a more equitable, more sustainable Europe. In a
report commissioned for the European Parliament, Piodi (1997:24-25) notes that the
Christopherson Report in fact argues that “improved access to the central poles of activity
of the Union will help boost competitiveness of the regions concerned and the
undertakings located there” which he correctly unveils as meaning that the TENs, from
their outset, were going to fundamentally contradict EU cohesion development goals:
[T]he Christophersen report frankly admits the existence of a circumstance which has
in some circles been seen as a breach of Article 129b of the Treaty, namely the priority
given to infrastructure creation in the Union's central regions rather than in the
peripheral and island regions.
The same dynamic continued when the EU started to address the issue of
enlarging the TENs eastward. Very quickly, the rhetoric switched from a talk about
network extensions to that of corridor expansion. Long before the Transport
Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) for the candidate countries was finished in
1999, the EU and the Candidate countries had already agreed on a set of Pan-European
Corridors who were to receive priority assistance. So once again, the priority focus was
on privileged “missing links” representing major trade routes between the various capital
cities, and not on an integrated, sustainable development of the networks as a whole. The
EU attempted to sell the corridors as a forerunner for a larger network, but the reality
remains that these links will skew the network and further reshape European space to
improve accessibility mostly between key links, and not equally across space:
These ten pan-European transport corridors are intended to improve trade and mobility
within Europe. The concept of the transport corridors is based on the same content and
objectives as the trans-European transport networks within the EU and represents the
forerunner of a Pan-European transport network. The investment requirement for these

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projects is in the region of ECU 25 to 30 billion. In the EU budget, ECU 1.8 billion
was made available for the years 1995 to 1999, including 75% for the priority projects.
(European Parliament 1999:6)
In sum, the “Missing-links” storyline is the one that most honestly reveals the key
rationale behind EU transport infrastructure investments, namely to improve conditions
for business and trade between the most powerful, most competitive urban
agglomerations in Europe.
6.3.6 Bottlenecks
Unless infrastructure is interconnected and free of bottlenecks, to allow the physical
movement of goods and persons, the internal market and the territorial cohesion of the
Union will not be fully realized.
EU White Paper “European Transport Policy for 2010: Time to Decide.” 2001:50
The bottleneck storyline is not a new one in EU transport policy, but it has
recently reappeared with vigor in the Commission’s new White Paper on the Common
Transport Policy (Commission of the European Communities 2001f). In the section on
infrastructure policy, the almost exclusive focus on the issue of bottlenecks in this
document is stunning. In some ways, it is a variation of the “Missing Links” storyline.
And again, the industry is ahead of the Commission in terms of setting the stage for the
ensuing rhetoric. In the mid- to late-1990s, the so-called European Centre for
Infrastructural Studies (ECIS) in Rotterdam published two major studies on the ”State of
European Infrastructure” (1996) and on “Bottlenecks in the European Transport
Networks” (1999).
The Bottlenecks-storyline aims at creating a strong sense of urgency. Its major
implication is that there are congested infrastructures that need to be “unblocked”. In its

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most simple form, it is an unqualified cry for infrastructure expansion. The idea is that
the free flow of goods, and by extension, the competitiveness of the entire European
economy, is hindered by the limited capacity of Europe’s roads, rail lines, waterways and
air routes. In complete disregard for the EU’s Sustainable Development Strategy, which
was published the same year, the new Transport White Paper is content in simply
focusing on curing the symptoms (i.e. bottlenecks) rather than address transport problems
from a more comprehensive, growth-managing perspective. It simply states that the
“transport boom is outstripping economic growth” and that this is “posing a major
problem.” The White Paper’s understanding of the environmentally sustainable policy
developed at the Gothenburg European Council is also limited: it supposedly only
“underlined” the need “to tackle rising levels of congestion and encourage the use of
environmentally friendly modes” (p.50). As for the latter, this appears to be defined as
anything apart from highway funding including multimodal projects, high-speed rail, sea
terminals and airports. Already in the introductory paragraphs of the section, the writers
of the White Paper (i.e. DG TREN) entirely abandon even the slightest nod towards stateof-the-art
transport policy - which would advise better management rather than building
after demand – (see quote at the beginning of the section).
The White paper suggests concentrating a major share of future TEN resources on
“unblocking the major routes” i.e. the existing 14 Essen TEN priority projects as well as
a select number of new “special” projects. There is simply no more talk of equal
distribution of benefits from infrastructures in this paper. The proposed two-stage
revision speaks for itself:

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The first stage in 2001 … should concentrate on eliminating bottlenecks on the routes
already identified as priorities for absorbing the traffic flows generated by
enlargement, particularly in frontier regions, and improving access to outlying areas.
… [For] the second state in 2004 [t]he idea is to concentrate on a primary network
made up of the most important infrastructure for international traffic and cohesion on
the European continent.
In the entire paper, there is no precise definition of what exactly constitutes a
“bottleneck.” A section entitled “foreseeable bottlenecks”, the White Paper includes
missing border links, single track rail lines, lack of bridges, and limitations on certain
waterways. Other sections speak of urban ring roads. In the end, the clear tenor is to
accommodate rather than manage growth. The European Environment Agency (2001:30)
strongly criticizes this, giving a negative overall assessment to EU transport investments
practices, even noting that the fact that “decisions on transport infrastructure are still
made mainly as a response to problems of traffic bottlenecks [is a] reactive approach
[that] favours extension of the road infrastructure.” It would be naïve to pretend that
bottlenecks can always be addressed though means other than infrastructure expansion.
What is problematic however, is that the Commission should be focusing so vicariously
on so-called international bottlenecks in relation to the TENs, since the actual projects
hiding behind this designation are often the very same large scale industry-lobbied
“missing links” that did not get built (yet) during the 1990s. Here, at a recent conference
on the release of the White Paper, the Secretary General of the ECMT, Jack Short (Short
2001:2) warned the Commission not to overstate the importance of EU funding:
Since a bottleneck is where there are severe problems it is logical that investment
should show high economic rates of return. But it should be understood that
bottlenecks in international traffic might sometimes benefits more from particular
national investments rather than high profile and very expensive international projects.

265
For roads, it might be a bypass round Budapest for example or a particular seed
investment in terminals for combined transport. 28
More importantly, Short reminded his Brussels audience that “bottlenecks are not
all physical” and that “there is a tendency to overdimension projects once they are on the
maps. Motorways or high speed trains are not needed everywhere” (p.3). This comment
is particularly insightful in light of current Pan-European infrastructure plans for the
Central European candidate countries, where ambitions for infrastructure expansion are at
a particularly drastic mismatch with actual funding and planning capabilities, and indeed,
as Short correctly notes, also with actual needs.
Finally, the dramatic resurgence of the bottlenecks storyline also points to another
key issue in need of further discussion, namely the persistent interdependence of Pan-
European and urban interests with regard to infrastructure expansion. Apart from
bottlenecks at natural barriers (e.g. Alpine tunnels) and national borders, congestion is
primarily related to urban densities. This is a circumstance that opens the way for both
cooperation and conflict (see esp. Chapter 7).
6.4 Conclusions: The Challenge of Prioritizing Investments
The difficulties in agreeing on a common European transport policy, of course,
have much to do with the fact that it is difficult to define its prime beneficiaries. From a
public welfare perspective, the key consideration for any investment is the optimal use of
public funds to the greatest possibly benefit of all populations in the affected regions.
One therefore also has to ask the question whether new investment into transport
infrastructures should be the priority strategy at all. Other investments, especially road
28 Note that in the specific case of Budapest, international, and more specifically EU (EIB) involvement in

266
upgrading and maintenance, often promise greater economic returns (World Bank 1996).
Especially in the mature economies of the European Union, it often makes much sense to
concentrate on even other aspects. For example, in order to attract the kind of highly
educated labor force that the new telecommunications and computer industries require,
place-factors such as cultural institutions may be more important than additional access
roads. However, regional interest may collide with national interests here. For example,
local residents may consider an upgrading of the local road or rail system much more
important and preferable than the construction of an additional long-distance freeway
routed through their region, especially if the project cuts though valuable nature reserves.
Yet, national priority projects are typically not based on the specific needs of the regions,
but rather on a more general national master plan. Large-scale links often receive priority
primarily not because they can be justified either through careful cost-benefit analysis or
production function calculations but simply for political reasons. This is even more true
at the Pan-European level.
The demand for new infrastructure or added capacity is of course typically highest
in regions with higher population densities, i.e. in core regions. Since cost-benefit
analyses continue to calculate the bulk of their benefits from time saving from the users,
investments in these more urbanized, higher density core regions will still show greater
benefits than in lower density regions. In other words, if investments were to simply
follow existing demand, then peripheral regions, which are typically more rural in
character, would be unlikely to receive priority investments. There is an obvious
dilemma here and it demonstrates that transport policy has to be developed in consistency
with spatial and regional policies. Despite efficiency arguments favoring investments in
the financing of the ring road has in fact been a crucial and contested issue. See Chapter 8 for details.

267
agglomerations in the core, the EU is likely to continue to be committed to developing
rural and peripheral regions, and will therefore continue to finance rural transport
infrastructures. It should be clear, however, that this is first and foremost a political
commitment, and not an efficiency decision. The problem is that these infrastructures
will be primarily roads. With population and economic activity necessarily being more
dispersed in peripheral regions, higher per capita investments are needed there. And
given current political dynamics, with non-central regions gaining rather than losing
political influence in Brussels, the EU is unlikely to discourage rural development for
efficiency reasons in the near future.
The fact that the key objective of EU cohesion and spatial development policies,
namely to achieve a more balanced distribution of infrastructure across space, is
contradictory to what the EU’s own house bank and main lending institution, the
European Investment Bank, considers state of the art economic rationality, is a deeply
troubling thought. The EIB itself has been the main funding institution for those very
TEN networks that supposedly will be developed “for the benefit of all citizens of the
European Union”. 29
On a more general level, the contrasting storylines explain the recurring dilemma
of all decision-making surrounding large-scale infrastructure: by definition, all “backbone
networks,” be they located along the Blue Banana or along any of the ten chosen Helsinki
Pan-European corridors, privilege connections between large cities and bypass
agglomerations of lesser importance. And the bypass effect is certainly much greater in
29 Much important grant funding for TEN networks particularly in the four lower income EU member
countries has come from the EU Cohesion Fund. However, a much larger part of the TENs was financed
through favorable loans from the EIB, as well as through public-private partnerships and national
government funds.

268
the case of high-speed rail than for roads. This means losers are scattered along the way,
and, according to the British SACTRA 30 experts, even possibly also at of the two ends.
This latter point becomes particularly important when we consider the EU’s ambitions to
extend the TENs into Central and Eastern Europe.
EU decision-making thus remains deeply conflicted and contested. EU transport
sector investments continue to have to satisfy different aims related to growth,
competitiveness, cohesion and sustainability. Environmental concerns often take a back
seat to mainstream economic development interests, and the politically most influential
core regions continue to be able to attract a significant amount of infrastructure funding at
the expense of less economically advanced peripheral areas. The TEN priority projects
fundamentally violate cohesion goals and sustainable development by concentrating
investments in already privileged areas. And despite a rhetorical favoring of rail, the
majority of investments still went towards road projects. (One of the key reasons why
lending and grant making remain so heavily biased towards road is the failing
commitment of the recipient governments to more actively pursue a modal shift towards
rail.) In the cases of the chosen fourteen TEN priority projects, which were determined at
the 1995 Essen Council meeting of the EU, most of the high-profile road and rail projects
were, in fact, long-standing pet industry projects that had been heavily promoted by the
industrial lobby for some time.
Finally and perhaps most importantly, the diminished faith in transport
investments as triggers of economic growth in lagging regions must be seen in the larger
context of the recent reevaluation of the possibilities of regional policy as a whole. In
Europe, empirical evidence in the 1990s has been used to support both supporters and
30 Standing Advisory Committee on Trunk Road Assessment

269
dissenters of the view that regional policies can help poorer regions catch up with
wealthier ones. Many commentators argue that the economic forces leading to an
increasing divergence between regions are simply too strong for regional policies to
counteract them. According to this view, infrastructure investments in poorer regions
appear as pure income transfers that are unlikely to seriously narrow the productivity gap
between poorer and richer regions. In fact, improved transport connections may even
accelerate out-migration in poor regions and thus widen rather than narrow the gap.
Alternatively, one might argue that these types of transfers negatively affect overall
growth. As Philippe Maystadt (2000b:4), the president of the EIB, recently noted:
“Indeed, [regional spending] may lead to lower overall prosperity if it drains resources
from those wealthy and innovative regions that are the main engines of economic growth.
If this is the case, we face a trade-off between equality and growth.”
An increasing number of scholars concerned about the increasing environmental
burden that our transport systems impose upon us would throw in ecology for good
measure, arguing that it is really a three-way trade off. So in the end, we are once again
faced with the fact that the goal of sustainable development, regional or otherwise, is
always struggling to balance at least three often incompatible dimensions: growth, equity
and the environment.

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Printed on September 21, 2002
Last revised on Sept 15, 2002
PART III: REALITIES
EU Transport Infrastructure
Decision-Making in the Context of
Eastern Enlargement

271
Printed Sunday, November 17, 2002
Last amended Sept 17, 2002
CHAPTER 7
EU Transport Infrastructure Plans for CEE:
From 10 “Priority Corridors” to a
“Backbone Network” for an Enlarged Union
7.1 Introduction..................................................................................................... 272
7.2 EU Plans and Programs for CEE Transport Infrastructures: Overview ......... 276
7.3 From the E-Routes to the Pan-European Transport Corridors........................ 278
7.4 The Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) for CEE................. 285
7.4.1 From Politically-Defined Corridors to an Assessed Network?............... 285
7.4.2 Continued Politicking: European versus National Interests ................... 292
7.4.3 Defining the Desired Future: EU Status Quo Defines CEE Needs ........ 294
7.4.4 Network Assessment & Priority Corridors: Contradictory Discourses .. 298
7.5 The Environmental Scoping Exercise on the Warsaw – Budapest Corridor .. 301
7.6 Epilogue: The Proposed Hungarian Amendments to the TINA Network ...... 305
7.7 Conclusions and Consequences ...................................................................... 308

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7.1 Introduction
Previous chapters demonstrated that development objectives for EU support for
transport infrastructures in member states are internally contradictory, attempting to
simultaneously achieve greater cohesion (i.e. economic convergence) and
competitiveness (economic differentiation and hierarchization) among different EU
regions. Chapter 6 further indicated that EU’s Trans-European Network plans and
related transport infrastructure investment rationales are ultimately dominated by two
powerful storylines, namely the notions of “missing links” and “bottlenecks”. Policymakers
and analysts have not sufficiently assessed the implications of such contradictions
and biases for enlargement-related transport investments. 1
The EU accession literature is
equally unhelpful. Recent books and articles on the EU’s Eastern enlargement do not
give much thought to the transport-specific aspects of accession (compare e.g. Avery and
Cameron 1998; Grabbe and Hughes 1998; Fink Hafner 1999; Smith 2000; Hughes, Sasse
et al. 2001). Moreover, few articles properly acknowledge the problematic fact that
structural assistance for CEE candidate countries is based on a model of structural
assistance that is heavily criticized by regional development experts and Green EU
parliamentarians. 2
To make matters worse, conflicts of interests surrounding EU-CEE
links are more geo-politically complex than in the case of internal EU connections
1 Note that parts of the information assembled in the following sections were collected as part of a two-part
research consulting project for the German Environmental Agency (Umweltbundesamt) which I co-directed
in 1999 and 2000. However, this research project focused exclusively on international transport
infrastructure investment-decision making processes in the Baltic Sea region, and therefore did not include
any information on the Hungarian international corridors and/or investment priorities. More importantly,
the focus of the research was not to analyze European Union transport policy but rather to analyze and
critique the lending activities and mechanisms of the International Financial Institutions active in the Baltic
Sea region (i.e. the World Bank, the EBRD, the EIB and the Nordic Investment Bank). The resulting report
(HELCOM 2000) is therefore partially guilty of the same default.
2 See for example the Hiltner report, a German Green Party position paper on the revision of the Structural
Funds, available on the Green-Party affiliated Heinrich Böll Foundation website (www.boell.de).

273
between member states, and prospects for environmentally-friendly, transparent
infrastructure decision-making are bleaker in the case of the candidate countries given the
dire state of CEE transport infrastructures.
The transport infrastructure investment decision-making process in the CEE
candidate countries must of course be seen in context with the collapse of Communism in
that region, and the transformation from a centrally planned to a market economy. CEE
countries are in various stages of transition, displaying variable degrees of privatization
and decentralization. Economic recession in the 1990s led to a severe reduction in
spending capacities of governments, particularly at the local level. In the area of
transport and land use, socialism left a legacy of non-market based infrastructures, landuses
and (intra-urban) population densities. Before the transition, low price, primarily
rail-based transport was provided by large, publicly-owned and –subsidized companies,
meaning that road networks were comparatively modest in size and relatively
undifferentiated. Also, significant backlogs in infrastructure and equipment maintenance
were already built up during the 1980s. Then, during the 1990s, the rapid rise in
individual motorization, the falling demand for public transport, the emergence of weakly
regulated private vehicle operators and dramatic shifts in urban land uses began to erode
the monopoly position of public transport companies and put them into existential
operational and financial difficulties. Between 1988 and 1996, public transport’s share of
motorized trips fell from 79 to 50% in Poland and from 80 to 52% in Hungary (Pucher
1999:227). By contrast, between 1990 and 1998, motorization levels rose from 276 to
511 cars per 1000 inhabitants in Prague, from 190 to 392 in Warsaw, and from 235 to
313 in Budapest (Mitric 2002). National and local governments are presently struggling

274
to react to a situation of rising levels of traffic congestion, noise, accidents, and pollution
in urbanized areas, as well as ill-maintained and inappropriate regional and long-distance
infrastructures. 3
In such contexts, the pursuit of sustainable transport infrastructure
investments appears as a particularly daunting task.
This chapter looks at two major EU transport sector initiatives that were launched
at the Pan-European level in the mid- to late 1990s just as accession negotiations with the
candidate countries began to pick up steam. First, I take a look at the gestation process
of the ten Pan-European Corridors, the so-called Helsinki Corridors. After that, I will
analyze the Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) process for CEE
countries supported by the European Commission. I also include a section on a strategic
assessment effort carried out for the TINA corridor between Warsaw and Budapest. The
presented material on these processes will then provide the setting for the subsequent
case study on EU pre-accession transport infrastructure investments support for Poland
and Hungary in Chapter 8. Note that the European transport ministers’ agreement on the
ten Helsinki Corridors can be considered a “history-making” (Peterson and Bomberg
1999) and therefore internationally binding decision, while the TINA process, despite
3 In fact, pollution from stationary sources, particularly sulphur/SO2 emissions fell drastically after the
transition. Also, due to the economic downturn and the switch from coal to gas in the region, overall
emissions of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, fell between 1990 and 1995. Since then, this
development has been increasingly offset by transport-related CO2 emissions from road vehicles (European
Environment Agency 2002). In Poland, CO2 emissions from transport rose by 23%, those from road
transport even by 40% between 1988 and 1999. Road transport now accounts for 96% of all CO2
emissions in Poland. Figures are similar for Hungary, although the most rapid increases in motorization
already occurred during the 1980s (Hook 1999:207). Nevertheless, transport-related CO2 emissions still
rose by 10%, and those from road transport by 23% between 1987 and 1999, with road transport now
accounting for 97% of all CO2 emissions in Hungary. See OECD (2002:27). Last but not least, after a
decade of rising death tolls, road safety is now improving again in most CEE countries, including Hungary
and Poland (European Conference of Ministers of Transport (ECMT) 2001).

275
having been an intergovernmental process, remained an effort without official legal
standing inside or outside the EU. 4
One of the overarching objectives of this “realities” part of the study is to attempt
to identify in how far conflicts of interests surrounding particular infrastructure
investments can in fact be linked back to different underlying investment rationales.
Using the international process culminating in the Commission-funded publication of the
Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) for the Central European candidate
countries as its case study focus, this chapter reveals the EU’s key underlying rationales
and rationalizations for investing in CEE transport infrastructures. The Pan-European
Corridor process simply demonstrates the primate of power and politics over economic
rationality at the history-making levels of EU decision-making. The TINA process,
however, is more interesting in that it proves to be a perfect example of a rationality-aspower
exercise within the discursive framework of ecological modernization.
The two central propositions for the next two chapters are the Decisional-Power
and the Challenges of Multi-Location Politics Propositions. The Decisional-Power
Proposition assumes that Pan-European Transport Network policies and plans are
primarily designed to satisfy national economic and multi-national corporate interests.
The Multi-Location Politics Proposition is based on the premise that despite being a
powerful Directorate General within the European Commission, the DG responsible for
4 In fact, under the old Transport Commissioner Neil Kinnock, the original plan was supposedly to hold a
ministerial conference on TINA, but due to corruption charges brought against several Commissioners at
the time, all Commissioners had to step down and extensive restructuring followed. The new DG TREN
Commissioners were then more cautious about working towards a ministerial decision. Nevertheless, DG
Transport & Energy representatives planned to elevate the TINA network’s informal status by attaching the
TINA report as an annex to the planned revision of the TEN guidelines, which are formal EU law. Since
these TEN guidelines are part of the so-called transport Acquis, i.e. the transport-specific sections of the
Acquis Communautaire, which form the basis of the accession treaties, they thereby become binding
legislation for the accession countries as well.

276
transport (DG TREN) in fact has limited power to straightforwardly implement its own
transport sector objectives and policies in the candidate countries both because of the
EU’s multi-level governance structure and the importance of additional stakeholders. 5
Meanwhile, previous propositions about “Dominant Discourses” and “Conflicting
Storylines” in EU decision-making also remain relevant for Part III of study, albeit
sometimes with slightly different twists.
7.2 EU Plans and Programs for CEE Transport Infrastructures: Overview
Table 7.1 provides a general overview of the four key initiatives relevant for our
analysis of EU transport-sector infrastructure investments in the CEE candidate countries.
Note that the Helsinki Corridors and the TINA network discussed in this chapter form
part of the so-called “Pan-European Transport Network.” In all, this network consists of
the following components (also see Commission of the European Communities and
Vienna 2000d):
?? The Trans-European Transport Network on the territory of the European Union
(TEN);
?? The ten Pan-European Transport Corridors situated in the acceding countries, in the
NIS and beyond;
?? The TINA network, which is composed of the ten Corridors and the additional
network components within the candidate countries for accession;
?? Four Pan-European Transport Areas (PETrAs) covering Maritime areas;
?? Euro-Asian Links, notably TRACEA (Transport Corridor Europe Caucasus Asia).
The TENs have been discussed in previous sections of this study. Due to
necessary limits in the scope of the present study, neither the PETrAs nor any Euro-Asian
5 The two propositions are quite compatible. Also note that contrary to common misperceptions,
interpreting the EU as a system of multi-level governance does not mean that national leadership and
decision-power necessarily succumb to a diffuse or even unstable hierarchy of influences. As Marks et al.
(1996) note: “The multi-level government model does not reject the view that state executives and state
arenas are important, or that these remain the most important pieces of the European puzzle” (emphasis in
the original).

277
links are investigated in any further detail here. For equal reasons, the Phare/LISF 6
program is also not presented in greater detail in the present study. It was equally beyond
the scope of this study to include a detailed comparative analysis of the transport-sector
loan activities of the “house bank” of the EU, the European Investment Bank (EIB), in
the CEE region, despite the fact that these loans present highly revealing additional
insights with regard to structural, macro-economic rationalities of the European Union. 7
In the end, it is also important to realize that the two major infrastructure plans
discussed in this chapter, the Pan-European Corridors and the TINA Networks, were
based on initiatives dominated by the Commission’s Transport Directorate and by
national transport ministries, while the subsequent ISPA program which disburses the
EU’s pre-accession infrastructure funds in the area of transport is administered by the
Regional Policy directorate, DG REGIO. Throughout the various initiatives, we will
witness varying conflicts of interests not only between the EU and the CEE candidate
countries, but also within different elements of the EU multi-level governance structure,
as well as with other outside actors.
6 LISF stands for Large Scale Infrastructure Facility. It only had a short life-span within the overall Phare
program. The LSIF was conceived in light of the need to restructure the Phare program in order to better
coordinate it with the emerging pre-accessing fund strategy, which culminated in the ISPA fund. In
essence, the LSIF was intended as a trial-run for the ISPA grant program.
7 Suffice to say that while in theory, the EIB is an EU institution accountable to both general EU policy
directives and specific investment priorities, in practice, EIB investments are guided by a curious mix of
“bankability”-considerations related to rationales derived from neo-classical economic theory and more
political considerations relating to the EIB’s overall mission of promoting European integration. (The latter
are mostly unstated and hardly referred to in official loan approval statements, of course.) Insisting on its
semi-independent status as an investment bank, the EIB also never officially agreed to restrict its transport
lending activities in the region to the priority projects identified through the TINA and ISPA processes.
Nevertheless, considerable cooperation and co-funding between ISPA and EIB transport projects occurs.
For a detailed case study on these EIB investment rationales in comparison to other international
development banks like the World Bank or the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, see
(HELCOM 2000). For radial and up-to-date critiques of the overall EIB approach, and particularly its lack
of transparency, see www.bankwatch.org

278
Table 7.1
Key Initiatives Related to EU Transport-Infrastructure Investments in CEE
Initiative: HELSINKI TINA ISPA PHARE/LSIF
CORRIDORS
What is it? High-Level Political EU-funded EU Pre-Accession Until 1999: only
Decision
Identifying key EU-
Transport
Infrastructure Needs
Grant Program for
Transport &
key EU Grant
Program for
CEE routes Assessment for CEE Environment CEEC
Main
Output
Sponsored/
Funded By
Grants for Infrastructure,
Institution-building,
Twinning (‘00-)
Decision-
Makers
Time-
Frame
Ten Multi-Modal
Priority Transport
Corridors in CEE
Pan-European
Transport Ministers
& EU Commission
(mainly DG TREN)
Pan-European
Transport Ministers
Corridor Definition:
until 1997
Investment
Coordination: 1997-
Source: Own compilation
Final report, TINA
maps with backbone
network &
additional networks
EU Commission
(via PHARE)
TINA Senior
Officials Group:
Member State &
CEE representatives
TINA process itself:
1998-1999
TINA time horizon:
until 2015
National CEE
strategies with
priority project list
for EU funding
EU Commission
(DG REGIO)
CEE Transport
Ministries &
EU Commission
National Plans:
2000
Grant Funds:
2000-2006
EU Commission
(misc. DGs)
CEE Transport
Ministries &
EU Commission
In operation
(with different
foci) since 1989
7.3 From the E-Routes to the Pan-European Transport Corridors
Before the transition, the main forum for cooperation between Eastern and
Western European countries was the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe
(UNECE). UNECE fostered international agreements for international road, rail and
combined transport routes (the AGR, AGC, and AGCT, respectively) and initiated work
programs on Trans-European Motorways (TEM) and Railways (TER), resulting in the socalled
“E” routes scheme. 8
However, while there was limited coordination on route
8 Note that this work on the UNECE’s Trans-European Railway Lines (TER) and the Trans-European
North-South Motorway Network (TEM) continues as a parallel effort to EU-CEE initiatives until this day.
For additional information as well as updated maps of the TER and TEM networks see
http://www.unece.org/trans/main/ter/termap.html and http://www.unece.org/trans/main/tem/temmap.html.

279
selection, there was no actual cooperation on international planning or joint financing of
priority investments.
European Transport Ministers from both EU and Central Eastern European
countries met for the first post-transition, Pan-European Ministers of Transport
Conference in Prague in 1991. After that, the TEN process was immediately included in
the Maastricht Treaty. Article 129c of the Treaty stipulates that
the Community shall establish a series of guidelines covering the objectives, priorities
and broad lines of measures envisaged in the sphere of trans-European networks; these
guidelines shall identify projects of common interest.
In the following years, the European Union’s TEN program emerged as an
increasing focus of the EU’s “eastern thrust” (Ross 1998:187) and reflection of the EU’s
pre-accession strategy. At the first Pan-European Transport Conference, the Dutch
Ministry suggested that representatives focus on developing a map of transport priority
corridors connecting the European Union to its eastern and southern neighbors. The
concept was endorsed again at the June 1993 Transport Ministers’ summit in
Copenhagen. The first set of nine international priority corridors was subsequently
adopted at the Pan-European Transport Conference in Crete in 1995. Although most of
the routes selected for the TENs were originally part of the UNECE E-routes, the
dramatic shifts apparent in East-West travel patterns had already required some changes
and additions to these older route selections. One corridor was added as late as June
1997 during the Pan-European conference in Helsinki, completing what is now
commonly referred to as the Helsinki Corridors. In addition, the conference identified
several larger transport areas around the Barents, the Caspian, the Adriatic and the

280
Mediterranean Seas. Figure 7.1 shows the map of the Pan-European Transport Network
at the time of the Helsinki Summit.
Figure 7.1 The Pan-European Transport Network with the 10 Helsinki Corridors
Source: European Commission
Arguing from a purely efficiency-oriented point of view, one would expect that
the major criterion for the selection of the corridors would have been traffic flows. This
was not the case, however. There is confusion even among DG TREN staff as to how
exactly the corridors were decided upon. When asked to explain the history of the
selection process, one expert said that he himself was told that there were several experts
who gave input at various stages of the process, but that the original routes were
researched by a desk officer at the Commission, who had based his selections mainly on
library research in Brussels. Other anecdotal evidence of participants at the Pan-

281
European ministerial meeting provides an even simpler, earlier explanation: during the
first transport ministers meeting in Prague, one of the Western European ministers
apparently had a sheet with brightly colored corridors on a map of Europe (supposedly
more intended for personal purposes than for official presentation), and this eye-catching
map subsequently became the basis of the corridor concept. Another interesting point is
that the corridor concept was close to the kind of master planning approach that the
representatives from the former Communist countries were used to. As a result, many of
them seem to have been sympathetic to the concept despite the fact that the proposed
corridors did not always express their national priorities, and the various color lines
became the basis for political negotiations at the ministerial level.
Part of the reason that the Helsinki Corridors did not have their basis in detailed
traffic forecasts was that reliable pan-European traffic estimates for East-West flows
simply did not exist at the time (also see below). The more important explanation is that
the corridors were decided upon at a level of decision-making where geopolitics and
national representational interests are simply more important than traffic counts.
Commission staff pointed out, for example, that the Polish delegates did not include a
main link from Berlin to Gdansk in the network – presumably largely for historical
reasons. (Overall, however, the Polish government predominantly emphasized northsouth
connections, less so east-west ones.)
Since the corridors had to be determined by what would be politically acceptable
to all stakeholders, the various selected routes were hardly of equal importance with
regard to real existing Trans-European trade and transport flows. For political reasons,
each capital city had to be included in at least one of the corridors. Although they were

282
given equal weight on the resulting map, in reality the section of corridor II linking Berlin
and Warsaw was obviously of much greater importance for Pan-European trade and
traffic flows than the stretch of corridor VII linking Durres to Tirana, for example. In
fact, numerous experts confirmed that this latter corridor was added for purely political
reasons.
There was some competition between ECMT, UNECE and the European
Commission over the corridor process at the Pan-European Transport conference in
Crete, where the routes emerged more clearly. In the end, the Helsinki corridors still
remain very close to the so-called E- routes which were developed by UNECE. Work on
the Helsinki corridors continues until this day, mainly though what has become known as
the Pan-European partnership. After 1997, separate Memoranda of Understanding
(MOU) for the different corridors were concluded among the participating countries.
These MOUs were voluntary commitments and recommended, among other things, the
establishment of different steering committees for the various corridors. Since these
MOUs, which can be considered administrative rather than governmental decisions, thus
had no legal binding character, large differences in the efficiency of these cooperative
efforts became obvious. 9
Secretariats were particularly quickly established for Corridors
I and IV. Work on the Via Baltica corridor is especially advanced.
In early 2000, the TINA Office 10 prepared a status report on the Pan-European
Corridors and Transport Areas which estimated the total lengths of the corridors at
9 Until violent conflict was halted in the Balkans, MOUs could also not be signed for the entire lengths of
the corridors 6, 7, 8, and 10 since all these corridors cross the territory of the Former Yugoslavia. On
February 27, 2002 the MOU for the Danube corridor (VII) was signed in Brussels, leaving only the MOU
for Corridor VIII to Albania to be completed (
10 The TINA Secretariat was never officially linked to the European Commission. In fact, the TINA office
was founded in February 1997 under the name “Wiener Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment
Bürobetriebsges.m.b.H.” (WTB for short) and it is still a limited company under Austrian law. In the fall of

283
25,310 km for the rail sector and 22,930 for the road sector. The costs were estimated at
€ 32.6 and 39.6 billion until 2015, respectively, i.e. a total of € 72.9 billion, but the
numbers are somewhat disputable. More importantly, the status report revealed once
again that many of the so-called corridors hardly deserved their name, since many of
them branch out into several routes that are sometimes hundreds of kilometers apart. Rail
and road corridors are also often running along very different routes. Taking the example
of Corridor IV running from Germany to Romania, Turkey and Greece, figures 7.2 and
7.3 vividly illustrate the emerging network character of the corridors. Of course, the
inclusion of more and more branches is largely a reflection of candidate states’ efforts to
also include secondary and tertiary links between major cities. Note that in the case of
Corridor IV, instead of defining one main corridor route linking Vienna, Bratislava and
Budapest, several closely parallel - and therefore competing - rail lines are included in the
corridor alignments.
2001, TINA VIENNA became directly affiliated to the City of Vienna, continuing the previous work of the
TINA Secretariat at a national level, while at the same time continuing to work as a consulting office. The
current TINA website (http://www.tinavienna.at/buero.htm) explains its continued raison d’être as follows:
The purpose of the foundation of this company was the implementation of the PHARE project
"Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment" (TINA)-process in Central and Eastern Europe as a
technical support body, named the "TINA Secretariat". To carry out the work, TINA VIENNA has,
based on the excellent contacts within the Vienna Cities Administration [sic], established a wide
network of contacts in the member states and in all CEECs, including Ministries, Universities and
individual experts. One of the main strength [sic] of TINA VIENNA is the expertise in international
strategic transport planning in Central and Eastern Europe.
All projects, [sic] which TINA VIENNA has undertaken were financed by international financing
institutes such as the EIB, EU-PHARE and TACIS.
Nevertheless, copyrights for the TINA maps are always credited to the European Commission. Note that
TINA VIENNA is currently also undertaking a Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment for Malta.

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Figure 7.2 Pan-European Transport Corridor IV – Road Sector
Source: CEC and TINA (2000d)
Figure 7.3 Pan-European Transport Corridor IV – Rail Sector
Source: CEC and TINA (2000d)

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7.4 The Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) for CEE
7.4.1 From Politically-Defined Corridors to an Assessed Network?
In order to put the politicized process of corridors prioritization on an ostensibly
more scientific and more objective footing, the European Commission, in cooperation
with the candidate states, and with financial assistance from the EU Phare Program and
the City of Vienna, launched the “Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment” process.
Even the European Commission itself readily admitted that the original Helsinki
Corridors largely reflected EU strategic interests. Stakeholders agreed that a larger needs
assessment for the candidate countries was necessary. The first official mention of a
Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) for the CEE candidate countries
process was made at the first structured dialogue between the European Union Transport
Council (of Ministers) and the relevant transport ministers of the candidate countries in
1995. At the time, the main goal was an identification of the transport-sector investments
required to bring transport infrastructures in CEE countries up to EU standards and to
ensure adequate linkage between CEE and EU infrastructures. More importantly for the
candidate countries, they realized that if the Helsinki Corridors were to become the main
basis for identifying infrastructure projects that were of “common interest,” many of their
national priority projects might not be eligible for funding within the EU’s emerging preaccession
grant framework.
The TINA process therefore had two underlying motivations which were often
incongruent with each other: on one hand, TINA was to present a retroactive, supposedly
de-politicized justification for the already selected priority routes by presenting data on
future traffic flows and “bottlenecks”. On the other hand, TINA was also supposed to

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give CEE countries a second chance to retrofit the selections that had already been agreed
upon at the ministerial level in light of additional national interests and newly emerging
developments in terms of actual traffic flows in the region. The resulting TINA Final
Report is thus a remarkable document that deserves some detailed attention.
The preamble of the TINA report reiterates key EU interests in the region, noting
that “the elements of the European Transport infrastructure network in the [Central
European] region are vital to competitiveness, economic growth and employment
throughout Europe, and in the European Union in particular” (TINA 1999:11). When
pledging consistency with the “principle of sustainable mobility,” the report defines this
principle as “bringing together the economic and social goals of efficiency, safety and
minimalisation of environmental damage.” Multimodality is identified as a core aim.
The TINA process is then divided into two main stages: first, an initial, cost-conscious
definition of the network and second, the identification of investment measures which
would the network “up to a desired quality level.” Built into the report was the typical,
yet disputable assumption that forecasting present trends into the future alone presents a
necessary justification for infrastructure expansion. As the report notes (p. 14):
?? The network should be in line with the criteria laid down in the EU Guidelines for the
Development of the TENs…
?? The technical standards of the future infrastructure should ensure consistency
between the capacity of network components and their expected traffic.…
?? The time horizon for the achievement should be 2015.
?? The cost of the network … should not exceed 1.5.% of each country’s annual GDP
over the period up to 2015. (my emphasis)
The most stunning fact with regard to the defined network, however, is that the
vast majority of the so-called “needs assessment” consists of a rather blatant continuation

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of the politically defined corridor approach taken at the Pan-European Transport
conferences. As the TINA report clearly states (p.14 and p.25):
The [TINA] backbone network … was defined by the Commission, so as to be identical
with the links and nodes of the ten multi-modal Pan-European Transport Corridors on
the territory of the TINA countries. The routing of the Crete/Helsinki corridors was
provided by the TINA Secretariat, using relevant information from the Steering
Committee or other working groups of the Crete/Helsinki Corridors, and by consulting
the UN TEM and TER offices, etc. It was understood that all parties concerned
agreed on the need for the Corridors so that further economic or financial
justifications were not required.
(My emphasis).
Rather different criteria were set for the potential additional network components,
however. Here, proposals needed to be “accompanied by sufficient information on its
economic viability” (p. 14). Regardless of the existence of these new criteria, however,
early lobbying of Estonia and Latvia, already resulted in the addition of one new major
East-West link from Corridor I towards corridor IX in each country. Additionally, the
criteria concerned the continuity of the links at the borders between TINA countries, at
the borders with NIS and EU countries, as well as the general consistency of the network
structures. The latter was explicitly understood to mean that there should be “no missing
links in the total TEN-TINA network” (p.25). Figures 7.4 and 7.5 show the final
proposed road and rail networks for the candidate countries as presented in the TINA
final report in October 1999. Figures 7.6 and 7.7 provide a more detailed overview of the
selected road and rail infrastructures for Poland and Hungary.

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Figure 7.4 TINA Road Network
Source: TINA Final Report

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Figure 7.5 TINA Rail Network
Source: TINA Final Report

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Figure 7.6 TINA Network Poland
Source: TINA Final Report

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Figure 7.7 TINA Network Hungary
Source: TINA Final Report

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The total needs listed under TINA are enormous, and meeting the investment
schedule under the 2010 time horizon would involve spending more than 1.5% of the
country's GDP in some of the candidate countries. Senior Commission representatives
consider this a realistic and doable investment plan. They also pride themselves in
having lowered overly elevated infrastructure building cost estimates on the part of the
candidate countries sometimes by a factor of 3. 11
In the end, however, the high-profile
TINA exercise did not achieve full consensus in arriving at routing and infrastructure
investment decisions. The following sections investigate both the network alignment and
the needs assessment decision-making processes in more detail.
7.4.2 Continued Politicking: European versus National Interests
The final TINA maps are especially inconsistent with regard to the criterion of
linking up all TINA and TEN routes, largely for political reasons. A close inspection of
figures 7.4 and 7.5 reveals that four of the additional TINA road components as well as
one of the new rail lines on the Czech side have no continuation on the German and/or
Austrian sides (also see TINA 1999:27-28). Also, there was rather harsh criticism from
many of the CEE governmental representatives with regard to several of the elements
included in the final TINA report. The following comments, extracted from a series of
governmental statements included as Annex XIV to the Final TINA report, provide
telling insights as to some of the persistent disagreements apparent throughout the
process:
11 In the case of Poland, Commission-hired consultants supposedly found cost estimates for a variety of
road infrastructure schemes to be lower than Polish supplied data by a factor of 2.

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It is our opinion that the TINA Secretariat should give some advice in accepting or not
accepting the objections of the Romanian government towards construction of a
second combined (rail and road) bridge across the river Danube at Vidin – Calafat. …
[Also] we are extremely surprised that after all discussions, sent data and the
succeeding decisions on this page of the Final TINA Report Haskovo – Makaza is still
treated as a branch with no continuation on the Greek side. We absolutely object to
this reappearing problem to be included in the Final Report.
Petko Tabakov, Deputy Minister of Transport, Bulgaria
What will be the role of the Steering Committee of the Pan-European Transport
Corridors in comparison to the TINA follow-up?
Juhani Tervala, Finish Representative of the TINA Senior Officials Group
You refer to a “common method for socio-economic project assessment, as endorsed
in September 1999 by the Group.” To our knowledge, the Group has not endorsed
anything, and up to now, we have not seen such a method that would be acceptable
and workable. 12
G. Chatelus, French Ministry of Transport
Hungary feels that the realization of the Szekesfehevar – Bogond – Pustzaszabolcs –
Adony – Cegled railways alignment is not realistic until 2015 as indicated.
András Hardy, Director General, Hungarian Ministry of Transport
Who are the “respective authors”? Why [do] TINA countries have no access to the
database? … At present there are no three (3) lane roads and in future there will not be
[any] three (3) lane roads in Poland because the construction of such roads is not
permitted by the Polish Law.
Adam Grodzicki, Polish Ministry of Transport (re-iterating/re-including comments by
the Polish Steering Committee representative during the final meeting in Triest in
1999)
Given these continued misunderstandings and disagreements, the status of TINA
as the guiding tool for EU investment in CEE transport infrastructure was problematic –
and TINA always remained a somewhat disputed document even within the Commission
itself.
12 The above text represents an unofficial English translation provided the TINA secretariat. The original
French text read as follows: “Le rapport fait reference à une “common method for socio-economic project
assessment, as endorsed in September 1999 by the Group”. A notre connaissance, le Groupe n’a pas adopté
quoi que ce soit, et jusqu’à présent nous n’avons pas eu connaissance d’une telle méthode qui serait
acceptable et fonctionnelle.“

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7.4.3 Defining the Desired Future: EU Status Quo Defines CEE Needs
Apart from political problems, the TINA initiative was also fraught with serious
methodological difficulties. With a time horizon of over 15 years, the estimations on
future expected traffic flows were necessarily highly speculative. Despite the fact that a
trilateral expert team from three very respected research institutions (NEA in the
Netherlands, IWW in Germany and INRETS in France) carried out the traffic forecasting,
traffic forecasts across international borders were still regarded as very unreliable by
several experts. To make matters worse, some of the national experts also strongly
doubted the accuracy of national level data produced by the international experts. The
Latvian Ministry of Transport was most emphatic in its official disapproval of the
consultant’s forecasting results (TINA 1999:Annex XIV):
MoT of Latvia can not [sic] agree and asks to disregard the study carried out by NEA
regarding forecasts for Latvia. For whatever reasons the results of the study
addressing rail and partially also road traffic forecasts for 2015 are out of any common
sense. They are in most cases completely different from what Latvian authorities as
well as international consultants have forecasted.
Vigo Legzidins, Director of Investment and Transit Policy Department, Ministry of
Transport, Latvia.
This assessment is especially damning in light of the fact that these harshly
criticized future demand forecasts calculated by the NEA, IWW and INRETS consultants
provided the very basis for the “assessed needs” of the TINA exercise. As the final
report itself stressed:
In the TINA process, the future demand should define the needs of the infrastructure
to be constructed. This future demand was investigated for all modes, from the results
of a relevant PHARE Study [done by COWI Consult]. This Final Report bases some
conclusions on the network design on the results of this Study, using a traffic scenario
with the maximum forecasted traffic per section.

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In Poland, internationally renowned senior-level traffic experts were equally critical of
the forecasts done by the Western consultants. Some of the NEA forecast models
supposedly predicted off-the-chart numbers such as train densities of over 200 trains per
day on the Berlin – Warsaw corridor. (Currently, there are about 4 international trains a
day.) As with most modeling exercises, small discrepancies in the used data can lead to
unrealistic results that need to be backed up by knowledgeable (national-level) expertise.
This was apparently not the case in this exercise.
At least as important as the questionability of the obtained results due to internal
miscalculations and incorrect parameter inputs is the fact that the overall extrapolation
method used, while seemingly rational within an overall eco-modernist discursive
framework that stresses growth, was based on the very same assumed relationship
between transport and growth that the EU’s own Sustainable Development Strategy
criticizes and seeks to remedy in the future. In other words: contrary to their own SDS,
which states that the EU will “decouple transport growth significantly from growth in
Gross Domestic Product” (Commission of the European Communities 2001a:12) in order
to “improve the transport system and land-use management,” the EU’s future needs
assessment for transport infrastructures in the candidate countries was based on a
traditional eco-modernist calculation that assumed a parallel development of GDP and
transport growth:
The basic economic data about the eleven countries for the base year 1995 were
provided by the NEA Study on “Traffic forecast on the 10 Pan-European Corridors of
Helsinki.” … In 1995, the eleven candidate countries had a population of 106 million
people …[and] they had an average per capita gross domestic product of about €
2,300 … These data constitute a starting point for extrapolations for the future. The
most important assumptions relate to economic growth in the countries. … Following
these assumptions [about a moderate growth scenario] the total produced GDP in the
candidate countries in the period 1998 to 2015 is about € 7.330 billion. …

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Extrapolations to the future years are made under the assumption that growth rates
gradually converge with average growth rates in the Union. (p.21-22, my emphasis.)
To boot, apart from providing the basis for the assumed transport future, these
extrapolations of current economic growth rates also formed the basis for calculating the
total of the desired transport infrastructure investments in CEE. The proposed solution is
an interesting example of the type of reverse-logic, growth-oriented rationalizations often
used to justify large-scale transport infrastructure investments. Choosing to ignore stateof-the-art
academic debates over the changing relationship between infrastructure
investments and growth (discussed in the initial chapter of this study), the TINA group
instead reverted to a normative approach that simply determined that a set percentage of
the GDP constituted a desirable level of infrastructure investment. The recurring use of
conditional phrasing is indicative:
In the past, the Group has discussed how infrastructure investments should relate to
the GDP. EU Member States invest between slightly under 1% and up to 2% of GDP
in Union-relevant infrastructure. … The discussion also confirmed, however, that the
acceding countries needed to do somewhat more. … The group agreed to accept, as an
indicator for a realistic ceiling of planned infrastructure investments, that their cost
should not on average exceed 1.5% of the GDP in the coming years. Assuming that
transport ministers would like to achieve this level, this would give an infrastructure
investment bracket for each country based on the different growth scenarios between
now and 2015. (p.24, my emphasis).
TINA thus assesses the desirable levels of future investment levels in the CEE
candidate states by using (non-referenced) data on current GDP-investment ratios in the
mature economies of the European Union. As a consequence, the desirable CEE future is
assessed by using the EU’s status quo as its main input. In addition, this supposed status
quo input is highly questionable given the wide range of investment ratios in Western
Europe both between countries and over time. The EU’s own data show that in 1996, for

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example, the range was in fact between 0.5 and 1.4 percent of GDP, averaging 1.1
percent (see figure below). 13
Apart from its methodological questionability, such an
approach is, of course, also questionable from a larger sustainability perspective,
precisely because it is so fundamentally uncritical of the status quo - which is also why
the TINA exercise is such a revealingly typical example of an eco-modernist
rationalization process.
Figure 7.8 EU Data on Transport Infrastructure Investment as Percentage of GDP
Source: http://europa.eu.int/comm/energy_transport/etif/transport_general/infrastructure
_investment.html, Last accessed 13 June, 2002
13 Also note that up to 1994, these data, displayed on the EU DG TREN website, were produced by the
European Centre for Infrastructure Studies (ECIS), a pro-infrastructure research center set up in the early
1990s in the wake of the first TEN ‘missing links’ enthusiasm. The center closed under somewhat
mysterious circumstances in 1996, including financial disagreements.

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7.4.4 Network Assessment & Priority Corridors: Contradictory Discourses
When asked about the relationship between the work on the Helsinki priority
corridors and the more inclusive TINA networks, Commission staff provided
contradictory answers. Some still hold that the Helsinki corridors are simply the
backbone, or first-order network of the larger TINA network, thus hinting at a
continuation of a two-tier structure. This is also still mostly the position of the Regional
Policy directorate, which administers the ISPA program. DG TREN officials, by
contrast, prefer to point out that the notion of corridors is mostly “outdated,” and that one
should instead only think in term of interoperable networks. This contradictory
assessment is also reflected in the somewhat twisted, non-committal formulations
regarding the eligibility of Helsinki corridors versus additional TINA network sections
for future ISPA funding. On one hand, the TINA document repeatedly asserts the
priority of (politically defined) backbone network over the additional components:
The TINA process will eventually lead to the identification of viable investment
projects, which will, in the future extended TEN-TR, be candidates for projects of
common interest. In the context of pre-accession financing, the ISPA team will, on
the basis of the TINA findings, perform a more detailed project analysis of all projects
which will be considered for financing. (p.13)
As a final result of the TINA process, the total network is proposed for
implementation in the time horizon of 2015. However, the backbone network is seen
as that part of the network, which should have a certain priority in its construction.
(p.15., emphasis in the original.)
While the Group has not established a list of priority projects, it recommends that, in
principle, priority be given to financing the backbone network over other components
of the network. (p.88)
On the other hand, however, the TINA report also presents an interesting,
additional list of criteria for the ultimate prioritization under ISPA (see p.17):

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The question of priorities is still open. The maturity of a project is an essential factor
for its selection for European funding. Other main parameters that can influence the
priority of a project are whether the projects contributes towards
?? increase of capacity – elimination of bottlenecks;
?? development of links toward not well-developed areas;
?? development of links to the TENs;
?? better functioning of the network – increase of its attractiveness;
?? completion of an already started programme;
?? lower operating costs;
?? etc.
This list is particularly interesting in light of future emerging justifications for
individual projects under ISPA. The argument that projects should receive funding
simply because they have already been started is certainly curious. Moreover, embedded
in an overall modernization discourse emphasizing “missing links” and “bottlenecks” we
suddenly also find elements of a “infrastructure-for-cohesion” discourse, namely via the
reference of “links towards not well-developed areas.” In essence, this formulation
leaves the door open for cohesion-type rural infrastructure projects that could not
otherwise be justified via economic or financial assessment criteria. This is a particularly
sensitive issue in the case of Hungary’s disputed M3 highway crosses rural territory in
Eastern Hungary and ends at the Ukrainian border (also see Hook 1998a).
A further remark about “bottlenecks” is in order as well. Although discourses
related to “bottlenecks” were clearly the types of rhetorical tropes which the authors of
the report welcomed to further highlight the urgency of their cause, it seems that it was
very clear to everyone involved that the related maps in Annex IX of the report indicating
“TINA Road and Rail Bottlenecks” for the year 2005, 2010 and 2015 would never hold
up as accurate predictions of future CEE infrastructure capacity deficiencies. In any case,
the TINA report itself makes little to no reference to these maps, thus already implicitly

300
relegating them to the status of a visually impressive yet ultimately unrealistic GIS-aided
desktop exercise.
Clearly, the Commission was not ignorant of the important methodological
problems related to assessing and prioritising transport infrastructure needs at the
network level. Quite to the contrary, DG TREN staff had been working for quite some
time with outside experts on the elaboration of a manual that would provide guidance on
such strategic assessment matters. Here, we find surprisingly exact instructions as to how
a Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment process that truly deserved the label
“assessment” could and should have been organized (Commission of the European
Communities 2000e:iv):
An assessment of a transport infrastructure plan at network level should include the
following components:
· assessment of the existing multi-modal transport network and expected future
changes using established environmental objectives and standards;
· identification of alternative courses of action to improve the expected future
situation, including transport infrastructure proposals;
· forecasting the impacts of the alternatives on the environment.
Modal alternatives at network level should be developed sufficiently to permit
assessment of the plan as a whole. This implies that decisions about particular
corridors within the network should be postponed until planning, assessment and
decision-making at corridor level is undertaken.
[Bold emphases in the original, italic emphases added].
According to this logic, the actual procedure followed by the EU and the
participating government of first selecting corridors and then attempted to retrofit the
corridors into a larger network, clearly made no sense. Seen from a “rational” assessment
perspective, there should have been no decisions made about particular corridors and
their modes before an overall assessment was done. More importantly, modal
alternatives and alternative routes would have had to be provided in order to enable an

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actual choice considering future network development. This was not the case with the
TINA exercise.
7.5 The Environmental Scoping Exercise on the Warsaw – Budapest Corridor
Many transport experts were aware of the above described deficiencies in the
TINA process and favored alternative, less status-quo oriented transport infrastructure
investment scenarios for Central Europe. A key focus of the critique was that a
comprehensive environmental evaluation should have been undertaken of the overall
network plans.
International transport experts at universities and international
organizations had long argued in favor of carrying out a so-called Strategic
Environmental Assessment (SEA) on the TENs, on the TEN extensions and on the future
Pan-European Transport Network as a whole. Strategic environmental assessment is a
rapidly evolving area of professional practice. SEA can be defined as “a formalized,
systematic and comprehensive process that evaluates the environmental impacts of PPPs
[policies, plans and programs], considers alternatives, includes a written report on the
findings of the evaluation and uses these findings in publicly accountable decision
making” (Therivel, Wilson et al. 1992; Fischer 2002). Even the Commission’s Transport
Directorate has nothing but praise for the method on its own website (Commission of the
European Communities 2002a):
Strategic environmental assessment (SEA) provides information about the
environmental consequences of decisions about policies, plans and programmes. It is
increasingly being applied to transport infrastructure plans. … SEA makes transport
more sustainable. At the European Union level, its importance was recognised at the
1998 meeting of heads of governments (the Cardiff Summit). The European Union
strives to integrate environmental considerations into its own policy making and the

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European Commission has stated, in its 1992 White Paper on a Common Transport
Policy, that it will apply SEA for infrastructure plans.
The incessant calls for doing an SEA on Trans-European Networks were also the
main reason why DG TREN developed the above quoted manual. So why did the EU not
carry out any strategic assessments at the network level before defining corridors? The
reasons for this are multiple, some of them clearly being of a methodological nature (no
overall consensus on methodologies, data problems relating mostly to availability and
inconsistency). Most importantly, however, there were two reasons: first of all, there was
no political consensus that modal substitution was even an option along key corridors.
Second, even the most sophisticated strategic assessments still need to measure their
proposed infrastructure scenarios against different technical and environmental targets.
There thus would have had to also be a political consensus on clear sustainable transport
and mobility objectives.
Nevertheless, by 1999, doing an SEA for the CEE TEN extension plan seemed all
the more important since the chance to do a timely SEA for the TENs had missed. 14
In
particular, the 1999 ECMT/OECD workshop “SEA in the Transport Sector” called for
the priority application of SEA for transport infrastructure development plans laid down
in TINA recommendations (OECD/ECMT 1999:5-6).
The European Union Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment (TINA) programme
presents the best immediate opportunity to develop SEA experience in the region and
more fundamentally raises a clear need for such an assessment. Ideally countries
along pan-European transport corridors along which TINA projects have been
nominated should co-operate to undertake joint SEAs. The results should help shape
the eventual selection of projects for financial support from European Union and
international finance institution funds and contribute to improving the design of the
14 Richardson (2000) provides an in-depth analysis of the “SEA on the TENs”-debate. The account now
has to be partially updated in light of recent developments, since there is now increasing consensus that
strategic assessments should be carried out on all EU TEN infrastructure projects.

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projects and the overall development of the transport corridors. The recent Trans
European Network transport corridor studies, co-funded by the European Commission,
can provide methodological guidance.
The Commission therefore organized an “Environmental Scoping” on the Multi-
Modal Transport Corridor VI. from Warsaw to Budapest organized by the Regional
Environmental Center (REC) in Szentendre, Hungary. This scooping exercise was a
partial if limited response to the ECMT’s somewhat ambiguously formulated call. It can
hardly be regarded as an acceptable shorthand version of a full strategic assessment of
TINA, however. While the original aim was in fact to assess the environmental impacts
of all the transport policies in the entire CEE region, i.e. do a full “SEA of the TINA
network”, this ambitious aim was quickly scaled down. As the Italian SEA expert Olivia
Bina (1999) already noted during the Warsaw SEA conference: “[it is] not feasible … to
attempt to complete a full assessment of the impacts of the network at this large scale of
analysis.” The compromise solution was to focus on one multi-modal corridor instead. It
was believed that “a well chosen corridor would provide, if not representative, at least
indicative evidence of the potential environmental problems faced by the rest of the
region.” The general objectives of the Warsaw – Budapest corridor initial scooping were
defined as follows (Regional Environmental Centre for CEE (REC) 2000:2):
- To identify potential impacts of the proposed development of transport infrastructure
in CEE on environmental commitments of CEE countries,
- To suggest suitable tools for integration of environment and transport (with specific
focus on potential application of SEA for international transport planning in CEE),
- To suggest practical provisions for effective coordination of environmental and
transport planning on CEE regional level [sic].
However, the report also clearly acknowledged the impossibility of doing any real
ex-ante evaluation, since the corridor was already a designated Pan-European corridor

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and as such part of the priority investment list of both national and international planning
documents. The scoping therefore was to be carried out as an ad interim assessment,
focusing on existing environmental and transport policy contexts. The final synthesis
report of the exercise begins by noting that “the EU Accession Process is the main driver
of change in Central and Eastern Europe” (REC 2000:1). The EU Accession process has
indeed already fundamentally transformed not only the transport, but also the
environmental policies in the CEE candidate countries. 15
Several conclusions that emerged from the REC exercise are revealing. For
example, the report notes that urban air pollution and loss of habitat are two major
impacts directly related to rising traffic volumes, which are in turn related to higher
incomes and accelerated trade between East and West. Much more importantly, the
authors of the synthesis report come to the clear conclusion that “the Community support
for the TEN [extensions in CEE] is drawing the limited national resources primarily
towards construction of long distance infrastructure, primarily highways” (REC 2000:9,
my emphasis). Moreover, REC researchers found that now that the backbone network of
the Trans-European network extensions had been determined in the form of the Helsinki
corridors, CEE in-country representatives frequently (and often purposely) misinterpreted
the TEN-extensions and the entire TINA exercise as an agreed and consultative
international agreement awaiting implementation at the national level. The argument was
often made in conjunction with the myth that the TINA backbone network was something
that would largely be funded by the EU (i.e. ISPA) and the IFIs. Consequently, anyone
opposing the content and priority networks contained in TINA appeared to be
15 Most CEE countries have by now adopted National Environmental Policies, National Environmental
Action Programs, and National Transport Policies that take into account EU requirements and regulations,
as well as strategic objectives.

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jeopardizing international funding assistance for their countries (Dusik 2000). 16
And
since, this line of argument continued, EU and IFI co-financing is mostly available for
backbone infrastructures, national priorities should consequently be redirected in the
same direction, regardless of actual independently assessed needs. The research carried
out as part of this environmental scooping exercise thus confirmed suspicions that TINA
effectively overrode national transport policies in the sense that national-level priorities
were changed according to what the TINA final report stated (Fleischer 2000).
Finally, the various scoping reports also pointed to the fact that since ISPA is
modeled on the Cohesion Fund, EU transport sector grant assistance currently cannot be
given for much needed urban public transit improvements, thereby further exacerbating
detrimental disinvestments trends. This likely over-prioritization of large-scale EU-CEE
road connections to the detriment of other key national infrastructure needs may be in
part be a tragedy of unintended consequences. It does not make it any less problematic,
however.
7.6 Epilogue: The Proposed Hungarian Amendments to the TINA Network
Not all governments were prepared to accept the network proposed in the TINA
final report as the last word on the issue. As late as early 2001, i.e. well after the
completion of the ISPA national strategy documents, the Hungarian government
proposed several specific amendments to the TINA rail and road networks, as well as two
additional TINA airports in Hungary. As justifications for these amendments, the
16
Another key issue from a procedural perspective is that TINA was still largely a “closed room
assessment” in the sense that the process only involved the transport ministries, and excluded decisionmakers
from the Ministries of Finance, Environment or Regional Development as well as civil society
stakeholders.

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Hungarians list “general economic and social development,” “advanced integration
negotiations,” “the political changes in Yugoslavia,” and “the Hungarian ISPA and
several sector strategies” (KöViM 2001). The proposed amendments are largely
congruent with those Hungarian national ISPA transport priorities that would not
otherwise be justifiable as TINA priorities. In particular, they concern road connections
from Rábafüzes to Biharkeresztes (with a new bridge over the Danube) and between
Mosonmagyaróvár and Nagykanizsa, a rail link between Sopron and Szombathely and
two regional airports at Debrecen and Sárméllek. (For details on the Hungarian ISPA
projects, see chapter 8.)
Note that these proposals must be seen as additional even to the Hungarian
government’s own investment priorities, particularly with regard to the road sector.
Figure 7.11 provides an overview map of Hungary’s planned motorway and expressway
investments from 2000 to 2010. The map clearly demonstrates that Hungarian road
sector national priorities, at least in their 1999 accepted version, are fully congruent with
the TINA backbone network (compare figure 7.11 with figures 7.9 and 7.10).

307
Figure 7.9 Proposed Hungarian TINA Road, Port and Airport Amendments
Source: Modified from KÖVIM (2001)
Figure 7.10 Proposed Hungarian TINA Rail Amendments
Source: Modified from KÖVIM (2001)

308
Figure 7.11 Hungary’s Motorway Investment Plan 2000-2010
Source: Lukács (2001)
7.7 Conclusions and Consequences
On a positive note, even if the true reality of transport corridor assessment in the
“New Europe” is likely to continue to be dominated by political opportunism and geostrategic
thinking, significant strides in developing better environmental, social and
financial assessment methodologies for large-scale infrastructure investments have been
made. Unfortunately, SEAs and EIAs are not always carefully and extensively enough
applied, especially when it comes to EU-funded transport projects in CEE. Such is also
the conclusion of the European Environmental Agency which notes in its latest TERM
report (European Environment Agency (EEA) 2001:48) that “the practice of strategic
environmental assessment is growing, but links with actual decision-making are weak.”

309
In the case of the TINA exercise, the Realrationalität of the process incorporated
the foundational premise and core belief of growth-led (ecological) modernization into its
analysis in such a way that its conclusions appear as “objective” assessments and “truths”
rather than the rationality-as-rationalization exercise that it was. Almost by definition,
the TINA process puts a disproportionate emphasis on international links, i.e.
international travel. The problem here is that, in fact, especially with regard to passenger
traffic volumes, long distance international travel still only accounts for a tiny fraction of
the total traffic volumes in Central Europe. The vast majority of passenger transport
needs are either within or between major urban centers. The situation is similar for goods
transport. While recent Eurostat figures show that road freight transport is in fact more
“international” in CEE than in the EU, this is mainly due to the smaller size of CEE
countries. (A truck traveling the 600 km from Munich to Berlin is still considered
“national travel,” whereas a truck traveling the 340 km from Prague to Berlin is
considered “international travel.”) Figure 7.12 shows that the share of international
traffic is about twice as large in CEE countries as in the EU. A greater emphasis on
upgrading east-west transport links is thus indeed justified. Nevertheless, over half of all
traffic in CEE countries is national in scope, and, as figure 7.13 shows almost 80% of this
traffic is over distances of less than 50km. The comparative figure for EU countries is
60%. Also, 17% of all national EU traffic travels very long distances (over 150km),
whereas this is only the case for 8% of national CEE traffic. This means that from the
perspective of the respective countries, investment in regional level transport
infrastructure should have at least an equally high priority as international infrastructure.

310
Figure 7.12 Share of international road freight traffic measured in ton-kilometers
%
100
80
60
40
20
0
international national cross-trade
EU
CEE
Data Source: Eurostat (1999)
Figure 7.13 National Goods by Distance Traveled in the EU and CEE
100%
80%
60%
40%
20%
0%
0-49km 50-150km over 150km
EU
CEE
Data Source: Eurostat (1999)
The now foreseen concentration of EU grant funds on only select EU-accession
oriented international routes will therefore not meet those countries’ general
infrastructure needs. This is an argument which is particularly relevant for rail
infrastructures. As an important CEPS Working Party report (Centre For European
Policy Studies - CEPS 1999) notes:
TINA's stress on trans-national networks is an important step towards extending the
narrow national planning horizons which are a major obstacle to heavy rail's
development. However, it also transfers the Union’s concept of subsidiarity into a
setting which requires a much broader view of transport needs.

311
With regard to the TINA exercise, we have to somewhat reconsider our
“Decisional Power” proposition which assumed a predominance of multi-national and
national transport interests. The bias towards international, long distance infrastructures
which the Helsinki Corridor and the TINA processes aim to justify is certainly in the
interest of the kinds of multinational corporations active in the European Round Table of
Industrialists (ERT). However, the overall process of drawing up the CEE Transport
Network plans displays quite a different dynamic from the type of targeted “Missing
Links” industry pet project lobbing that went on during the development of the TEN
priority projects. Participants confirm that both the Helsinki Corridors and the TINA
processes were driven by the Commission and national governments, without any real
influence of either private sector interests or civil society. Much of this has to do with the
fact that during the time of their development, the Helsinki Corridors bore no concrete
promise of a special EU grant fund budget line looming in the background. There was
thus more room for national government-dominated politicking. This politicking,
however, was limited to debates over the inclusion of additional transport infrastructure
links of inter-urban and supra-regional importance. Whether or not even these additional,
secondary links in fact represent the true priority interests of these countries from a
sustainable transport development perspective is yet a different question – one that will
be answered affirmatively by highway and high-speed rail-oriented modernizationists and
negatively by political economy or renunciation-oriented sustainability advocates, and in
fact by almost everyone else. In any case, even very mainstream transport experts (e.g.
World Bank and EBRD senior transport specialists) emphasize that given the
maintenance backlog and dire financial situation of CEE countries, the expensive new

312
construction of additional infrastructures should not take priority over the much needed
maintenance of already existing roads and rail lines of regional importance.
In sum, while from the point of view of the Commission, the TINA process was
an attempt to politically and scientifically justify their foreseen emphasis on international
corridors with regard to future ISPA grant funding, from the point of view of the
participating CEE governments, TINA was their best chance to “amend” the Helsinki
Corridor commitments and to make a case for the inclusion of additional national priority
networks. As we will see in our analysis of the Polish and Hungarian ISPA transport
grants, the backbone corridor prioritization proved to be a hard one to undo.

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Printed on Sunday, November 17, 2002
CHAPTER 8
EU Pre-Accession Transport Infrastructure
Funding for Poland and Hungary
8.1 Introduction..................................................................................................... 314
8.2 EU and IFI Transport Sector Assistance to Poland and Hungary Pre-ISPA .. 318
8.2.1 IFI Transport Sector Loans to Poland and Hungary (1990-2001) .......... 318
8.2.2 EU Transport Sector Grants Pre-ISPA: Phare and LISF (1990-1999) ... 321
8.3 A Precursor to Cohesion Funding? Overview of ISPA Priorities................... 324
8.4 EU ISPA Transport Funding for Poland......................................................... 330
8.4.1 The National Context: Polish Transport Policy (Post-Transition).......... 330
8.4.2 The Polish ISPA Transport Strategy and Its Priorities ........................... 336
8.4.3 Preliminary Conclusions: EU ISPA Grants for Poland (2000-2001) ..... 340
8.5 EU ISPA Transport Funding for Hungary...................................................... 342
8.5.1 The National Context: Hungarian Transport Policy (Post- Transition).. 342
8.5.2 The Hungarian ISPA Transport Strategies and their Priorities............... 352
8.5.3 Preliminary Conclusions: EU ISPA grants for Hungary (2000-2001) ... 355
8.6 Concluding Remarks on the EU’s ISPA Transport Program.......................... 357

314
8.1 Introduction
This chapter will investigate EU pre-accession grant-making for transport
infrastructure investments under the EU ISPA (Instrument for Structural Policies for Pre-
Accession) program. I review the first two years of ISPA transport-sector funding in two
of the most advanced candidate countries, Poland and Hungary. Until now, I
concentrated on the strategic aspects of EU transport decision-making, i.e. on transport
policies, plans and programs. Chapter 7 showed that the EU’s emphasis on creating an
international priority backbone network connecting the candidate countries to Western
Europe was the driving factor in the elaboration of the TINA network maps. TINA was a
declared effort to make the EU’s Pan-European priorities congruent with the accessions
countries’ own national infrastructure priorities. ISPA, by contrast, supports actual
infrastructure projects in the fields of transport and environment. 1
Hence, ISPA is clearly
the significant point of contact where EU transport sector decision-making and funding
rationalities meet national CEE government rationalities. I thus move away even further
from a discourse-focused approach towards a more reality-focused evaluation.
Of course, I will not attempt to evaluate the consequences of all international,
regional and local traffic and land use impacts of each individual transport project that
has received ISPA funding. Not only is this much beyond the scope of this study, it is
also still impossible at the present time. The European Union only officially launched its
ISPA program in April 2000. Since almost none of the infrastructures slanted for funding
in 2000 and 2001 have been completed, ISPA projects cannot yet undergo any ex-post
1 There are currently the other two grant programs assisting the ten CEE candidate countries: Phare and
Sapard. Sapard deals with the modernization of agriculture and rural development and does not concern us
here. For details on the Phare program, see section 8.2.2 below.

315
evaluation. 2
What is possible, however, is an evaluation of the general trends with regard
to EU transport investments in the candidate countries. In how far are actual grants for
transport investment projects in line with the sustainability aspects of EU transport
policy? Are there inconsistencies, and if so, why?
The general ISPA objective and grant requirements were formulated by the
Commission in 1998-1999. The candidate countries themselves then had to formulate
their National Strategy documents and prepare individual projects for funding. These
were then submitted to the ISPA Management Committee for approval. 3
By the end of
2000, all National ISPA Transport Strategies and the initial project lists had been
formulated and submitted to the Commission in Brussels. 4
How much the Commission
2 An assessment of other individual projects, e.g. under Phare, however, is certainly possible, and I do, in
fact, discuss both the contrasting investment rationales and the (present and foreseeable) effects of one
particularly controversial EU-supported transport investment project in CEE, namely the Budapest ring
road, in the following chapter. Also note that evaluations of other individual projects are available in the
literature, although comprehensive assessments of both traffic and land use impacts are rare. With regard
to general evaluations, one particular study deserves special mention: in 1999, the now defunct Evaluation
Unit of the Joint Relex Service of the European Commission (SCR) commissioned the Greek consulting
forms TRADEMCO and SYSTEMA, together with the UK Universities Leeds and Westminster, to carry
out “An Evaluation of Phare-Financed Transport Programmes” (Commission of the European Communities
1999d). Their inventory included 75 program contracts (including those from the Phare multi-country
transport program) and 800 individual contracts. The evaluation was based on a retroactive Logical
Framework (LogFrame) approach. However, it did not operationalize the criterion “sustainability” of
investments in any privileged way. (Also note that although LogFrames are supposed to be the standard for
both IFI and EU project design, monitoring and evaluation, LogFrame matrices were not available for all
projects and thus had to be constructed retroactively.) Most of the key findings were related to the general
relevance of the Phare transport programs to the rapidly changing needs of the candidate countries and
general management efficiency, which was found to be generally mediocre to poor mainly due to delay in
project preparation and implementation, deficiencies in coordination between Phare and the IFIs, the
absence of appropriate strategic/pre-investment studies, as well as lack of sufficient progress in the
restructuring of transport operators (see executive summary, pp. v-viii). Many of these deficiencies seem to
still hold for ISPA as well. Secondly, there has also been “An Evaluation of PHARE and TACIS Co-
Financing Programmes with the EBRD” carried out by Maxwell Stamp for SCR (Commission of the
European Communities 1999e). This study, among other things, presents individual evaluations of two
Phare co-financed transport projects to the Bulgarian and Romanian Railways (both from 1996). The
evaluation criteria were “relevance,” “efficiency,” “effectiveness,” “impact,” and “sustainability.” Yet
statements under the latter heading are non-committal: “Since the full, final impact of these projects cannot
yet be determined conclusively, their sustainability remains somewhat indeterminate at this stage” (p.85).
3 The ISPA Management Committee is the EU body with representatives from all member states which
deals with ISPA matters, also see (Commission of the European Communities 1999g).
4 The first ISPA Annual Report (Commission of the European Communities 2001p:10) clarifies that “the
national ISPA strategies are not intended to be legal documents but should rather be seen as tools to guide

316
shaped the final list of submitted transport projects and which types of projects ultimately
received priority funding are some of the key questions investigated in this chapter. In
how far the resulting ISPA transport infrastructure grants can then be interpreted as an
expression of EU “sustainable transport policy making” is a yet more daunting question. 5
Obviously, issues related to both the “Decisional-Power” and the “Multi-Level
Governance” propositions strongly frame this case study.
Of course, it will be impossible to cover all the manifold political controversies
surrounding each transport mode in detail in this chapter. As it turned out, motorway
plans were by far the most controversial types of investments in both countries, so I
dedicate a disproportionate amount of attention to them in both cases.
Finally, given my study’s declared focus on transport infrastructures, transport
regulatory issues are naturally not analyzed in detail here. Nevertheless, a few issues
need to be emphasized. In addition to the economic transition from a Communist to a
market economy, preparing for EU accession obviously entails profound policy
adjustments in all areas for the CEE candidate countries. Poland and Hungary are both
faced with taking over the EU’s acquis communautaire, i.e. the entire body of EU laws.
Transport law alone represents about 10% of the entire acquis, and it is comprised of
the selection of priority projects for ISPA support.” They can be changed over time, but are always
intended to be consistent with the Accession Partnerships, the National Programmes for the Adoption of the
Acquis, and relevant national planning documents, in particular the National Development Plans (which
candidate countries were still finalizing in 2002). The National ISPA Environment Strategies do not
concern us here. ISPA environment grants are focus on waste-water treatment, water supply and solid
waste management. Note that the ultimate, longer-term, post-accession goal for the ISPA program is a
complete devolution of grant selection responsibility towards national authorities similar to the Cohesion
program
5 As noted in earlier sections of this study, one of the seemingly most hands-on statements of EU transport
policy is the preference it seeks to give to more “sustainable” modes such as rail, combined transport and
public transit in stead of road or air. I will therefore also analyze the modal distribution of EU ISPA grant
investments. We will quickly realize, however, that other issues such as are the scale, the level, timing and
the procedural aspects of the planned investments, as well as the availability of funding from other sources
are equally important categories of analysis.

317
hundreds of EU regulations, directives and decisions. In order to further facilitate their
transposition into national CEE law, DG Transport prepared a comprehensive “Guide to
the Transport Acquis” (Commission of the European Communities 1999f) which gives a
detailed overview of EU transport legislation as of January 1 st , 1999. The Guide’s first
chapter on horizontal issues also includes a section on the TEN Guidelines, the
interoperability of the TEN high-speed rail system and on TEN financial regulations. 6
In
road transport, a vast array of social, technical, fiscal, safety and environmental
requirements are at issue, and some transitional arrangements have been granted already.
For example, both Poland and Hungary have negotiated a gradual increase of axle load
limits on their national road network. In the rail sector, Poland and Hungary also have
resisted full and immediate access to national rail markets and have instead negotiated a
phased approach. Moreover, Poland and Hungary were the only two countries for whom
the EU has proposed provisional closure of the transport chapter which did not see
themselves in a position to implement the EU’s revised railway acquis as of accession. 7
By the time the 2001 Regular Reports were published in November 2001, neither Poland
nor Hungary had fully closed Chapter 9 (Transport Policy) of the acquis. However, by
December 2001 and June 2002, provisional closure was achieved for Hungary and
Poland, respectively. Overall, accession negotiations with both Poland and Hungary are
among the most advanced. 8
6 The whopping 236 page document is available in English, German and French on the DG TREN Website
under http://europa.eu.int/comm/transport/themes/enlargement_policies/english/en.pdf. More importantly,
since December 2001, the document has also been also available in all of the accession country languages
on the DG Enlargement website under http://europa.eu.int/comm/enlargement/docs/index.htm.
7 Also see “Chapter 9 – Transport Policy” under http://europa.eu.int/comm/enlargement/negotiations/
chapters/chap9/ issued June 2002 (last accessed 6-28-2002)
8 For example, the 2001 Regular Reports note the following key progress in the road and rail sectors (see
Commission of the European Communities 2001l; Commission of the European Communities 2001m): In
Poland, the following legislation was adopted: a Program of adjustment of Poland’s Road Network to

318
The rest of this chapter is organized as follows: the next section first situates ISPA
within the longer history of EU and IFI transport sector assistance to Poland and
Hungary. After a general introduction to ISPA and its funding priorities, I then move on
to the two case studies. In both cases, I precede my analysis of the gestation of the
National ISPA Strategy Documents and the priority lists with a discussion of each
country’s key transport infrastructure needs national transport policies. I offer both
preliminary conclusions at the end of each individual case study as well as a set of
concluding remarks at the very end of the chapter.
8.2 EU and IFI Transport Sector Assistance to Poland and Hungary Pre-ISPA
8.2.1 IFI Transport Sector Loans to Poland and Hungary (1990-2001)
IFI co-financing, particularly with the EIB, has been an explicit aim of the ISPA
program. A detailed overview of past IFI funding to Poland and Hungary between 1990
and 2001 is presented in Annex I. Also, detailed analyses of the different roles that the
EIB, the EBRD and the World Bank have played in transport sector funding in CEE have
been presented elsewhere (see especially CEE Bankwatch Network 1997; Feiler and
Stoczkiewiecz 1999; Hook and Peters 1999), and thus need not be repeated here.
However, in order to be able to better assess the magnitude and the importance of these
international investments in relation to ISPA, I nevertheless want to focus on a few key
points that emerge from the data in the various tables in Annex I.
European Union standards, the INTERBUS agreement, a Law on Road Transport , a Law on working time
for drivers, a Law on taxes and local charges, a new Law on railway transport (which includes the creation
of a new Railways Transport Office), a regulation on allocation for railway undertakings, and a Law on
commercialization, restructuring and privatization of the Polish Railway Company PKP. Hungary also
passed the INTERBUS agreement, separated the accounting of railway infrastructure from the accounting
of railway operations, aligned safety belt legislation and the rules for admission to the occupation of road
haulage operation.

319
First, as far as funding for the TINA networks is concerned, one needs to keep in
mind that although international finance has been available for many projects located in
the key TINA corridors, the CEE countries themselves will still be left with vast majority
of the overall investment burden. A few numbers suffice to illustrate this: according to
the TINA Final Report, the total assessed infrastructure needs from 2000 to 2015 amount
to € 36.42 billion in Poland and € 10.16 billion in Hungary, thus theoretically requiring
average annual investments in the amount of € 2.28 billion in Poland and € 635.38
million in Hungary to bring transport infrastructures up to the desired level until 2015.
Investments for the Helsinki corridors alone would require average annual investments in
the amount of € 607 million rail sector and € 784 million road sector investment in
Poland, as well as € 182 million rail sector and € 240 million road sector investments in
Hungary. By contrast, past funding records show that between 1990 and 2000, Poland
was only able to attract an average amount of € 150 to 200 million a year for TINA type
infrastructure investments from international institutions, and Hungary only attracted
about an average € 80-100 million a year. 9
So in the end international funding only ever
covers a fraction of CEEC infrastructure needs. More importantly, IFI assistance comes
largely in the form of loans that will have to be paid back by the governments.
Second, the TINA estimations also show that the road sector should receive no
more than 49%, i.e. less than half of all funds in Poland or Hungary, while the rail sector
should receive at least 40% of all TINA-type infrastructure investments. Contrary to this,
until 2000, the EIB, the EBRD and the World Bank allocated about 70% of their
combined funds in the TINA networks to the road sector. There has thus been a strong
bias towards road investments in past international lending (also see Figure A.1). Many
9 These figures were calculated using data listed in the tables in Annex I and in the TINA Final Report.

320
of these loans, and in particular those from the World Bank, included much needed funds
for upgrading and maintenance rather than for new construction, so it is true that without
taking a closer look at the specific purpose of each loan, this striking statistic ultimately
tells us little about how “sustainable” a particular loan was. Nevertheless, this past bias is
a good indicator that in the absence of particular efforts on the part of both the lender and
the recipient government to the contrary, it is much more difficult to attract international
funds for the rail than for the road sector. One should also remember, however, that
together the road and rail sectors accounted for about 90% of all assessed investment
needs in Poland and Hungary. EU and IFI funding are therefore consistent with needs
assessments at least in the sense that they almost exclusively funded road and rail
infrastructures in Poland and Hungary.
Third and perhaps most important, contrary to ISPA and its predecessors, Phare
and LISF, the IFIs also attributed a sizeable share of their loans in Hungary and Poland
towards urban transport projects. Citing the principle of subsidiarity as the central
reason, the EU currently leaves funding for public transit entirely to its house-bank, the
EIB. I will return to this problematic issue both in this and in the following chapter. It
certainly seems a bitter irony that at a time where official European Union transport
policy is more actively than ever favoring rail and urban public transit as “more
sustainable modes,” there is currently no funding mechanism available for channeling
any EU transport sector grants into urban areas other than for ring roads and bypasses
forming part of the Helsinki corridors.

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8.2.2 EU Transport Sector Grants Pre-ISPA: Phare and LISF (1990-1999)
As noted above, ISPA was only instituted in 1999. The European Union's
comprehensive proposal for coherent accession assistance to CEE was first set out in
Agenda 2000 (Commission of the European Communities 1997d; Commission of the
European Communities 1997e), which specifically mentions the creation of the new
ISPA instrument. ISPA was designed to complement and in part supersede the EU’s
older Phare grant program and the LSIF. 10
In order to also better contextualize the ISPA
program within the longer post-transition history of EU grant assistance, the following
section presents a short review of EU transport infrastructure grants to CEECs from the
early 1990s.
The EU’s first grant assistance instrument, the so-called Phare program was
originally instituted in 1989 to coordinate EC assistance toward Poland and Hungary. 11
After the 1994 European Council meeting in Essen, Phare became the EU’s main
program for grant assistance for the CEE candidate countries. From 1990 to 1994, the
program allocated 4.2 billion ECU, a sum that was increased to 6.7 billion in the
following programming period from 1995 to 1999. However, it was only after the
Luxembourg European Council in 1997 officially launched the present enlargement
process that Phare became a true “pre-accession” instrument. This also meant that Phare
became a less demand-driven instrument, since the EU began setting out its own list of
10 LISF (Large-Scale Infrastructure Facility) was a short-lived, Phare-funded pre-cursor to ISPA. From
1998-99, the LISF was intended to cover the transition from Phare to ISPA by funding select large-scale
infrastructure projects in the candidate states, with an emphasis on co-financing with the IFIs. It was
primarily for this purpose that the EC, the EBRD and the World Bank signed a Memorandum of
Understanding in March 1998 setting out the means and method of their enhanced cooperation. Also see
Commission of the European Communities (1999d:5).
11
The (francophone) acronym PHARE meant “Poland and Hungary - Assistance for Economic
Reconstruction.” The acronym became common usage so it was kept even after the program was extended
to include other countries. Detailed information about the Phare program can be found under
http://europa.eu.int/comm/enlargement/pas/phare/index.htm, last accessed on 6-21-2002.

322
short and medium priorities for the candidate states. Since then Phare funding focuses on
priorities set down in the countries’ Accession Partnerships. In 1999, Phare orientations
were then adjusted again in order to clarify the relationship of Phare to the other new preaccession
instruments, “so as to redirect the Phare funds that were liberated by the arrival
of SAPARD and ISPA from rural development and from selected infrastructure projects
in the sectors of transport and environment towards the area of economic and social
cohesion.” 12
Hence, Phare is now considered the pre-accession instrument for regional
development. The program currently concentrates on institution building and investment
support as the two main types of assistance. 13
Figure 8.1 gives an overview of the
evolution of Phare funding in the two CEE countries to first receive grant support, Poland
and Hungary. The share of infrastructure related to total funding jumps from 13% to
45% in Poland and from 2% to 34% in Hungary after 1994, with the percentages
remaining relatively stable after that. In the coming funding period, investment support
is to account for about 70% of the entire Phare budget, and it is to be closely linked to the
adoption of the acquis communautaire. With the complementing of Phare by the two
new pre-accession instruments ISPA and Sapard after 2000, overall grant aid to CEE
12 See http://europa.eu.int/comm/enlargement/pas/phare/, Section 1.2 “Phare Orientations” (last accessed 6-
21-2002).
13 Note, however, that Phare grants after 1999/2000 always also included some funding for concrete
transport infrastructure projects at the local/regional level. However, due to limits in the scope of this
chapter, these Phare transport projects are not analyzed in detail here. Institution building and technical
assistance accounted for a major part of early Phare transport-sector funding, with grants being mainly used
for feasibility studies. However, when regulations were changed to allow Phare to use an increasing share
of its budget for project co-financing with other financial institutions in 1994, overall spending on concrete
infrastructure projects increased greatly. For 2001, the initial Phare budget amounted to € 1634 million, of
which Poland received € 411 million, i.e. about one fourth, and Hungary € 90 million. Additionally, it was
possible for countries to receive funds as part of multi-country grants via the cross-border allocations (€
163) and the regional and horizontal allocations (€ 230 million).

323
countries will increase substantially, likely accounting for at as much as 2 billion Euro in
infrastructure development. 14
Looking at Phare’s past record in transport sector funding, we can see that Phare
grants were also biased in favor of road projects. Figure 8.2 reveals that 53% percent of a
total 884.2 million ECU disbursed were allocated to road, while only 32% went to rail.
This modal bias is still odds with the mode-specific assessed needs of the recipient
countries, and it remains to be seen if ISPA will finally reverse this trend.
Figure 8.1 PHARE Funds for Hungary and Poland per Sector 1990-97 (in MECU)
800
700
Infrastructure (energy,
transport,
telecommunications)
13%
600
500
400
2%
Other sectors
300
200
100
34% 39% 26% 33%
45% 52%
58%
47%
0
1990-
1993
1994 1995 1996 1997 1990-
Hungary
1993
1994 1995 1996 1997
Poland
Source: Own compilation using data from the EU Phare Program
14 The budget for Sapard, the pre-accession instrument for agricultural and rural development aid, is
significantly smaller than ISPA, accounting for 520 million a year. The 2 billion per year in infrastructure
development consist of the about 1 billion of Phare’s annual total of 1.5 billion which will go for
infrastructure investment, and ISPA, of which 500 million will go directly to transport infrastructure.

324
Figure 8.2
EU Transport Grants to CEEC pre-ISPA (Phare 1990-97 and LISF 1998-99)
Airports &
Ports
5%
Railways
34%
Other
7%
Roads &
Highways
54%
Total funds
disbursed:
978 MECU
Source: Own Compilation using data from the EU Phare Program
8.3 A Precursor to Cohesion Funding? Overview of ISPA Priorities
In its final agreed form, ISPA evenly divides a total of € 1.04 billion a year at
1999 prices between transport infrastructure and environment projects for the next six
years.
ISPA is strongly accession-oriented, and will closely follow the format of the
Cohesion Fund. However, since contrary to the Cohesion Fund, ISPA is dealing with
applicant, rather than member states, the distribution of funds is not decentralized (yet)
but requires ex-ante approval of tendering and contracting. 15
The country-by-country
allocation is based on three criteria: population, per capita GDP and land surface area.
Table 8.1 shows the per country allocation, given by the Commission as a range. Poland
alone is thus to receive roughly one third of all ISPA grants, Hungary less than one tenth.
All countries have to submit National ISPA Strategy Papers and present a coherent
investment plan. Only very small portions of ISPA money will be used for preparatory
studies and technical assistance. The leveraging of additional international co-financing
15 However, a recent DG Regio paper (CEC, DG Regio 2000) notes that “Coordination regulation 1266/99
of 21 June 1999 (art 12.2) opens the possibility for waiving the ex-ant approval requirement and for
conferring on implementation agencies management of aid on a decentralized basis. This will however
only be decided on the basis of a case by case analysis of the management capacity, financial control
procedures and structures regarding public finance.”

325
is also an explicit goal. The general eligibility criteria further specify that individual
measures should have a cost of at least 5 million Euros in order to be of a significant
scale to have an impact on network development. The Commission will grant up to 75%
of total project cost, and while ISPA is not to be combined with other pre-accession
funding (i.e. Phare), loans by IFIs, including the EIB, are encouraged as co-funding.
Combined assistance under ISPA and other Community aid is not to exceed 90% of total
expenditure of a project. Exceptionally, up to 2 % of a country’s total ISPA allocation
may be used to fund preliminary studies, environmental assessments and additional
technical assistance related to ISPA priority projects, and in these cases ISPA may
finance up to 100 % of the total project cost.
Table 8.1: Per Country Allocation for ISPA Transport Grants
Country
Surface
Area
(km²)
Population
in 1997
(Million)
Index of GDP
per inhabitant
(average = 100)
Indicative
Allocation
(percent)
Indicative
Allocation
(Million €)
Poland 312685 38.66 91 30 - 37% 156 - 192.4
Hungary 93030 10.15 124 7 - 10% 36.4 - 52.0
Bulgaria 111062 8.31 67 8 - 12% 41.6 - 62.4
Czech Republic 78864 10.3 166 5.5 - 8% 28.6 - 41.6
Estonia 43431 1.46 90 2 - 3.5% 10.4 - 18.2
Lithuania 65300 3.7 76 4 - 6% 20.8 - 31.2
Latvia 64589 2.47 67 3.5 - 5.5% 18.2 - 28.6
Romania 238391 22.55 84 20 - 26% 104 -135.2
Slovenia 20256 1.97 175 1 – 2% 5.2 - 10.4
Slovakia 49035 5.38 116 3.5 - 5.5% 18.2 - 28.6
Source: http://www.europa.eu.int/comm/regional_policy/funds/ispa/provisions_en.htm
(Last accessed on 6-20-2002) and Commission of the European Communities (1999g:5)
All in all, ISPA remains a somewhat curious, hybrid funding instrument. One
Commission expert called it “an elastic category of accession.” Much of it has to do with

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the particulars of Eastern enlargement, which is also a process of flexible date setting.
ISPA is neither a true pre-accession version of the Cohesion fund (although that is clearly
its closest pendant within the internal EU family of funds) nor is it comparable to nonaccession
related external aid which the EU provides to non-accession third countries via
EuropAid.
Remember also that of the three pre-accession instruments which – upon
accession - are to be transitioned into regular EU funding instruments, Phare, and not
ISPA, is the program which is devised as the precursor to regional development funding.
Consequently, (economic and social) cohesion does not feature as a prominent storyline
justifying ISPA transport interventions. This also means, however, that transport
infrastructure investments in Poland and Hungary which largely serve regional or local
development objectives, e.g. rural access roads outside the TINA network, while not
eligible for ISPA funds, might still be still be eligible for EU funding under the Phare
program. Given this “division of labor” between the different EU funding instruments, it
interesting to note that the term “cohesion” nevertheless appears in the very first article of
the Council Regulation establishing ISPA. Article 1 sets out the “Definition and
Objective” of the instrument as follows (Council of the European Communities 1999):
ISPA shall provide assistance to contribute to the preparation for accession to the
European Union of the [hereby defined] “beneficiary countries'” in the area of
economic and social cohesion, concerning environment and transport policies in
accordance with the provisions of this Regulation. (my emphasis)
Of course, the relationship between economic and social cohesion and
environmental and transport policies is purely implied. Article 2 of the regulation then
sets out the particular eligibility measures for the ISPA program, also specifying which
function they must fulfill within the international or national transport network:

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1. The Community assistance financed under ISPA shall include projects, stages of a
project which are technically and financially independent, groups of projects or project
schemes in the field of environment or transport, hereinafter referred to collectively as
“measures”. A stage of a project may also cover preliminary, feasibility and technical
studies needed for carrying out a project.
2. The Community shall provide assistance under ISPA in the light of the objectives
mentioned in Article 1 for the following:
[(a) environmental measures]; (b) transport infrastructure measures which promote
sustainable mobility, and in particular those that constitute projects of common
interest based on the criteria of Decision No 1692/96/EC and those which enable the
beneficiary countries to comply with the objectives of the Accession Partnerships; this
includes interconnection and interoperability of national networks as well as with the
trans-European networks together with access to such networks. 16
Note that no particular reference is made to either the TINA backbone or the
TINA additional network.
Nevertheless, commission representatives repeatedly
emphasized that ISPA transport funding is to be primarily allocated towards major
infrastructure investments along the Helsinki Corridors. It is therefore interesting to see
how this particular wording has since reappeared in somewhat different phrasings in
several less official Commission documents designed to explain the eligibility of ISPA.
The wording in the DG Regio’s document “ISPA mandate, programming and
implementation – State of Play” is still very close to the phrasing in the regulation (see
Commission of the European Communities 2000a). The same can be said about the
wording on the official website of the European Delegation in Poland. 17
16 This article re-appears as Article 3 in a Council regulation clarifying the relationship between ISPA and
PHARE. Article 2 of this “Council Regulation (EC) No 1266/1999 of 21 June 1999 on coordinating aid to
the applicant countries in the framework of the pre-accession strategy and amending Regulation (EEC) No
3906/89” (Council of the European Communities 1999) amends the Phare Regulation as follows:
Regulation (EEC) No 3906/89 is hereby amended by adding a new paragraph 3 to Article 3 to read as
follows:
For applicant countries with accession partnerships with the European Union, funding under the
PHARE programme shall focus on the main priorities for the adoption of the acquis communautaire, i.e.
building up the administrative and institutional capacities of the applicant States and investment, except
for the type of investments financed in accordance with Regulations (EC) No 1267/1999 (*) and (EC)
No 1268/1999 (**). PHARE funding may also be used to finance the measures in the fields of
environment, transport and agricultural and rural development which form an incidental but
indispensable part of integrated industrial reconstruction or regional development programmes.
17 The exact wording in the DG Regio document is as follows:

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By contrast, the DG Regio information brochure “ISPA in a nutshell” presents an
interpretation which much more clearly privileges investments in the Helsinki corridors:
ISPA co-finances projects in the major road and rail corridors in the candidate
countries, identified at the Helsinki and Crete Conferences, including connections
between national networks and links to the Trans-European transport Networks within
the Union. 18
Meanwhile, the EU delegation in Hungary provides the interested public with an
even more creative interpretation. On their official website, they explain the ISPA
criteria as follows:
In the case of transport projects under ISPA, they must be an extension of a TEN
network, one of the priority corridors which the Commission is recommending, or an
access road to such a network. 19
So access roads suddenly receive a particular mention, but nothing is said about
either road or rail projects being eligible because they increase the interconnectivity of
national networks. This much more restrictive interpretation is particularly interesting in
light of the fact that the EU delegation website for Hungary, which is also available in
Hungarian, is likely to be the first and perhaps even only source of information consulted
by Hungarian stakeholders interested in ISPA eligibility criteria.
Projects that encourage sustainable forms of moving people and goods, in particular projects which are
of Community interest, and project which enable the countries concerned to meet the objectives of the
Accession Partnerships. This will include providing good connections between the Trans-European
transport networks and road and rail corridors (identified at the Helsinki and Crete Conference [sic]) in
the applicant countries and interconnections between national networks and links from them to the
Trans-European transport Networks.
On the website of the EU Delegation in Poland this reads as follows:
The investments in the field of transport infrastructure should encourage sustainable forms of mobility
and compose of projects which are of general interest on the basis of the Decision's No. 1692/96/WE
criteria and projects which will provide good interconnections between national networks and links
from them to the trans-European transport networks.
See http://www.europa.delpol.pl/english/podstrona.php?url=/english/III/3.php, accessed Aug 22 nd , 2002
18 CEC [, 2002b #1526], also see http://europa.eu.int/comm/regional_policy/funds/ispa/pdf/nutsh6.pdf . It
should also be noted previous editions of this two-page brochure in 2001used identical phrasing.
19 See http://www.eudelegation.hu/delegacio/elocsatlakozas_ispa_en.html, accessed on Aug 22 nd , 2002

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During the High-Level Meeting in Brussels, March 2000, Guy Crauser, then
Director General for Regional Policy at the Commission, delivered a speech which was
supposed to clarify the aims of structural and cohesion funding in Member states and
their relationship to pre-accession funding to the applicant countries. The ISPA-relevant
excerpts from this speech are also well-worth considering in detail. Turning to ISPA,
Crauser began by saying the following (Crauser 2000):
As you all know, ISPA will be a major new source of investment in the transport and
environment sectors. ISPA is not an environmental or a transport policy
instrument. ISPA has been designed as a precursor of the Cohesion and Structural
Funds. It is hence part of the family of financial support instruments for economic
and social cohesion. ISPA's principal aim is therefore to lay the foundations for
the future Structural Funds by providing the authorities here with the experience of
managing large-scale strategic investments in partnership with the Commission. This
experience will be invaluable when the time comes to manage larger and more
complex investment programmes supported by the Structural Funds. (Emphasis
added.)
Just a few moments later, however, we find the following remarks:
ISPA's aims are ambitious: it will support major investments which make a real
difference to the transport system and to the quality of the environment … I
understand that there has been some confusion as to the scope of the different
instruments. ISPA is a precursor of an economic and social cohesion support
mechanism but not an instrument of regional policy and not an instrument for
rural development. ISPA beneficiaries are entire countries with their whole territory.
ISPA is targeted to the trans-European transport corridors and to investment into
the environmental acquis. (Emphasis added.)
In the end, Crauser himself did little to end the confusion over ISPA, but rather
exacerbated it. How can an instrument not be a transport policy instrument when it is
explicitly aiming to make a difference in the recipient’s transport system by targeting
Trans-European transport corridors? How can an instrument not be a regional policy
instrument when it is a) being administered by the Directorate General for Regional
Policy and b) considered to be part of “a family of instruments for economic and social

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cohesion”? And if ISPA is neither a transport nor a regional policy instrument, what is it
exactly, then, other than a random pre-accession hand-out? Given the elaborate criteria
and policy documents relating to ISPA, ISPA is all but a random instrument, of course.
The fact remains that, as Chapter 7 already indicated and as will be demonstrated
in more detail below, the prospect of receiving ISPA grants profoundly shaped national
transport policy considerations in the recipient countries. So de facto, ISPA is clearly an
EU instrument influencing CEE transport policy, despite the semantic acrobatics of the
EU’s Regional Policy Director to the contrary.
Apart from generic references to the favoring of environmentally friendly modes,
neither the ISPA Council Regulation not any other supplementary materials contain any
specifications on modal allocations. It is thus possible that similar to the EU Cohesion
Fund as well as Phare and IFI funding in CEE, ISPA will end up disproportionably
benefiting the road sector. Of course this has to be looked at on a case by case basis,
since much also depends on what the different countries desire to submit for ISPA
funding. This is why I begin each of the two case study reviews on National ISPA
funding in Poland and Hungary with some preliminary remarks about the national
transport policy context after the transition.
8.4 EU ISPA Transport Funding for Poland
8.4.1 The National Context: Polish Transport Policy (Post-Transition)
Polish national transport policy underwent several profound changes before the
ISPA strategy was formulated in 1999 - 2000. A comprehensive post-transition transport
policy document, the so-called Polish Transport White Paper (Polityka transportowa,

331
MTME 1995) was elaborated in 1994/1995 by a Social Democrat. It displays the typical
optimism of transport’s economic benefits including
an increasing quality of life for the population of the country, the development of new
investments in particular regions of the country, ... decreasing unemployment,...
promoting the development of old and new sectors of industry, reinvigorating the
economies of declining regions and small and medium towns, easing the transfer to the
country of foreign technology, and speeding the integration with European countries.
(MTME 1995, as translated and quoted in Judge 2000)
The paper was considered neither a consistent nor a consensual policy document.
As Taylor (1998:227) summarizes:
Irrespective of the real impact of this document on the realization of transport policy,
it illustrates the way of thinking and preferences of the Ministry of Transport and
Maritime Economy. On one hand, it speaks of necessary changes, more economic
autonomy and financial balance for transport, while on the other, it is against full
privatization and deregulation in transport. Moreover, its discussion of how to finance
transport and its approach to ecological problems, are mostly controversial.
It is of course impossible to pass judgment on this paper without entering a
normative debate on policy and investment preferences. Most important from the point
of view of my study, however, is the fact that the policy was attacked from a great variety
of perspectives which together almost represented the entire bandwidth of sustainable
transport-related discursive frameworks. Neither the IFIs nor the EU were content with
the policy, largely due to its lacking commitment to full liberalization and transition to
market principles. National transport policy experts found traffic forecasts to be
unrealistic and missed a clear and transparent elaboration of infrastructure investments
priorities. The environmental movement hoped for greater support for rail and wanted to
stop the motorway construction program. Given its anti-market, protectionist approach in
key areas of transport policy (particularly in the airline sector), as well as its lack of any

332
clear environmental commitments, the 1994/5 White Paper can thus not be characterized
as a typical ecological modernization policy paper. Even as a basic infrastructure
modernization program it was rightfully considered lacking by both national and
international experts. In this sense, Polish national transport policy of the mid-1990s was
thus still rather different from both EU member state policy at the national level, as well
as from EU transport policy as a whole.
The most controversial element of the policy was its approach to motorway
expansion. In 1996, two of the country’s leading environmental non-governmental
organizations, the research-oriented Institute for Sustainable Development and the more
activist/advocacy-oriented Polish Ecological Club, therefore assembled a team of
internationally respected Polish experts, drafted an “Alternative Transport Policy for
Poland” (Instytut na Rzecz Ekorozwojo (Institute for Sustainable Development) 1996)
and challenged the national government to a debate. When the World Bank then agreed
to host a seminar on the topic in April 1998, the new government could do little but
accept the challenge. The ensuing debate between the Ministry of Transport – headed by
the Minister himself – and the environmentalists was closely followed by the European
Commission and IFI representatives. Noting that “Poland is notable for its vigorous
community of organizations concerned about the environment,” the World Bank
summarized the key issues of the debate as follows (World Bank 1999:33-34):
[The Alternative Transport Policy] showed that extrapolation of the Government’s
present policies – supportive of private car use and road transport generally,
construction of motorways, and neglect of urban public transport – would carry a
much higher environmental cost than a strongly pro-public transport, pro-rail, antiprivate
cars policy. The analysis omits assessment of the economic benefits from
greater travel and transport, so remains only partial. It does not address the question
of what policy instruments could achieve the environmentally-friendly scenarios, and
what effort – chiefly political – would be needed.

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In fact, the World Bank agreed with the NGOs that the key political efforts
needed were a revision of Polish Motorway policy, and renewed attention to rail. Yet
while the NGO’s call for a reevaluation of the government’s over-ambitious highway
construction program was chiefly motivated by environmental reasons, World Bank
skepticism, quite predictably, was based on economic arguments. The World Bank’s
official road-sector recommendation to the Polish government is worth citing at length
here (World Bank 1999:i-ii):
Major investments in transport infrastructure, including motorways, are clearly
required as Poland’s economy continues its rapid growth and as it prepares for
accession to the EU. However, … considering the competing demands of the State
budget for financing many other investments in social and physical infrastructure, we
recommend that the Motorway agency and the Ministry of Transport revisit the timing
and phasing of the motorway program and look at other alternatives which could still
meet Poland’s transport needs in the coming years, but at lower cost. … [Private
concessions have] turned out not to be viable. … The A1 and the A2 sections as now
planned are separate segments which would not for the time being be linked with
other motorway segments, but yet be built as full dual carriageways with gradeseparated
interchanges. This phasing is not the most economic. Several other options
could be considered. One would be to look again at options for improving existing
roads … as a first step and postpone major motorway construction until traffic is
much higher. Another option is to start work on the motorway program, but to
concentrate first on completing the main trans-European motorway (working
outwards from Warsaw)…. All this will require rewriting of the Motorway Laws. The
Motorways Agency has received abundant advice on options before it, the time has
come for decisions. Which sections should be built first? What staging will be most
economic? Which risks should be borne by the State and which by the concessionaire?
… What decision criteria should be adopted? [Emphasis added]
For one, this quote aptly summarizes the key deficiencies of the Polish motorway
plans. Additionally, it is a dramatic reminder that an ecological modernization approach
that is consistently complemented by a neo-liberal fiscal federalism perspective (typically
exemplified by the World Bank) in fact tends to favor more moderate (and thus also
lower-impact) infrastructure construction plans than modernization approaches that are

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chiefly guided by political and/or Keynesian pro-investment rationales (exemplified by
the Polish as well as some EU governments). Assuming larger “structural” benefits, the
latter are always less concerned about the particular financial costs and benefits of
individual infrastructure projects. 20
However, as Judge (2000:488) concluded in a recent
review of the regional and environmental dimensions of Polish motorway policy,
despite government rhetoric about the regional benefits of the motorway system, there
is no published research on where these benefits might arise. … Instead, the strategic
development aspects have de facto been submerged by financing issues, the drive to
enter the European Union and controversy over the environmental impact.
Lastly, it should be obvious that the World Bank’s suggestion to privilege
highway investments in the Pan-European corridors around Warsaw was of course well
suited to the EU’s strategic interests.
The Polish government remained reluctant to give up its vast motorway
ambitions, however. It is highly revealing that in this context, TINA was portrayed by
the Polish government as an “EU initiative” that is “encouraging” a particular set of
infrastructures, and not as the Pan-European effort to deliver an objective CEE needs
assessment that it purported to be. Otherwise, the government showed itself amenable to
various reform ideas in the rail and public transport sectors, but firm in its commitment
towards motorway construction. Finally, the government also made it very clear that the
NGOs’ renunciation-type demands of advocating lower levels of traffic stood no chance
under the current political regime. 21
20 Remember that there are increasing empirical challenges to this Keynesian governmental pro-growth
infrastructure-building argument (also see the relevant sections of chapters 2 and 6).
21 The actual summary points presented by the Polish government during the debate over the Alternative
Transport Policy were as follows (Attachment 2, World Bank 1999:34):
Yes, the Ministry will take environmental concerns into account.
It will be hard to stop the motorway program.

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However, due to renewed shifts in the Polish political landscape of power,
circumstances changed dramatically again just before the Polish National ISPA Strategy
was supposed to be drafted. Interestingly, Jan Friedberg, the Ex-Deputy Major of
Krakow and a long-time supporter of Polish Ecological Club initiatives, became Deputy
Minister of Transport and Under Secretary of State. Friedberg had already acquired an
international reputation as a savvy sustainable transport expert by being one of the key
promoters of the much acclaimed Krakow Fast Tram urban transport project (supported
financially by the EBRD, the EIB and Phare). Most importantly, Friedberg had also been
one of the co-authors of the Polish Alternative Transport Policy of 1998. Knowing that
he had several influential political adversaries both inside his ministry and inside the
Motorway Agency, and that his time as Under Secretary of State might therefore be
limited, Friedberg wasted little in reworking Polish transport policy. 22
In some short fullday
(and night) working sessions in June 2000, a new draft transport policy was
developed with the help of key national experts. Although neither finished nor approved
at the time that the Polish ISPA transport strategy was finished (January 2000), this
background certainly explains the shift in tone compared to previous Polish transport
policy statements. However, while generally hailed as a much more consistent overall
approach, one national expert nevertheless warned that, as usual, the devil lay in the
As part of Poland’s preparing for EU access, the EU, though its Transport Infrastructure Needs
Assessment initiative, is encouraging investment in major transport infrastructure supported by IFI
financing.
We will try to factor externalities into our project, but much remains to be done to give them monetary
values.
We agree that rail has an economic advantage for long-distance, mass transportation.
Rail lines not of national interest can now be devolved to regional governments.
We accept that the State should take urban transport under its wing in a “strategic thinking process.”
Limiting mobility goes against out basic policy of free choice in transport, so it is asking a lot to suggest
the Government to do so.
22 Jan Friedberg in fact managed to remain in his position until the latest elections in 2001.

336
details, and that the details of the new policy were not always necessarily more
sustainable. Either way, the new Polish policy is now more consistently set within an
overall framework of ecological modernization that heeds to market forces. In its draft
amended 2001 version, the main goal of Polish transport policy is the “creation of a
transport system which would be sustainable in terms technology, economy, spatial,
social and environmental aspects; this should be achieved while developing a market
economy and taking into account international competition” (Republic of Poland 2000;
ECMT 2001:11).
8.4.2 The Polish ISPA Transport Strategy and Its Priorities
According to the Under Secretary of State Jan Friedberg, he himself drafted the
introductory texts of the Polish ISPA transport strategy. The Commission representatives
were rather pleased with the document, finding it to be the most competent one among
the submitted national strategies. The ISPA document is well organized and structured.
An introductory section reviews ISPA guidelines and requirements. Here, the mention
that in Poland, “the quality of the infrastructure is a bottleneck in efficient transport
operations” (p. 4) is interesting inasmuch as it renders an important, alternative meaning
to the key term bottleneck: what seems needed most in the Polish case is an overall
modernization of the existing infrastructure, rather than a focus on particular high-profile
international priority projects. This important strategic view is shared by several key
Polish experts (see especially the quote from Prof. Suchorzewski’s ECMT Report in the
concluding section of this chapter). In the following section of the document, which

337
describes Polish transport sector trends from 1990-1998, the following key statistics are
notable:
?? the dramatic, 70% increase in the number of road vehicles,
?? the fact that road transport now accounts for 80% of cargo by weight and for 40% of
ton-km, the 50% fall in passenger rail transport,
?? the two-thirds increase of airport traffic, the increase of border traffic resulting in
about 270 million people crossing the borders in 1997,
?? rising numbers of accidents resulting in about 7000 fatalities a year, and finally,
?? the substantial deterioration of the road network over the last decade due to limited
funds from the state budget.
With regard to the road network, the profile section (p.7ff) then also points to the
lack of a developed, limited access expressway network as well as the fact that at present,
less than 50% of Polish roads are even adjusted to axle loads of 100 kN, while the EU
standards is 115 kN. With regard to the rail sector, only about 60% of the lines are in
good or very good condition, and many lines have reserve capacity. The following
sections on medium term “strategic aims for transport infrastructure development” and on
the “method of selection of projects to be co-financed by ISPA” prepare the way for the
concrete suggestions presented in the final sections. Besides basic compliance with
formal requirements concerning maturity and size of the projects and other elements of
the EU’s ISPA regulation, the document takes particular care to assure compliance with
the preference for Helsinki Corridor location, although the authors of the document,
writing in somewhat twisted, non-native sentence constructions, still clearly attempt to
keep the door open for other projects:
During the selection of projects in Poland, it has been taken into account that the
projects put forward for ISPA financing must be situated on the main routes of
international importance, which after the accession to the EU will become the part of
TENs. The list of these routes for all the candidate countries, identified as the ‘TINA
network’, have been agreed by all the involved countries and approved by the
European Commission. The basic components of this network are the connections

338
within the frame of the Pan-European Transport Corridors systems established on the
Crete conference (1994) and Helsinki conference (1997). Four Pan-European
corridors crossing Poland and the projects located in these Corridors will be the
investment priorities in the years 2000-2006 and in the later period. … Moreover, in
the context of ISPA funds and IFI loans participation in the financing of the
infrastructure projects, the important investments (from the point of view of the
development of the country’s transport system) could be placed in the rest of the
components of TINA network and would supplement, in the necessary scope, the
framework created by the corridors.
Of particular interest here is the mention of the national perspective, hinting at
dissonances between European and national level priorities. Before presenting the list of
priority projects, the document then also has an additional section on “sources of
financing: aims, principles and assumptions.” Here, the Polish government assures the
EU that they will apply “principles of sound management” and quote a series elements
from their national document “Strategy for public finance and economical development,
Poland 2000-2010. 23
In the end, weighing the suitability of ISPA grant funding for
possible projects against sources from the state budget, from local authority budgets,
private sector contributions, IFI and other bilateral loans, and Phare grants (for regional
infrastructure), the Polish ISPA document presents a list of projects which would, if
executed, exceed the foreseen Polish ISPA allocation for the 2000-2006 period.
Originally, Polish officials were interested in presenting an even wider selection of
projects to DG Regio in Brussels. However, they were strongly encouraged by the
responsible DG Regio officer to concentrate on select TEN corridors, and more precisely
on Helsinki Corridors II and III. These are the same stretches of motorways and railways
23 This document, among other things, assumes that “state budget expenditures for transport infrastructure
will increase from PLN 5.7 billion in 2000 to PLN 11.6 in 2006, i.e. from 0.8% of GDP in 2000 to 1.0% of
GDP in 2006” (Republic of Poland 2000:15). Using 2002 exchange rates, this amounts to € 1.5 in 2000 and
€ 3 in 2006. By comparison, TINA assumed average annual expenditures of € 1.3 from 2000 to 2015 just
for Helsinki corridor expenditure in the road and rail sectors, as well as an additional € 0.8 for additional
TINA lines and infrastructure nodes.

339
that had previously received most Phare and IFI funding. This strategic focus was then
consistently integrated into the formulation of the Polish ISPA Transport Strategy. At the
point that the document was published, the projects for submission in 2000 had already
been chosen, and all three had received funding. Table 8.2 presents an overview of both
the planned ISPA projects until 2006 and those that had received funding until December
31, 2001.
Table 8.2 Overview of ISPA Transport Grants to Poland
ISPA Transport Grants to Poland TINA Planned Approved
(in Million €) Location? ('00-'06) ('00-'01)
Modernization E-20 Railline Rzeptin-Border Corridor II 30,00 17,72
Modernization of the Poznan rail node E-20 Corridor II 200,00 50,58
Rail Improvements / Liquidation of Bottlenecks Corridors & Add. 83,25
Modernization E-30 Railline Wegliniec-Legnica Corridor III 186,00 92,84
Technical Assistance Modernization E-65 Railline Corridor VI 5,96
Modernization E-65 Railline Warsaw-Dzialdowo Corridor VI 270,00
Modernization E-20 Railline Siedlce - Terespol Corridor II 288,00
PERCENTAGE OF GRANTS RAIL SECTOR 40% 46%
Construction A4 Highway Klesczów - Sosnica Corridor III 120,00 84,21
Reconstruction A4 Highway Krzyzowa - Wroclaw * Corridor III 374,00 189,53
11.5 Axle Load Strenghthening on National Roads Corridors I,II, III, VI 496,00 62,12
11.5 Axle Load A4 Highway and Nat'l Road No. 4 Corridor III & Add. 46,67
11.5 Axle Load Nat'l Road No. 717 Corridor II 24,57
Project Management Training of Staff N/A 0,40
Pre-Feasibility Study Warsaw Transport Node Corridors I,II & VI 0,71
Kwiatkowski access route to seaport of Gdynia Corridor VI 47,00
Construction Nat'l Road No.1 Skoczow-Ciezyn Corridor VI 47,00
Modernization Nat'l Road S 18 Wyszkow * Corridor I 80,00
Construction Nat'l Road No.1 Bielsko-Skoczow Corridor VI 38,00
Construction A4 Highway Zgorzelec - Krzyzowa * Corridor III 285,00
Road Access to port of Gdansk Corridor VI 71,00
Modernization S-94 National Road Zywiec-Zwardon Corridor VI 97,00
PERCENTAGE OF GRANTS ROAD SECTOR 60% 54%
* = Listed in National Strategy as 2 Projects Total 2741,00 752,00
Source: Own compilation using data from the European Commission DG Regional
Policy ISPA Website (http://europa.eu.int/comm/regional_policy/funds/ispa/ispa_en.htm)
and the National ISPA Transport Strategy Poland

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The table shows that the projects submitted exclusively concern the road and rail
sectors, with 20% more road than rail submissions. Actual grants until 2001, however,
displayed a more even modal distribution. So far, the granting of Polish transport grants
seems to have progressed rather closely according to the list submitted with the National
Strategy. Also, Commission officials commented on the comparatively high capacity of
the Polish counterparts to adequately manage and absorb the funds, a circumstance that
was not given for all the candidate countries.
8.4.3 Preliminary Conclusions: EU ISPA Grants for Poland (2000-2001)
In 2000, as part of its National ISPA Transport Strategy, Poland submitted a “List of
proposals of investment projects for ISPA co-financing” which contained 19 projects
totaling € 2742 million. Of this, € 1655 million were for road and € 1086 million for rail
projects. This total project volume was more than twice as high as Poland’s maximum
ISPA allowance of € 1344 million (i.e. the added yearly possible maximum of € 174
million from 2000-2006), so that the Commission still had significant leeway in
concentrating investments in particular modes or locales. Additionally, as noted above,
Commission officials had already made it clear to their Polish counterparts that they
believed all Polish ISPA projects should be located on Helsinki corridors. Within the
larger array of possible large-scale infrastructure projects that were then submitted as
eligible grants projects, responsible Commission officials further steered the prioritization
process towards a select number of projects located in Helsinki corridors, mostly those
close to the Western borders (Germany). The TINA exercise was decidedly not used as
an input for project prioritization in the Regional Policy Directorate. By the end of 2001,
projects in the amount of € 752 million had been approved by the ISPA Management

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Committee, i.e. well over half of the maximum ISPA transport grant volume to Poland
(or 62% of the mean total volume foreseen). Almost all of the projects approved so far
are international rail lines and expressways in Helsinki Corridors II and III. Interestingly,
there is one significant “joker” in the Polish ISPA list that has presented an important
counterweight to the strongly west-oriented expressway bias in road sector grant
allocations, and that is the axle load strengthening program. At € 496 million this “group
of projects” accounts for 30% of the entire road sector submissions. This final item on
the Polish ISPA projects list essentially presents a back door for funding all those
national roads that are part of the entire TINA network but which are not expressways on
the primary axes of the corridors. Many of these national roads run roughly parallel to
the planned future expressways foreseen as the final Helsinki corridor backbones, and
many carry increasingly heavy transit traffic. Some, however, are not congruent with the
expressway alignments. Note that a similar “joker” does not exist for the rail sector, so
that the bias for international transit lines is more pronounced. As far as the location of
the rail sector allocations is concerned, however, there is less of a “western” bias in the
allocations. As far as the balance between modes is concerned, there seems to have been
a conscious effort by both the Commission and the Polish counterparts to keep
allocations evenly balanced between the road and rail sector. Overall, the Polish ISPA
grant allocations appear as a relatively well-crafted, carefully worked out compromise
that displays a predictable prioritization of East-West oriented international transit
corridors.

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8.5 EU ISPA Transport Funding for Hungary
8.5.1 The National Context: Hungarian Transport Policy (Post- Transition)
Any scholar researching transport issues in Hungary is quickly enlightened about
several idiosyncracies of the Hungarian infrastructure network. Most importantly,
contrary to the polycentric settlement structure predominant in Poland, Hungary’s urban
system is extremely dominated by Budapest. With 1,8 million inhabitants, Budapest is
clearly Hungary’s primate city. Although two thirds of Hungary’s population is urban,
the majority live in towns of less than 40,000 inhabitants, and only a few secondary cities
approach 100,000 in size. The reasons are of course largely historical. 24 Consequently,
the transport network is extremely centralized, with Budapest functioning as its main
bottleneck for anyone wishing to travel from one end of the country to the other. This is
particularly true for the rail sector. Ninety percent of the entire bridge lane capacity
(including public transport links) across the Danube are located in Budapest, only two
other major crossings exit.
As in many communist countries, serious backlogs in rehabilitation maintenance
were build up during the 1980s when the Hungarian economy went through recession.
Ambitious road building programs were postponed and even basic maintenance was
neglected in the rail sector, whose infrastructure had been extended significantly in
previous decades. Despite the faltering economy, there was already a continuous, albeit
24 During the 19 th century, Hungary was trying to assert its independence from the Austrian empire, and
thus built up Budapest as a strong alternative capital. At this time, Hungary was about three times as large
as it is now, and important secondary cities of the former empire like Bratislava or Zagreb are now located
in neighboring countries. Although the country’s first comprehensive transport infrastructure plan,
developed by Count Szechenyi in 1848 envisaged a comprehensive network that also directly connected
outlying regions though peripheral and lateral connections, this plan was never fully implemented. Instead,
a more radial system concentrating on the capital was developed after the loss of was parts of the country’s
territories after the first World War. After the Second World War, Communist leaders found this radial
infrastructure to be suited to the needs of their centralized economy.

343
moderate increase in private vehicle ownership in Hungary during the 1980s. The other
decisive trend – similar to other transition economies, albeit somewhat earlier than
elsewhere – was the continued changeover from rail-based to road-based, increasingly
small trucking-dominated transport in the freight sector. Figure 8.3 illustrates this
development, which together with the continued parallel rise in private vehicle
ownership, led to increasing political pressure for highway expansion.
As early as 1992, the Hungarian government adopted the so-called “principles of
the Hungarian transport policy.” From these, four strategic directions were developed,
which are considered “of equal importance” and elaborated further in the official
Hungarian Transport Policy adopted in 1996 (KÖVIM 1996):
- Promotion of integration into the European Union
- Enhancement of the conditions of co-operation with the neighboring
countries, and of a more balanced regional development of the country,
- Protection of human life and of the environment, and
- Effective, market-oriented transport regulations
Figure 8.3 The Rise of Road-Based Freight Transport in Hungary (1980-1994)
Change in Modal Split
for Hungarian Freight Transport
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
1980 1985 1990 1994
Road (including Small Truckers)
Small Truckers
Rail
Inland Waterways*
Pipelines
* From 1993 numbers are inconsistent
due to exclusion of deep sea shipping
Data Source: Ministry of Transport (1996, Appendix, Table 4)

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These strategic directions are consistent with an overall eco-modernist agenda.
More importantly, the official Hungarian policy explicitly voices a strong Keynesian
belief that investments in transport are the best way to stimulate development, i.e. it
clearly adheres to the (academically disputed) public capital hypothesis formulated by
Aschauer and others (also see Chapter 2) which strongly emphasizes macroeconomic
spillover-effects from transport infrastructure investments. At the same time, the policy
makes a clear reference to EU cohesion countries as models for Hungarian development,
thus implicitly also making an investment-for-cohesion argument (for details on the
“cohesion” storyline, see Chapter 6). The respective passage in the policy is worth
quoting in its entirety (KÖVIM 1996:13-14):
[In countries like] Spain, Portugal, Greece, the development of transportation, while
also anticipatory, acted as leading force, for the other sectors of the economy.
Development programs in transportation which purposefully preceded other sectors of
development, started with good reason. The aim was to create favourable conditions
for capital and resource input, particularly for those that originate abroad. For
Hungary, due to its present economic state and desirable future growth path, the lesson
of [such] countries at a mid-level of development (which also are “catching up” fast)
has more to offer than that of the most developed ones. Another favourable impact of
transportation development is through the multiplier effect, the results of which on the
economy as a whole is proven by international research. According to this, each unit
of investment made in transportation development generates, in the country or in a
particular territory, 2.5-3 times its size, in private investment. Transportation
development, in terms of its overall impact on the economy, is second only behind
telecommunications and is ahead of all other sectors. Moreover, at a macro economic
level, at times of recession, a well thought-out development program in transportation
is capable of filling the role of a counter-cyclic agent.
The “strategic directions” section also has a clearly Keynesian slant (p.21):
Investments in infrastructure act as stimulants in economic policy aimed at a program
of structural transformation, and as such, they should be initiated, supported and
funded by the state. One of the prerequisites of a renewed growth in production is an
infrastructure oriented development program.

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As far as mode specific details relating to the first strategic direction, i.e. the
promotion of EU integration is concerned, the Hungarian national policy clearly favors
investments in the road sector. Interestingly, the 1996 does not [yet] pre-dominantly
focus on new construction, but emphasizes maintenance, and even mentions cycle paths
as an element promoting EU integration. Bypass roads, however, are also mentioned,
thereby implicitly reemphasizing the importance of the M0 ring road as an “EU
integration project”:
Previously postponed programs of maintenance in the road network must be carried
out without delay. The program should, later on [sic] include the completion of
autostradas [motorways] in the transit corridors … as well as … new bridges.
Additional general programs include building of bypass roads, reduction … of the
number of road/railway level crossings, reconstruction of points with high traffic
concentration, at peripheral locations, and expansion of the bicycle path network.
Within the railway network, only selective developments can be envisaged. These
will include, primarily, modernisation of the main transit lines, investments in areas
wherever cost reduction and/or quality improvement can be achieved, and where
safety will be enhanced.
[bold italics in the original, additional bold emphases added]
In other sections, the document also contains rather specific statements regarding
various mode-specific developments as well as the relationship between maintenance and
new construction. However, in contrast to Keynesian-type approaches favoring reliance
on large-scale public works, the 1996 Transport Policy estimates that only about one
quarter of the total estimated financial resource requirements for all modes, namely 680
to 770 billion HUF, i.e. over € 2 billion would have to be covered by the state.
Nevertheless, the official document makes no direct reference to the most contested
Hungarian transport initiative of the time, i.e. the toll road concessions for the M1/15 and
the M5 motorways. Given the government’s acute lack of financial resources, toll roads
were regarded by many experts as the best way to complete missing sections of the

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national highway network. As it turned out, the government’s hopes of being able to
speed-up highway construction through private-sector funded, build-operate-transfer
(BOT) concessions were ultimately gravely disappointed due to major problems with the
actual concession schemes. The M1/M15 concession disaster still serves as warning
example for other CEE governments. 25
As far as public reactions to the official Transport Policy were concerned, the
document received the predictable kudos from the infrastructure and construction sector
and the equally predictable criticism from environmental organizations and railway
enthusiasts (see e.g. Clean Air Action Group and Hungarian Traffic Club 1999).
The 1996 document is still considered the official Hungarian Transport Policy. 26
However, there have been major changes in Hungarian transport policy since 1996,
particularly in the wake of the 1998 and the 2002 national elections. Most importantly,
the first National ISPA Strategy for Hungary had to be prepared at a time when the
country was in the midst of political restructuring. Consequently, the preparations of the
25 During an ECMT expert seminar, KÖVIM representative Ferenc Szabó and EBRD representative Dr.
Andras Timar presented comparatively sympathetic accounts of the experience. Yet even they admit that
tolling motorways remains “a very sensitive issue” (Szabó 1999) and that under prevailing conditions in
Central Europe, the opportunity costs of the necessary substantial government contributions must be
thoroughly evaluated (Timár 1999:6). Meanwhile, Hook (1999:212) presents a much more outspoken
critique of the highly problematic M1 toll concession, which lost millions of Euros and eventually lead to a
costly government bailout operation at taxpayers’ expense. As he summarizes:
After the M1 was built, traffic and revenues were 50% below projections, mainly because most
Hungarian motorists elected to take slower, parallel untolled routes. … Unable to meet its debt
payments, in June of 1999 ELMKA [the concession company] was taken over by the Hungarian
Government. All of ELMKA’s assets were turned over to a fully-state owned ‘Replacement Company.’
Most of the initial investors lost their [substantial] equity investments. … The consortium of banks that
lent money to the concession company also lost US$31 million. [Yet] in the end the road will cost the
Government of Hungary some US$30 million less than if they had simply built the road as a public toll
road with EBRD loans. As a result of the experience, the EBRD’s new transport policy states that it will
only get involved in BOT highway projects in the future where the level of government subsidies to the
project are much greater or where the concessionaire’s rate of return is guaranteed by the
government…. This position fits uncomfortably with the EBRD’s policy of working to remove
subsidies in the public transit and rail sectors.
26 An English language version remains available for download on the website of the newly formed the
Ministry of Economy and Transportation (via the still-existing website of its legal predecessor). See
www.kovim.hu/Celok/Kozlekedes/EU-Integration/Transport_policy/Transport_policy_of_Hungary.doc

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Hungarian National ISPA Strategy documents were intimately related with the release of
the new government’s national economic development plan (“Széchenyi Plan”). This
document deserves some detailed attention. In particular, a closer look at the
government’s Széchenyi Plan will explain why the initial draft ISPA Transport Sector
Strategy of June 1999 (prepared by the Hungarian Transport Ministry) was completely
changed and a totally different ISPA priority list presented to the EU about a year later.
In 1998, national elections were then won by the center-right parties, 27
who
agreed that the national motorway program should be accelerated, but who had their own,
very particular ideas about how the construction program should be financed. In 1999,
the new coalition government under Prime Minister Victor Orbán adopted a ten-year
motorway expressway program which was accelerated to seven years in 2000. In the
spring of 2000, the Economic Ministry then presented a national economic development
plan, the so-called Széchenyi Plan (GM 2000). One of the cornerstones of the Plan was
an ambitious expressway construction program which in turn was centered around an
immediate expansion of the M3 and M7 highways (to be completed until the end of
2002) as well as the construction of the Szekszárd Danube bridge (until mid-2003).
Additionally, the plan also proposed the modernization of three railway lines along key
Helsinki corridors along Zalaegerszeg-Boda, Budapest-Cegléd-Szolno-Lökösháza and
Budapest-Hegyshalom as well as a regional airport development subprogram. Tables 8.3
and 8.4 list the proposed measures in the new seven year plan.
27 The new government was formed on July 8, 1998 by three parties: the Fidesz Hungarian Civic Party
(Fidesz-MPP), the Independent Smallholder's Party (FKgP) and the Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF).

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According to the Széchenyi Plan’s own rhetoric, the program appeared firmly set
within a framework of market-oriented economic modernization that adhered to EU
framework priorities:
The Széchenyi Plan is a program for rapid and sustainable economic
development. The fundamental objective of the Széchenyi Plan is to provide for
dynamic and sustainable economic growth and to improve the Hungarian economy’s
level of competitiveness. [See Section 5].
The Széchenyi Plan introduces a planning practice that is radically new in Hungary.
This practice rests on three major aspects: partnership between the government and the
business sector; limited co-financing by the government; and program financing for a
coordinated use of government supports. … The Széchenyi Plan remains firmly and
purely on a market economic footing. This is a program financing in the manner
practiced in the European Union…. Even though the word “plan” is included in the
title of the Széchenyi Plan, it is, naturally, completely different from the planning
practices of the past forty years in Hungary.
[Section 6, emphasis added].
Table 8.3 The Széchenyi Plan’s Railway Modernization Program
Source: Hungarian Ministry of the Economy (GM 2000)

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Table 8.4 The Széchenyi Plan’s Expressway Construction Program
Source: Hungarian Ministry of the Economy (GM 2000)

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Most importantly, the Széchenyi Plan completely redefined the role of the state
and other players in expressway development. The Plan directly critiqued the previous
government’s concession-oriented approach as “extremely costly both for the state and
motorists.” However, instead of using the opportunity to open a debate over more
socially just, economically acceptable, and financially viable (i.e. “sustainable”) ways of
approaching the expansion of the national highway network, the new Orbán government
did exactly the opposite. Echoing the protectionist, and in part nationalist, interests
represented by the various coalition parties, the Széchenyi Plan argued that the previous
concessional solution had resulted in an unfavorable situation where foreign companies
dominated the expressway construction market and that priorities therefore had to be
arranged according to the following four goals:
to build expressways faster and at a smaller investment cost than before;
to make the use of expressways financially viable for motorists;
to allow Hungarian financial institutions and personal savings to play a greater role in
financing the developments;
and to allow Hungarian road companies to play a greater role in the execution of
developments
(GM 2000).
What followed in the next two years, however, was neither cost and time efficient
nor in sync with “market economic footing” but essentially a corruption scandal which is
only now being investigated in detail. Following the publication of the Széchenyi Plan,
the National Motorway Company Nemzeti Autópálya Rt. (NA), founded by the new
government in 1999 via Government decision 2117/1999 and 99% owned by the stateowned
Hungarian Development Bank, ignored all rules of public procurement legally
required both according to EU and Hungarian law. No tenders were called for the

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construction contracts, and none of the three qualified Hungarian construction firms in
possession of the appropriate equipment to carry out such large-scale road works were
contacted by NA Rt. (Pócza 2000). Instead, two Hungarian construction companies who
had never before been involved in motorway construction (and who were characterized as
politically close to the governing Fidesz party in the national press, see e.g. Lovas 2000),
Vegyépszer Rt. and Betonút Rt., were awarded both the first contract for the M3 and
numerous subsequent ones.
The circumstances of this contracting and funds
disbursement process were highly dubious from the start, and even included sub-contracts
with quarries owned by the family of the Prime Minister (ibid). 28
Under these
circumstances, EU Commission representatives made it clear to the Hungarian
government that they could not realistically expect to receive any ISPA co-financing for
their motorway construction program. As we will see, ISPA grant funding in Hungary
was therefore heavily concentrated in the rail sector during the first two years.
28 By the time that the Orbán government was ousted in the May 2002 elections, none of the motorways in
the above listed table had been completed, and for many of them, work in fact had not even begun. In the
end, allegations of corruption and incompetence related to the construction program were a significant
factor in the 2002 elections. The opposition especially criticized the fact that financing the expressways via
the Hungarian Development Bank (MFP) and not through the state budget meant that there was no
parliamentary control over these expenses. In the weeks following the election, the new center-left socialdemocratic
government formed by the MSZP and the SZDSZ and headed by Péter Medgyessy acted
quickly. By late June 2002, the entire management and board of directors of NA Rt. had been exchanged,
and the vast majority of the incoming representatives are now also members of the two governing parties.
Similar measures were taken at the Hungarian Development Bank. In late July, the new government then
even annulled a previous July 11 invitation-only tender (in which Vegyépszer Rt. had not been invited to
take part) and promised open tenders for all subsequent contracts. In early August, the new CEO of the
Hungarian Development Bank told the Hungarian press that the repayments of the credits taken out for the
expressway construction projects might cost Hungarian taxpayers as much as HUF 180 billion (over € 730
million) for want of cover on the part of the Hungarian Development Bank.

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8.5.2 The Hungarian ISPA Transport Strategies and their Priorities 29
The initial 1999 draft ISPA National Transport Strategy document was very much
a cut-and-paste document that did not undergo much final editing. Different sections
even display different type fonts and sizes (and sometimes even colors). There is no table
of contents. The entire document is separated (i.e. segmented) into an introductory part,
and a road and a rail sector annex which sometimes repeat information and do not relate
to each other. The draft does not [yet] contain any priority projects for inland navigation
or civil aviation. Not surprisingly, the document was not well received in Brussels. On
an editorial level, the responsible Brussels desk officers demanded a more coherent, more
consistent document with a clearer argumentation leading to a logical set of ISPA priority
projects. On a pragmatic level, the 1999 draft version listed priorities within the road and
rail sectors, but did not allow for any prioritization between road, rail or other projects.
Within the rail sector, however, the 1999 draft was already unproblematic. The three top
ISPA priority projects were identical with the Széchenyi Plan priorities (see Table 8.4
above). These were in turn identical with Helsinki corridors IV and V, so there was thus
a mutual interest from the Hungarian and the EU sides to first modernize these lines.
The road sector, however, was more problematic. In the 1999 draft, the “key
projects forming part of the government strategy” are introduced as follows:
29 Much unlike the Polish officials, Hungarian officials were extremely reluctant to provide me with inside
insights into the gestation and formulation of the Hungarian ISPA strategy when I conducted my interviews
in Budapest in August 2000. At that time, final consultations on the second, dramatically changed version
of the strategy had not been completed, and the material was still highly politically sensitive. Contrary to
the Polish case, I therefore was not able to conduct detailed, first-hand interviews with the actual author(s)
of the ISPA strategy documents. As evident in this chapter, I still managed to obtain a significant amount
of information, including copies of both the draft 1999 and the final 2000 versions of the Hungarian
National ISPA Strategy, but this information did not come from official governmental channels. Note,
however, that by 2002 (and possibly earlier) the final ISPA version could be found on the Transport
Ministry’s website.

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There are thirteen [road sector] projects proposed to receive ISPA support within the
coming medium term period. These projects from [sic] the 'long' list in the first etap
[phase]. Most of these projects are situated in the Helsinki Corridor and belong to the
TINA network. 4 projects from the 'long' list being able to start in 2000 have been put
to the so-called 'short' list (4.1-4.4). After a site visit experts delegated by European
Committee DG XVI [sic] suggested 2 of these 4 projects to form part of ISPA 2000.
[These are:]
1. Construction of Motorway M7 between Budapest and Zamárdi […]
2. Construction of Motorway M3 between Füzesabony and Polgár
So at least at this point, the top two ISPA road priorities were still fully congruent
with the national development objectives in the Széchenyi Plan. EU delegates had also
clearly identified these particular projects as top ISPA priorities. Of the additional eleven
projects listed in the document, most of them were also congruent with the Széchenyi
Plan priorities. In particular, of the listed ISPA priorities 3 through 7, only one project,
the expressway M43, differed from the Széchenyi Plan priorities. All other projects
listed, i.e. the Eastern section of the M0 ring road, the M30 between Emöd and Miskolc,
the M7 between Zamárdi and Letenye and the M9 expressway bridge across the Danube
at Szekszárd come straight from the Széchenyi Plan priority list.
For reasons explained above, the final ISPA strategy document from June 2000
then presents a very different picture. Challenged to explain the sudden withdrawl of
almost all previous top road priorities from the final ISPA document, the Hungarian
government chose to downplay this radical departure by pretending that only two projects
were withdrawn. As the final ISPA Strategy has it:
At the beginning of 2000 a new Government Decision was made (2037/2000) to
speed-up the construction of new motorways. The Hungarian Development Bank Ltd.
was entrusted with full responsibility for the financing of motorway and expressway
development, and NA Rt. was requested to contract directly with Hungarian firms for
the construction of priority motorway sections. As a result of this decision, two
motorway projects which were previously considered for ISPA Funding, M7 and M3,
were withdrawn from the list of potential ISPA projects.

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In reality, however, not only those two, but practically all other Széchenyi Plan
priorities were also dropped from the new priority list. By then, the EU had obviously
made it clear to their Hungarian counterparts that no EU co-financing would be given for
construction projects that did not adhere to standard procurement rules. So in the end, the
Hungarian government only listed three road sector priority projects in its final National
ISPA Transport Strategy: a general axle load strengthening program along national roads,
the section of the M43 between the M5 and the Romanian border and the Eastern section
of the M0 highway. Additionally, an additional road project was “hidden” in the “inland
navigation” ISPA priority list: the Hungarian government planned to request € 27.4
million for the “construction for a new ‘spinal’ access road connection to the port of
Csepel (Budapest) on the Danube” (p.23).
The three rail sector priorities, by contrast, appear entirely unchanged, except that
they are now listed before the road sector priorities. Finally, in addition to two new
inland navigation projects, the Hungarian government now also requests ISPA grant
funding for three civil aviation projects that did not previously appear in the ISPA draft.
Table 8.5 presents an overview of the planned and received ISPA transport grants to
Hungary.

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Table 8.5 Overview of ISPA Transport Grants to Hungary
ISPA Transport Grants to Hungary TINA Planned Approved
(in Million €) Location? ('00-'06) ('00-'01)
Rehabilitation Railline Budapest-Györ-Hegeshalom Corridor IV 43,00 42,99
Rehabilitation Railline Vecsés-Szolnok Corridor IV 63,00 63,00
Rehabilitation Railline Zalalövö-Boba Corridor V 84,00 83,70
Technical Assistance Railline Szolnok-Lökösháza Corridor IV 0,50 0,15
Technical Assistance additional rail projects Corridors IV & V 1,50 1,61
PERCENTAGE OF GRANTS RAIL SECTOR 50% 90%
11.5 Axle Load Trunk Roads 3 and 35 Additional 34,00 20,00
Technical Assistance 11.5 Axle Load Project Additional 0,50 0,15
Expressway M0 Budapest (Eastern section) Corridor Node 71,50
Expressway M43 (M5 – Romanian border) Corridor VI 26,50
"Inland navigation": Access road Csepel port B'pest “TINA Riverport” 10,50
Technical Assistance Expressways Misc. Corridors 0,50
PERCENTAGE OF GRANTS ROAD SECTOR 38% 10%
Multimodal cargo terminal Györ-Gönyü Danube port Corridor VIII 5,50
Airport Budapest Ferchegy International TINA Airport 20,00
Airport Debrecen Proposed Additions 10,00
Airport Balaton Proposed Additions 10,00
Technical Assistance Budapest Airport TINA Airport 0,50
PERCENTAGE OF GRANTS MULTIMODAL & AIR 12% 0%
Total 381,50 211,60
Source: Own compilation using data from the European Commission, DG Regional
Policy Website (http://europa.eu.int/comm/regional_policy/funds/ispa/ispa_en.htm) and
the National ISPA Transport Strategy Poland
8.5.3 Preliminary Conclusions: EU ISPA grants for Hungary (2000-2001)
Between 1999 and 2001, ISPA transport grants were selected and approved under
difficult political circumstances in Hungary. Deficiencies in road sector project
accountability led to an originally unintended, almost exclusive concentration of ISPA
funds in the rail sector. Contrary to Poland, the final project list in the June 2000 ISPA
Strategy only listed a total project volume slightly in excess of Hungary’s maximum
possible ISPA transport sector allocation (i.e. a total of € 381.5 million compared to a

356
total possible of € 364 million). By the end of 2001, a total of € 191.49 million had been
allocated to the rail sector, accounting for 90% of all allocations until that time, and
already for 52% of the total possible, and for 63.3% of the mean allocated volume of
ISPA transport grants to Hungary. Together with one non-expressway axle load
strengthening project, these projects then accounted for 58% of the total possible, and
70% of the mean allocated volume for Hungary. No funds were approved for either
expressway development or access roads. Whether this record will be reversed in 2002
after the post-election restructuring of the Hungarian motorway agency remains to be
seen. 30 In Hungary, the EU encountered a situation where the Commission’s only last
option to ensure transparency in the allocation of funds (i.e. procedural sustainability),
namely to threaten to withhold grants for the road sector if international procurement
rules were not met, was more or less shrugged off by the recipient government, which
then decided to finance the respective highway sections on its own. One might argue that
by still providing grant funds to the rail sector, the EU might have thus “freed up”
additional governmental funds for the unaccountable road sector. However, choosing to
also withhold funds from the struggling rail sector at a time where this mode continued to
lose shares against road-based motorization also hardly seemed like a desirable choice.
As far as the overall “sustainability” of the EU’s grant funding in Hungary is concerned,
30 As far as medium- to long-term transport sector preferences of the new Hungarian government are
concerned, they are not likely to be different from their predecessors. In their renewed ambitiousness, they
clearly recall post-war German autobahn projects. As Benkö (2002) reported in mid-August 2002:
Economy and Transport Minister István Csillag said [that] …. the proposals will be based on the
previous government’s medium-term and long-term road building programs. “As part of the pan-
European network, a primary goal of Hungary’s transport policy by 2015 is to build a freeway network
from border to border, crossing the country from north to south and east to west, with a density that
ensures access to the nearest motorway or principal road in half an hour from any point of the
country,” reads the plan that the ministry will submit to the government. [Emphasis added]

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most of the more problematic choices, such as the decision over the eastern section of the
M0 ring road or for civil aviation projects, have so far been postponed, so that it would be
premature to pass judgment on the portfolio as it stood in late 2001.
8.6 Concluding Remarks on the EU’s ISPA Transport Program
It is still too early to present any strong conclusions on the EU’s new ISPA
program. But based on ISPA program directives and requirements, as well as on the
record of lending and grant making activity until December 2001, the following remarks
can be offered:
The ISPA National Strategies played and still play very different roles in the two
case study countries in terms of re-organizing national transport policies. Disputes over
the content of these strategies once again demonstrate the conflicted and contested nature
of EU transport policy making, as well as its particular problems in the enlargement
countries. The different documents were clearly written under very different political
circumstances at the national level. It is interesting to note that Polish official(s)
obviously took the writing of the ISPA national strategy document as a welcome
opportunity to force their government to develop a medium to long-term, mode-specific
list of priorities in the transport sector and to commit to a multi-year strategy (thereby
making Polish transport policy more “sustainable” at least in the sense that it might
become more future-oriented, internally consistent and better integrated across sectors).
In Hungary, by contrast, the writing of the strategy was seen mostly as a necessary
document to receive supplementary financial aid from Brussels. When it became clear
that the grave violations of international procurement rules in the national expressway

358
program would result in their road sector projects being rejected by the ISPA
management committee, the Hungarian government simply rearranged their ISPA
strategy and excluded the problematic motorways from the list.
In the end, the fact that Hungarian ISPA funding record for the first two years was
90% biased in favor of rail is a highly atypical, special case. More importantly, this ISPA
grant-related imbalance in favor of rail has to be seen in the context of a continued bias in
favor of road projects both in terms of national government funding and IFI loans. Since
railway projects in CEE typically require a broader sectoral approach involving difficult
questions of overall restructuring (including, in most cases, highly politically issues of
downsizing and retraining due to overstaffing), and also since rail investments are
frequently more complicated to justify in terms of strict financial and economic rates of
return, there is always a danger of more international funding going to Helsinki road than
rail corridors, thus further tipping the balance against more sustainable modes. So far,
however, ISPA allocations have been rather evenly balanced between the road and the
rail sectors, with over half of all grants going to rail projects. 31
The European Union will continue to be the major grant financer of transport
infrastructure in Central Eastern Europe. Since this grant funding will typically be used
to leverage additional international funds, this money is likely to have a major influence
on the future concentration of resources in the transport sector in CEE accession
countries, also with regard to the use of IFI loans. The planned progressive
decentralization of the ISPA program means that the CEEC themselves should have
increasing control over the use of the funds, which in turn means that it will be more and
31 Until December 31, 2001, modal allocations for all CEECs were 50.74% for rail, 46.99% for road, 0.21%
for road and rail combined and 2.06% for airports. Also see CEC (2002d).

359
more up to the CEEC to make sure that funds are used in the most environmentally
friendly and regionally balanced manner. Presently, however, program decisions seem to
still be rather strongly influenced by the EU’s DG Regio. At least in the case of the two
countries more closely analyzed in this paper, DG Regio placed a near exclusive
emphasis on funding major corridors facing the EU borders and was reluctant to consider
non-Helsinki corridor TINA network stretches for initial funding.
To be sure, the EU’s preference for funding a select number of international
corridors which will better connect the candidate countries with the EU is of course
hardly surprising and quite understandable from a larger perspective of European
integration. What is at issue, however, is that the stated objective of ISPA is supposedly
not to just to promote European integration by improving international road and rail
connections, but rather “provide assistance … in the area of economic and social
cohesion and for “transport infrastructure measures which promote sustainable mobility”
(see above). Given the above analysis, this larger claims seem less justified and even a
bit hypocritical, at least from a more locally-focused CEE perspective. This has also
been pointed out by key experts both in Brussels and in the recipient countries. For
example, in reacting to the launch of the Commission’s ISPA program, a CEPS Working
Party report (1999:9) noted the following:
Urban and regional transport are key elements in economic development,
underpinning the service economy and labour markets. They also help to shape spatial
development in and around cities for decades to come. Defining the "European"
interest exclusively in terms of cross-border links neglects the other "European"
dimensions: sustainable transport on the one hand, and (local) economic development
on the other.
As of October 1999, it was declared policy of ISPA – the regional aid forrunner [sic]
for the candidate countries – to limit grant aid to the Trans European Network. This is
a major policy error to be addressed by the new Directorate General for Enlargement
and the equally new joint DG for environment [sic - energy] and transport.

360
This view is also partially shared by Prof. Wojciech Suchorzewski, Poland’s
leading international transport policy expert. Invited to deliver the keynote presentation
at the ECMT’s 2001 Transport Policy Forum, he presented the following assessment
which confirms and re-summarizes the key conclusions from this ISPA case study
chapter (European Conference of Ministers of Transport (ECMT) 2001:13):
In several cases this focus [on Pan-European transport corridors] is well justified by
the intensity of both international and national traffic/transport. However, there are
areas of networks not belonging to trans-European corridors where the volumes of
regional/national traffic may be much higher than in these corridors. … Allocation of
large amount [sic] of money (through EIB, PHARE/ISPA etc) to projects on Pan-
European corridors may, to some extent, reduce investments into other national or
regional roads and railways, in spite of the fact that their importance for the whole
network might be comparable or even higher than links belonging to international
corridors. Deterioration of local/suburban railway systems serving large cities and
agglomerations is among the least desirable results. And the backlog in road
maintenance and rehabilitation of secondary networks may be growing.
In sum, we can hardly answer the question of how “sustainable” EU transport
infrastructure investments in Central Eastern Europe are without first considering the
spatial scale at which we are making our argument. The spatial dimension cross-cuts our
categorization of sustainable transport discourses, particularly with regard to
modernization-oriented arguments. Taking the example of the Budapest ring road, the
following chapter will therefore develop a typology of investment rationales that more
explicitly distinguishes the different spatial scales at which sustainability arguments are
being made. By way of transition, it is useful to re-consider the categorizations of
sustainable transport discourses presented in Chapter 3 and 4. Here, the following
remarks can be offered with regard to the issues discussed in this Chapter:
“Renunciation”-type, eco-centric arguments are generally directed against all large-scale

361
new infrastructures, regardless of whether they are national or international. “Political
economy” arguments are less categorical. They make the “who benefits” question their
central focus. Yet depending on whether the arguments are made from a primarily urban
or rural, or a primarily national or local perspective, either backbone or secondary
infrastructure investments might be favored. “Communicative rationality” approaches,
by contrast, would put this process of normative preference setting (e.g. local vs.
international preferences) center stage, and rather than take a stand in it beforehand, open
it up for debate. They would certainly also insist on clear and transparent financing
procedures. Finally, much like political economy approaches, “reflexive modernization”
and “ecological modernization” approaches also privilege particular types of investments
over others. Quite predictably, EU-approaches favor an accession-oriented focus on
international links without necessarily relying on existing traffic flows or current market
demand. Yet even rather mainstream academic (NGO) sources in Brussels (e.g. CEPS)
as well as key experts in the EU and the CEEC are worried that the exclusive focus on
international links is misguided. At the same time, more conformist, accession-oriented
CEE government representatives work to rearrange national governmental perspectives in
light of EU demands in order to extract maximum financing from EU and other
international sources.

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Printed Thursday, October 31, 2002
Last amended on September 17, 2002
CHAPTER 9
Local Dimensions of Sustainability:
A Case Study of the Budapest Ring Road M0
9.1 Introduction: The Significance of the M0 Case Study.................................... 363
9.2 Description of the M0 Including a Chronology of International Funding...... 364
9.2.1 The Southern Section: An undisputed fait accompli?............................. 366
9.2.2 The Northern Section: A heavily disputed fait accompli........................ 367
9.2.3 The Eastern Section: A comparatively undisputed fait non-accompli?.. 368
9.2.4 The Western Section and the M0 Bridge: New priorities from 2002..... 369
9.3 Arguments For and Against the M0 Ring Road: A Typology........................ 370
9.4 Local and International Protests Against the Northern Section of the M0..... 375
9.5 Risk-rational Concerns: Is Brussels Co-financing Urban Sprawl in Budapest? 381
9.5.5 Reexamining the impact of ring roads on travel & land use................... 383
9.5.6 The role of the M0 in spurring ex-urban development in Budapest ....... 387
9.5.7 The lack of integrated transport and land use decision-making ............. 392
9.5.8 The EU as a partial accomplice in a problematic transformation........... 396
9.6 Conclusions..................................................................................................... 397

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9.1 Introduction: The Significance of the M0 Case Study
This chapter looks at the financing of the Budapest ring road M0 as an instructive
case study of how international, national, regional and local transport and land use policy
interests interact, and to how they sometimes complement each other, sometimes conflict.
Much like general environmental discourses around European transport policy, the M0
“case” really consists of multiple discourses. Different spatial contexts result in different
sustainability discourses. And as always, different discursive frameworks privilege
different sets of arguments. In this chapter, I will apply my developed typology of
discursive frameworks for “sustainable” transport policy decision-making to a concrete
case study and compare how the overarching themes, key concepts and policy proposals
of the five different discursive frameworks are reflected in the local controversies over a
large-scale infrastructure. We will also re-identify our two key pro-construction
rationales from Chapter 6, namely the “missing links” storyline which justifies the
Budapest ring road as a part of the Pan-European transport networks, and also the locallevel
“bottleneck” storyline which demands road infrastructure expansion due to rising
traffic levels. 1
However, as I will demonstrate below, these two storylines do not
adequately capture the diversity of arguments for and against this key international link.
The M0 case study is the only chapter in the “realities” part of this study that
explicitly aims to take account of the actual effects of large-scale infrastructures at the
local level. Due to the predominantly discourse-analytical focus of this study, this is a
dimension which we have not closely investigated so far, but which we will pay
1 Interestingly, the cohesion and polycentricity storylines are less suitable for justifying the ring road, since
these storylines mostly stress parity of access and balanced urbanization at a national/international (rather
than at a metropolitan) scale, meaning that the related arguments would necessarily tend to dissuade rather
than encourage a concentration of additional infrastructure capacity in the already privileged, highly
urbanized capital region of Hungary (also see discussions below).

364
increasing attention to while addressing the sixth and last proposition of this study in
more detail, namely the “Local Impacts” proposition. According to this proposition, the
“ecological modernization” investment rationales favored by the EU tend to
underestimate the negative local impacts of large-scale infrastructures. I will show how
each of the other four discursive frameworks adds an important dimension to the overall
issue. As we will see, not all of them can be adequately addressed within the current
decision-making system.
9.2 Description of the M0 Including a Chronology of International Funding
The planned circular motorway around Budapest, the so-called M0, constitutes a
key node in the Trans-European Networks. Four of the ten TEN corridors pass through
Hungary, and all four of them intersect in the Budapest area, with one of them, the river
Danube, passing right through the very center of the city. The exact bypass locations of
the other corridors were not precisely defined at the time that the Helsinki corridors were
decided upon (see figures 7.1, 7.4, 7.5, 7.7, and especially 7.11-7.13). The M0 is to
connect the eastern motorways M1 from Vienna/Bratislava (Corridor IV) and the M7
from Lake Balaton (Corridor V/Vb) with the M5 (Corridor IV) and the (currently nonexisting)
M6 going South to the Former Yugoslavia and Romania (Corridor Vc) as well
as the M3 going east to the Ukrainian border (continuation Corridor V) and the M2 going
North. Figure 9.1 shows how the M0 connects to the major arteries of the city. Note that
the 1998 base map does not show any alignment for last section in the West. This section
of the M0 was neither part of TINA nor of the Hungarian government’s long-term
motorway plan (also compare figures 7.11 and 7.13). Nevertheless, there are now

365
reinvigorated calls to build this section sooner than originally planned. More specifically,
the new socialist government is now calling the Northern M0 bridge and the completion
of the ring a new national-level infrastructure priority.
Figure 9.1: The Budapest Ring Road M0
M2
M0 New Danube Bridge &
Western Sections?
(was not a TINA or National Priority)
M0 Northern
Section
(now completed)
M3
City Limits
City Center
M0 Eastern
Section
(planned)
M1/M7
City Limits
M0 Southern Section (existing)
M5
Source A: Scanned Topograph AGAT map (1998) with own additions
Source B: HVB Expertise (2001)

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9.2.1 The Southern Section: An undisputed fait accompli?
In the early 1990s, the Hungarian government’s first step was to build the
Southern section of the ring road in order to connect the M1 arriving from Vienna in the
West with the M7 running South-West and with the M5 running South-East out of
Budapest. These sections have been completed, in part with EBRD and World Bank
money. 2
The construction of this section was uncontroversial at the time, since its main
purpose was to successfully route the vast majority of the unwanted East-West transit
traffic around Budapest. Even the typically skeptical environmental NGOs noted that
“remaining transit truck traffic [now] represents less than 2% of the traffic on the streets
of Budapest [and] environmental groups did not oppose the construction of the Southern
section of the M0 for this reason” (Mihok 1998). Note however, that these same groups
have since grown rather disenchanted with this Southern section, mostly due to the
mushrooming of greenfield developments along the M0 which they claim “created a
much more serious traffic problem than the ring road was supposed to solve” (ibid). Also
see discussions below. NGOs are thus likely to oppose the further expansion of this
section from a limited access 2x2 highway into a 2x3 highway which is planned for the
upcoming years.
2 World Bank funds to the first section of the M0 were provided under their First Transport Project to
Hungary (Loan Nr. 2557-HU), providing USD 30 million out of a total project cost of USD 75 million.
Besides funding the M0, this loan also provided assistance to the Hungarian State Railways (MÁV) and the
trucking company Hungarocamion. The loan was already approved in 1985, but the projects were only
completed in 1992. In 1992, the EBRD provided a € 21 million loan to Hungary specifically for the M0.

367
9.2.2 The Northern Section: A heavily disputed fait accompli
The second section on the priority list was the controversial Northern section
around Dunakezi which was to connect the old national road No. 2 and the new M2
highway - both running straight north – with the M3 highway starting in the North of
Budapest and running West. This section was completed in 1999, albeit with certain
amendments and under strong protests from citizen and environmental groups. Further
details of this controversial section are discussed in section 9.4. The project received cofunding
through a € 72 million loan from the EIB and a € 14.26 million grant from the
EU Phare program. 3
In the respective Phare project evaluation fiche, the objective of the
EU intervention is described as follows:
The project purpose is to construct by-passes of the National Road No. 2, parts of the
M0 (ring road of Budapest) motorway and interchanges to M3 (which leads to the
center of Budapest) motorway and to the local network (old No. 2 national road). The
projects contributes to the following overall Phare objective: To ensure a balance
[sic] development of and between national roads, feeder and trunk roads and
international links which constitute transit corridors and paths for external trade.
[Emphasis added]
This justification is interesting, since rather than just transit corridors in the
classic sense (i.e. roads that carry a dominant share of non-local users), the EU here also
purports to fund the more general development of a “balanced system” of different types
of roads, including feeder roads to international corridors and trunk roads, thus harkening
back to “cohesion”/“polycentricity” arguments rather than “missing-links”/“bottleneck”
arguments. Of course, the EU Phare program would only contribute to a balanced
development by funding this privileged link if (additional international) funding for other
3 For additional information on the EU Phare program see Chapter 7.

368
classes of roads were equally available (which has not necessarily been the case, also see
Annex I). From a discourse analytical point of view, the cited Phare regional
development objective represents an interesting “rationalization” for infrastructure
funding, since it is conveniently phrased such that it in fact leaves the door wide open for
funding almost any kind of road not strictly intended for local use. Keep in mind,
however, that at least the main “victims” of the M0 ring road are likely to be found at the
local level.
The second source of EU-related funds came via the house bank of the EU, the
EIB. Approved in 1993, the € 72 million EIB loan had two components: rehabilitation of
350 km of existing roads as well as construction of a 35 km section of the M2 highway
north of Budapest, part of which is included in the M0 ring road. The EIB also partially
funded the new construction of national road Nr.2 to which the M0 was to connect.
9.2.3 The Eastern Section: A comparatively undisputed fait non-accompli?
The next major stretch to be built is the Eastern section. Hungary’s National
ISPA strategy asked for EU funding for the new construction of the 46 km long stretch of
the M0 ring road connecting the M3 and the M5 highways. The total budget of the
project is a whopping € 469.5 million (1999 price level estimate, excluded VAT). The
justification was as follows (Republic of Hungary 2000:21-22):
The so-called “Eastern Sector” of the M0 Ring Road, functioning as bypass road to
Budapest, starts at Motorway M5 and terminates at Motorway M3. This Section of the
Budapest Ring Road forms part of the transit routes of south-west/north-east
direction and forms link with the existing section to Motorways M1 and M7 (Pan-
European Corridor V. and link to Corridor IV.). The construction of this major section
of M0 will facilitate the development of traffic and result in very important gains in
terms of time and safety for all kinds of passenger and freight road traffic (local,
international and transit) in, out and through Budapest. It will substantially improve

369
the environment and living conditions for inhabitants of the Eastern and North-
Eastern parts of the Budapest agglomeration.
[Emphasis added]
Originally, the preparatory phase was to only last until the third quarter of 2001,
with construction running from 2002 to the third quarter of 2006. Feasibility studies for
this section are still underway, however. However, although ISPA was expected as early
as 2002, to date, no EU funding has been approved for this section. In terms of local
resistance, less controversy is expected to ensue over this particular section since the
environmental areas to be crossed are considered less environmentally sensitive, and
local communities to be less affected. This impression, of course, may change as new
NIMBY (Not-In-My-Backyard) groups rise to the fore, new details from the feasibility
studies emerge and new land use development plans in the wake of (or rather,
anticipating) the ring road become public.
9.2.4 The Western Section and the M0 Bridge: New priorities from 2002
Although neither foreseen under TINA nor under the previous Hungarian
government national highway plans, the Budapest municipality, with the support of the
new socialist national government, has recently pushed the idea of constructing a new
bridge over the Danube and continuing the M0 on the Western side. As a July 4, 2002
CEE Bankwatch/CAAG press release reads:
Two environmental NGOs, the Central and Eastern European Bankwatch Network and
the Clean Air Action Group, were astonished to learn of the June 26 statement by
István Csillag, Hungarian Minister of Economics and Transport, and Gábor Demszky,
the Mayor of Budapest, saying that the Municipality can now count on the
government's support in constructing … a bridge over the Danube north of Budapest
and sections of the M0 ring road on the river's western bank. The statement also

370
included information that the Government and the Municipality would apply for
funding from the European Investment Bank (EIB) to fund these projects. 4
The environmental groups were highly alarmed and critical of these plans.
Whether or not they quickly become reality remains to be seen. The accelerated full
completion of the Budapest ring road is indeed the key difference between the long-term
transport plans of the new social-democratic government and the old Orbàn government.
Transport and Economy minister István Csillag and Budapest Mayor Gábor Demsky
optimistically announced the completion of both the new M0 bridge and the ring as a
whole for as early as 2006. Nevertheless, the exact location of the bridge (as other
alignments of the ring road) is still disputed; two options about 4 miles apart from each
other are currently being considered. The Clean Air Action Group has already brought a
court case against one of the two locations. Despite the renewed interest in the
construction, so far, neither the national government nor the EIB have committed any
concrete funds to develop this section, although this might soon be the case.
9.3 Arguments For and Against the M0 Ring Road: A Typology
Table 9.1 gives an overview of the key arguments for and against the M0 ring
road, organizing them into the five discursive frameworks for sustainable transport
decision-making identified earlier in this study. It also lists the key promoters and
opponents of the infrastructure. Key arguments for the ring road are listed under the
ecological modernization ideal. 5
Arguments against the road, or rather: objections raised
against some of the substantive and the procedural sub-aspects of its planning process,
4 Online under http://www.bankwatch.org/press/2002/press98.html, last accessed September 6, 2002.
5 Note that many of these positive effects are also recognized within the other frameworks, even if these
frameworks ultimately do not consider them the most decisive arguments in the decision-making process.

371
are then listed within the four alternative discursive frameworks. The details of the
arguments are discussed in later sections.
In general, arguments unequivocally speaking for the ring road are rather
consistent at the local, national and international levels: the bypass road is to speed up
traffic, avoid congestion in the center, improve accessibility and road safety. In terms of
cost-benefit calculations, travel time savings (for both passenger and freight travel) and
improved road safety were the weightiest arguments for the ring road (as demonstrated in
the ISPA grant request and the EIB funding justifications). 6
Arguments against the construction of the ring road are more varied, and can be
divided into four categories, paralleling the four alternative frameworks. First of all,
there are the impacts the road is likely to have on the surrounding natural habitat, i.e.
local ecosystem balance. Although also recognized within other discursive frameworks,
such “habitat preservation” arguments only take priority under the discursive framework
of renunciation. Giving absolute priority to ecology of course means taking a fully antidevelopment
perspective and opposing the construction of any roads.
Secondly, there are political economy arguments focusing on the road’s effects on
Budapest residents with regard to health and noise impacts, as well as alternative modal
options. Here, the challenge lies in finding a solution that most fairly distributes both the
positive and the negative impacts amongst citizens. Of course, such a locally focused
appraisal is bound to be at odds with an appraisal that “adds the European dimension,”
6 Note that despite this pre-construction rhetoric, I dropped the road safety argument from the above table.
The reason for this is that empirical evidence was to the contrary. The completed southern section of the
M0 did not feature any separation between the lanes and turned out to be an especially unsafe highway,
leading to the unfavorable nickname “Death Road” both in the media and the public at large. Empirical
data presented by the ministry show that accidents with light and serious casualty rose sharply on the M0
after 1993, peaking in 1995. Levels are now going down, however, since the government retrofit the M0
with additional safety features (dividers, reflectors, additional information panels) and increased police
presence to avoid speeding (for detailed data, see Ruppert 2001).

372
i.e. an appraisal that includes the time-saving benefits to all passenger and freight
transport using the infrastructure, and not just local residents. The problem is that longdistance
travelers only reap the benefits of the ring road, but have to bear none of its local
environmental burdens. (This is also mostly true for Budapest’s inner-city residents.)
Thirdly, communicative rationality arguments relate to the assessment and
decision-making process leading up to the construction of the road. In other words: such
arguments do not immediately question the substance of the arguments in favor of the
ring road, but instead focus on the procedural aspects of the planning process, and object,
for example, to deficiencies in the public information, democratic participation and
environmental assessments procedures prior to the ring road construction. This line of
argument is, of course, also consistent with the fourth and last alternative discursive
framework of reflexive modernization, since the concept of “risk rationality” also
strongly relies on the ability of decision-making bodies to fully and adequately capture
all social and environmental costs and benefits of planned transport infrastructures during
the assessment stage, and to then approve or reject (i.e. prevent) a project accordingly.
Finally, there is an important line of argument relating to longer-term regional
impacts of the ring road, notably the impact on the future of the urban economic structure
(“sprawl”) and on modal splits (i.e. a move towards a more car-oriented system). This
line of argument is not easily associated with one single discursive framework. I have
grouped it in the reflexive modernization category, since a truly consistent risk rational
approach which is concerned about unintended consequences and thus cautious to take
preventive action would seem the most likely arena for these issues to gain currency. In
a way, one might also say that the reflexive modernization framework offers a much

373
more progressive variant of the ecological modernization decision-making framework
with a heightened precautionary, future-oriented, more comprehensive consciousness. 7
As below accounts will show, the threat of detrimental medium- to long term
modal and land-use impacts related to the construction of the ring road is real, yet
relatively unaccounted for in current decision-making structures. Anti-sprawl and modal
bias arguments are frequently championed by advocacy-oriented NGOs (see Barnes
2001, especially the quote in section 9.5 below), but to date, neither the local Hungarian
governments nor the EU institutions have firmly addressed the issue. We will come back
to this important point in the conclusion.
Now, in order to put this still somewhat abstract typology on a fully reality-based
footing, the following section will show how all these different viewpoints and arguments
played out in one concrete case. As evident from above overview, each section of the
ring road has been, or is still to be, built under a particular, shifting set of circumstances,
so that convincing rationalities for building or not building one stretch of the highway
will not necessarily apply to all other parts of the M0. I will therefore limit my close-up
view in the next section to the stretch of the M0 whose construction has been the most
controversial so far, namely the section between the old National road No. 2 and the M2
highway in the North.
7 Note that for the sake of completion, it is worth pointing out one additional position, namely the
“alternative investments” argument. Such a position would discourage any new infrastructure investments
in the comparatively wealthy Budapest regions and instead favor investments in less privileged and poorer
settlements in Hungary. This position, which might best be grouped in the political-economy category, is
consistent with certain EU and national arguments for spatial cohesion and greater polycentricity.
However, although politicians from rural Eastern Hungary indeed do object to many additional large-scale
infrastructure funds going into the capital, this did not really carry any weight in the actual debate around
the M0. Also remember that with regard to local-level political economy arguments, depending on the
local actor’s personal viewpoint and economic situation, the same impact (e.g. mushrooming of
hypermarkets) can be of course perceived as positive (e.g. cheaper, one-stop shopping, potential for local
employment) or negative (destroyed nature recreation area, threatens small local shopkeepers).

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Table 9.1 Main Arguments for & Objections against the M0 Ring Road Plans
Mainstream
Policy Goals
Arguments in favor of
the M0 Plans
Key Proponents
Ecological
Modernization
“Sustainable
Growth”
Network Expansion
High-Speed
transport
Managed Growth
“Missing Link”:
Key international &
national transit node
“Bottleneck”:
Effective bypass,
helps Budapest growth
EU,
IFIs,
Hungarian national
government,
Budapest
municipality
Alternative
Concerns
Objections raised
against the M0 Plans
Key Opponents 8
Reflexive
Modernization
“Risk
rationality”
Precautionary
Principle?
Unintended
Consequences?
Longer term land use
impacts (sprawl)
Increased motorization
International
sustainable transport
advocacy groups:
ITDP, T&E
Communicative
Rationality
“Rationality”
Participation?
Access to
Information?
Democracy?
Faulty participation
procedures, no adequate
public information
Faulty EIA (wrong maps,
no dispersion model used
for pollution impacts, etc)
EU Environmental
NGOs:
FOEE, European
Environment Bureau
CEE-wide NGOs:
CEE Bankwatch
Political
Economy
Equity & Social
Justice
Renunciation
“Ecological
Balance”
Who benefits?
Impacts on
citizens?
Land use
consumption?
Effect on overall
mobility?
Impact on habitats?
Privileges car owners
Lack of parallel
investments into transit
Health & noise impacts
on local residents
New greenfield land take
Severance effects
Inadequate measures for
protected bush
Sensitive ecosystems in
the Buda Hills
Local municipalities
in Dunakeszi
Local citizens:
Káposztásmegyer
Environmental
Protection Society
Local environmental
NGOs:
Clean Air Action
Group
8 ITDP is the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy, based in New York City. This
international transport advocacy NGO has worked closely with the Hungarian Clean Air Action Group on
many CEE transport issues over the last decade and provided key support on the M0 case. T&E is the
acronym for the European Federation for Transport and Environment, the umbrella organization of
European Traffic Clubs. FOEE is Friends of the Earth Europe, an umbrella organization of environmental
NGOs based in Brussels. CEE Bankwatch monitors IFI activity in the CEE region, with a particular focus
on the EIB. The Clean Air Action Group is a Hungarian national federation of over 80 individual NGOs.

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9.4 Local and International Protests Against the Northern Section of the M0 9
The Northern extension of the MO ring road was a heavily contested construction
project which set two environmental precedents. For one, it was the first case in postsocialist
Hungary, and in fact in post-socialist Central Europe at large, where local civic
and environmental groups managed to get a local court to issue an injunction to halt the
completion of a large-scale transport infrastructure on the basis of faulty environmental
assessments. Secondly and equally extraordinary, a large part of the fight against the
road was not only carried out in Budapest, but also in Brussels and Luxemburg, the seats
of the European Union Commission and the European Investment Bank, respectively.
For the first time, international environmental groups managed to bring a case before the
EU Ombudsman that prompted an investigation into the lending assessment practices of
the European Investment Bank. The circumstances of the case are therefore instructive
for European Union decision-making in the transport sector, and for transport decisionmaking
with regard to the enlargement countries in particular.
While the Hungarian government and the European Investment Bank take a
predictable pro-investment ecological modernization position in this dispute,
environmental and civic organizations, together with local communities, brought forth a
variety of communicative rationality, political economy and renunciation arguments to
fight this development.
9 Much of the key correspondence of the case is contained in a special “M0 Dossier” prepared by the CEE
Bankwatch Network in January 2000. I included additional information and updates from my own
interviews, site visits and email correspondence with the relevant stakeholders. Additional information on
the (NGOs’ interpretation of the) M0 case can also be found in Feiler and Stoczkiewicz (1999). For the
very first time, the EIB has recently begun to more pro-actively respond to the repeated NGO attacks
regarding this case by presenting some of their own views on their web page.

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Contrary to the Southern section, there was opposition against the planned
Northern section of the M0 from the very start. The environmental impacts of the project
were expected to be much worse than those for the Southern section. It was also deemed
a less-necessary undertaking, so that the environmentalists also argued that this money
should be better spent on upgrading existing infrastructures, especially since Hungary
was and is still facing a very severe backlog in road maintenance even on key
international motorways. Along with environmental groups, two district municipalities in
Budapest and four nearby towns opposed the construction of the M0 on their territory.
Nevertheless, against strong local protests and as the environmentalists point out, “in
violation of several Hungarian laws,” the first part of the northern section between the
M3 motorway and the old road Nr. 2 was eventually completed, using part of the € 72
million loan from the EIB as well as part of the € 14.26 million from Phare.
The arguments of environmental and civic groups opposed to the construction of
the Northern section of the M0 were multiple. Yet not all of them carried equal weight in
the actual court cases. Interestingly, there was next to no way of effectively including
“sprawl” related arguments into the environmental and civic fight against it, since the
required standardized EU environmental assessment methodologies and cost benefit
analyses (which, given its candidate status, should now also be binding for Hungary) do
not require consideration of longer-term spatial effects. Consequently, the actual legal
case against the Northern section of the M0 reads much more like a classical NIMBY and
ecological activist case than it might have otherwise been. Not withstanding this nonapplicability
of additional sprawl arguments, the case brought forward by the
environmentalists shows how controversial the investment was.

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The permission plan and the EIA of the project show that the route was going to
pass through an area protected under the Hungarian Act 53/1996 on Nature Protection
inhabited by a protected bush. The route was also situated about 300 meters away from a
housing estate called Káposztásmegyer II that houses about 5000 people. A junction was
planned only 150 meters away from the local nursery, with the public access roads
leading up to it less than 15 meters away from residences and key social institutions
including a kindergarten and primary school. According to assessments presented by the
Clean Air Action Group, the network of civic and environmental organizations that led
the protest against the case, permissible air pollution levels in the area were to be
exceeded by up to 30% and noise levels would reach up to 76 dB during the day and up
to 68 dB at night, thus also greatly exceeding permissible levels (of 65 and 55 dB,
respectively) according to WHO and EU standards (also see picture 9.1).
Picture 9.1: Construction of the Northern Section of the M0 ring road with the
Káposztásmegzer II Housing Estate in the background.
Photo Credit: Feiler and Stoczkiewicz (1999:22)

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The environmental groups further pointed to faulty public participation
procedures to explain the fact that nobody from the community participated in the public
hearing at which the plans were discussed for the first time. Contrary to official
requirements, the hearing was not announced in any major newspaper, and only sixteen
official representatives attended the meeting. Hence, almost all residents first learned of
the projects when the actual construction began in the spring of 1998. When the
concerned citizens of Káposztásmegyer II immediately formed a protest organization, the
Káposztásmegyer Environmental Protection Society, and began their investigations, they
found out that their own housing estate had not been on the map used by the motorway
company when it applied for the construction permit. Only Káposztásmegyer I, which
was more than a mile further away from the future site of the M0, was drawn on the map.
After two unsuccessful trials which were appealed, the Capital Court of Budapest
sided with the environmentalists and issued an injunction to halt construction in the
northern section of the M0. Nevertheless, the citizens and the NGOs eventually lost the
case and the road was opened to traffic anyway at the end of October 1999, with only one
modification: the last 50 meters leading up from junction 2 remained unbuilt, so that the
M0 cannot be reached directly from the residential area.
Despite this defeat, both the NGO fight inside Hungary and the European fight
against the EIB’s involvement in the case dragged on much beyond this date. They
turned to the EU Ombudsman who is entitled to investigate possible incidents of
maladministration in the EU.
Projects funded with inadequate environmental
assessments would fall under this category. Interestingly, it was not possible for the
Hungarian environmental groups to directly bring their complaint to the Ombudsman,

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since only citizens or legal persons of the EU are authorized to voice such complaints,
regardless of the fact that in this case EU funding outside its current borders was at issue.
The complaint therefore had to be officially handed in by the head of the European
Environmental Bureau (EEB), a large, Brussels-based environmental umbrella
organization.
When the Ombudsman’s office was not content with the materials provided by the
EIB president in response to the investigation requested by the environmentalists, the
Ombudsman requested additional information, which the EIB initially refused to provide,
citing Article 237(c) of the Community Treaty according to which decision’s of the EIB’s
Board of Directors are not subject to judicial review. The Ombudsman pointed out that
the activities of the Ombudsman are instead governed by Article 195 of the Treaty and
that “the Ombudsman conducts inquiries … concerning instances of maladministration in
the activities of the Community institutions or bodies… Specifically, it does not provide
for any exception relating to the EIB. 10
The EIB eventually complied and supplied
additional information.
In the end, the environmentalists’ fight against the M0 and the EIB illustrates two
fundamentally different interpretations of what EU-led sustainable transport development
in CEE means. Three excepts from the respective correspondence serve well to illustrate
this opposition. The environmentalists argued that:
The M0 orbital motorway is called an ‘environmental project’ because it is said to
have positive impacts on Budapest’s transit traffic. The northern sector of this road,
however, is actually an unnecessary part of the project, having more disadvantages
than advantages for the quality of life, not only for the local citizens affected, but also
for a much wider area. 11
10 Letter by the European Union Ombudsman to Sir Brian Unwin, President of the EIB. Cited in Feiler and
Stoczkiewicz (1999:23).
11 Background Information Sheet, in: CEE Bankwatch Network (2000)

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In its initial reply, the EIB only provided a short two-paragraph response to the
Ombudsman request to supply additional information, noting that:
The EIB only supports projects in the Central European countries which fulfill the
European Union’s broader aim to assist the adoption of the EU body of laws and
standards in order to prepare these countries for membership in the European Union.
With regard to the transport sector, the EU council of Ministers has confirmed the
importance of strategic highways linking EU Member States with accession
countries as part of the preparation of EU membership. … It is not for the bank to
comment on national legal procedures for granting project permits and other
permissions.
So we find a justification very much based on Pan-European efficiency and the
requirement for national modernization of infrastructure. Then, after repeated and more
forceful requests by the Ombudsman demanding EIB cooperation, the EIB, with a long
letter dated December 14, 1999 that contained several annexes, supplied specific
information on the M0 case. Here, a paragraph entitled “Objective of the by-pass
construction” is particularly revealing:
The objective of the by-pass construction is to reduce existing severe
environmental degradation (noise, vibration, air pollution and road traffic
hazards) caused by traffic crossing central Budapest as well as the agglomeration
of Dunakeszi, Göd, Szödliget and Vac, north of the capital, where the residential
population runs into the tens of thousands. The fact that by-pass projects which are –
like the present one – designed to reduce serious environmental degradation in major
urban areas run close to or even impinge on certain other existing buildings is not
uncommon, and is often unavoidable if the overall improvement which is the aim and
purpose of such schemes is to be achieved. The analysis of these aspects, positive and
negative, are among the subjects of Environmental Impact Studies. 12
This statement is interesting in that rationales and rhetoric are completely
different from the first response letter. The EIB now claims the need for the M0 as an
12 Annex of a letter written to Mr. Jacob Södermann, the European Ombudsman, by Sri Brian Unwin, the
President of the EIB, on December 13, 1999. Copy supplied in: CEE Bankwatch Network (2000)

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environmental matter. Moreover, the EIB immediately relegates the level of debate to
the realm of possible specific procedural shortcomings, only admitting that “the
complaint reflects a disagreement on the judgments that have been made in the
assessment of certain environmental aspects, and on the way in which these have been
weighed against other aspects of the project,” as the body of the letter itself explains it.
At question, then, are no longer the rationales for the investment itself, which have now
been reincarnated as objective environmental needs, but only the technical expertise with
which it was administered. Even the blame for eventual procedural flaws is put on the
Hungarian government as the project promoter. Environmental and citizen advocacy
groups thus rightfully point to a continued discrepancy between an EU-advocated
rhetoric of highly integrated, transparent, all-inclusive, “reflexive” decision-making on
one hand, and a continued reality of a firmly un-self-critical EIB on the other hand, i.e. an
EU house bank which provides infrastructure financing under comparatively nontransparent,
inconsistent decision-making rationales.
9.5 Risk-rational Concerns: Is Brussels Co-financing Urban Sprawl in Budapest?
Beyond the more locally substantive and procedurally focused legal action against
the EIB, international environmental groups have since increasingly begun to question
EU funding for ring roads in general, and those in connection with TEN network
completion in particular. The current NGO viewpoint in this regard was best summarized
by Jim Barnes of Friends of the Earth Europe (2001:6) in a speech at the Trans-European
Transport Networks Conference organized by the EIB in Strasbourg. The argument is
multi-dimensional and worth quoting at length:

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Many of the links that are being built in the CEE with EU funds are in fact ring roads
or bypass roads. While for small cities these roads play a positive role of diverting
truck traffic out of city centers, in primary cities these ring roads are serving over 90%
local traffic, and over 90% of the destination of the traffic is the major city. The
construction of these ring roads with EU money, most notably in Budapest and Sofia
but others as well, is by far the strongest inducement to suburban sprawl. These ring
roads have set off a spree of real estate speculation, big box retail mall development,
and increasingly of suburban housing that is fundamentally transforming urban traffic
patterns from a downtown public transit focus to an ex-urban automobile dependence.
These urban changes are dramatically increasing Vehicle Kilometers Traveled in CEE
cities, driving most into violation of the EU’s directive on NOx. While these ring
roads dramatically reduce the cost of car trips in suburban areas, as they are heavily
subsidized with EU grants and concessional loans, they are creating unfair competition
with existing public transit systems that are not, for all practical purposes, eligible for
any EU funds. Because these ring roads serve primarily local traffic, and compete
directly with public transit systems, they should either be disallowed as eligible for EU
funding as not being key to ‘integration’, or they should be supported only in a context
where EU funding supporting urban surface public transit systems is also found.
This is quite a complex and sophisticated argument. Moreover, it is an argument
that does not necessarily preclude the construction of the ring road as such, but rather
criticizes politicians and funders for not sufficiently taking all possible medium- to longterm
effects of this road into account in their decision-making process. In other words, it
is - at its minimum - a reflexive modernization-type argument which calls for
precautionary mitigating measures that might counteract the unwanted and unintended
consequences of this large-scale infrastructure. Alternatively, the environmentalists of
course also mean to imply that should the apparently currently ignored modal and land
use effects of the M0 turn out to be as massively detrimental as they fear, this would be
grounds not to construct any additional sections of the ring road. This is where the
argument touches upon issues of intra-regional and intergenerational equity, and
therefore turns into a more full-blown political economy argument.

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9.5.5 Reexamining the impact of ring roads on travel & land use
In order to be able to better evaluate the important objections to the M0 regarding
its future environmental risks of sprawl and increased car use, I will now take a brief look
at the state-of-the-art knowledge on the impact of ring roads on travel and land use
patterns. As already noted above, in theory, ring roads are designed to divert traffic away
from city centers in order to avoid congestion in the core. They are seen as being
beneficial both to the inner city populations who will no longer be affected by the
negative impacts of transit traffic passing through their neighborhoods, and to the road
users for whom the by-pass affords substantial time savings. Unfortunately, this
otherwise impeccable logic has two central flaws: first, it ignores the medium to longterm
effects that high-speed, limited-access ring roads have on overall land-use and travel
patterns in the region, and second, it intentionally re-locates local environmental impacts,
namely noise, air pollution and severance effects, from one location to another, thereby
pre-programming LULU 13
/ NIMBY reactions. It is the first, much more complex
problem which concerns us in this section.
The strongest general counter-argument against expanding high-speed road
capacities whenever congestion occurs is that a temporary easing of traffic conditions
will in fact induce additional travel, thus causing additional congestion in the medium to
long term. The issue remains a matter of academic dispute, although evidence in support
of this interpretation has been mounting in recent decades. At least for the case of peakhour
travel on limited access roads, Anthony Downs (1962; 1992) has by now rather
thoroughly debunked the myth that it is possible to build one’s way out of congestion.
13 Land uses perceived as detrimental to a particular area by nearby residents are often called LULUs (=
locally unwanted land uses) . What is considered a LULU varies throughout a city and also depends upon
the affluence and history of the neighborhood.

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Hence, the main economic argument in favor of ring roads, namely user time savings,
tends to disappear over time.
As for the medium- to long-term impacts of ring roads on travel patterns,
metropolitan structures, and – by extension – on the future competitiveness of the
agglomeration at hand, there is also no consensus in the literature. Crane (1999) provides
an excellent, exhaustive, albeit predominantly U.S.-centered overview of the rapidly
growing literature investigating causal links between urban form and travel, concluding
that “while research … is improving in several respects, our current understanding of
these relationships remains poor.” Crane’s main aim, however, was to assess the scope
for using land use as a determinant of affecting travel behavior, rather than the other way
around.
Four recent European studies explicitly investigate the effects of ring roads on
metropolitan development: Guitérrez and Gómez (1999) in Spain, Linneker and Spence
(1996) in Britain, and van Nes (2002) in Britain, Germany and Norway, and Falleth
(1999) in Norway. 14 Guitérrez and Gómez focus on measuring intra-metropolitan
accessibility, but most of their conclusions are rather tentative. Interestingly, the
investigated M40 ring road in Madrid was completed as recently as 1990-96 to relieve
congestion on an older, inner orbital motorway, the M30. The main rationale for the M40
was thus never to serve as a transit bypass, but always to accommodate increasing traffic
between the city center and suburban municipalities. In the end, Guitiérrez and Gómez
(1999:14) conclude that
14 In fact, Falleth’s study does not investigate ring roads but by-passes, i.e. partial ring-roads that are not
designed to encircle the entire town or city. The study remains highly relevant to our case study, however,
since this is of course what the M0 is in its current form.

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Orbital motorways do not necessarily lead to an increase in equality in the distribution
of intra-metropolitan accessibility, for this will depend on their location within the
metropolitan area: … the further in they are, the more traffic they will attract and the
less extensive will be the area over which greater equality is brought about in the
decentralization of accessibility.
These conclusions thus seem to confirm the worry expressed by the NGOs that
urban ring roads bring about problematic shifts in travel patterns. The second example,
Linneker’s and Spence’s study on the regional development effects of the M25 London
orbital motorway, is of limited transferability since their computer model heavily relied
on regional employment data whose dynamics are rather particular to the British case. In
addition, their results ran counter to previous research in the area, and their ultimate,
“safe bet” conclusion was restricted to the insight that “accessibility improvements are
not mono-causal and unilateral in their impact” (p.90). Taking a rather different
approach, Van Nes’ (2002) Ph.D. thesis used the so-called space-syntax approach
developed Bill Hillier and his colleagues at University College London – a method
normally mostly used to predict “the likely effects of architectural and urban design
choices” (Hillier 1999:345) - to present eight different European case studies on ring
roads and urban change. Her research uses historical data on shops and puts it in relation
to changes in the configuration and integration of the overall street grid. Although they
do not take into account the influence of land use and transport policies on shop
relocation, her space syntax models are able to explain significant differences in the way
the ring roads affected the various town centers. One of her main conclusions is that
“apparently, it is not the ring road that attracts the establishment of new retailers and
shops, but the way in which the ring road is connected to the urban grid on which it was
imposed” (van Nes 2002:18). Finally, Falleth’s study specifically investigated suburban

386
growth and land actors along by-pass roads in Norway. The results of her research are
the most relevant to the Budapest case, since the main point of contention in Budapest is
also suburban sprawl. Falleth summarizes her findings as follows (Falleth 1999:357):
It has been argued that by-pass roads lead to suburban growth and that the construction
of such roads will prompt the planning of industrial and other commercial
developments, on the part of the local municipal government. This case study of five
by-pass roads shows that a significant, but limited suburban growth takes place along
these roads.
So although the investigated towns were neither undergoing rapid transition nor
were they of a size comparable to Budapest, the respective by-passes still induced
“significant” suburban growth. This conclusion is consistent with the results from the
recent OECD study “Managing Urban Growth” (2000b), which also found that one of the
major factors facilitating sprawl is the development of high-speed access roads around
urban centers. Also note that in the case of Norway, this growth occurred despite the
existence of explicit national policies targeted to curb urban sprawl. 15
As Falleth explains
(p. 358):
An increasing number of political restrictions have been laid down through national
guidelines on suburban growth along by-pass roads. … These guidelines are more
restrictive to the construction of new exit roads from the by-pass roads and to
suburban growth along the roads. The Ministry of Environment has singled out
densification within the urban area as a national policy for urban growth since the
1980s to avoid further urban sprawl.
Many European countries now have similar policies, confirming that anti-sprawl
sentiments are the new mainstream of EU urban policy (for an excellent up-to-date
overview of policies, see Baar 2002).
15 Falleth’s study also points to the key role local and regional governments have in either supporting or
discouraging private investment adjacent to the infrastructures. As we will see, this is a key issue in the
case of Budapest as well.

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At this point, a suitable definition of the term urban sprawl seems in order.
“Sprawl” is generally used to describe unfavorable expansions of urban settlements into
the surrounding landscape, and it carries extremely negative connotations because of the
very inefficient, resource-intensive land use and transport patterns associated with it. In
an attempt to provide a common definition of the term, the OECD (2000b) concluded that
sprawl could be recognized though 1) relative low density, 2) a pattern of land
consumption which is characterized by outward growth with particular patterns such as
leapfrog development and small area development alongside trunk roads, and 3) the
absence of strategic planning, with little capacity to cope with unplanned land use and
monofunctionality. As discussed below, all three factors are relevant in the Budapest
case. In another, frequently cited study, Duany, Plater-Zyberg and Speck (2000:5) also
stress the issue of monofunctionality, finding that “the dominant characteristic of sprawl
is that each component [of sprawl] is strictly segregated from the others.” They identify
five components of sprawl: roadways, housing subdivisions, shopping centers (also
variously named shopping malls or big box retail), office/business parks, and civic
institutions. With the exception of the latter, all five of those uses are presently
mushrooming around Budapest. And although a ring road in and of itself does not cause
a segregation of uses, the on and exit ramps of urban highways have always been
preferred locations for leapfrog development.
9.5.6 The role of the M0 in spurring ex-urban development in Budapest
Returning to our Budapest case study, it is certain that the key role the M0 is
playing in spurring ex-urban development is not an invention of environmentalists. New

388
greenfield developments are springing up around the M0 and its adjacent areas at a rapid
pace and on a massive scale. Most local and national decision-makers hail these
developments as positive signs of economic growth in the Budapest region, and both the
municipal and the national governments are strongly supportive of the various industrial
parks and warehousing facilities spring up alongside the new road infrastructures.
Yet greenfield investments are problematic both from the point of view of the city
of Budapest and from a larger sustainability perspective. Most development occurs just
outside the city limits, where accessibility is high but land prices are still cheap, so the
city incurs significant revenue losses from residential and commercial uses. Instead of
re-using the extensive brownfield sites in Budapest’s de-industrialized transition zones
located in relative proximity to the historical core, large multinationals are instead
attracted to greenfield sites offered to them by suburban communities and/or developers
at low market prices (also see Colliers International 2001:44). Almost all of these
greenfield developments are of the big box retail kind that is considered a classic example
of auto-oriented urban sprawl.
Developments near the southern end of the M0 near the intersection with the
M1/M7 are particularly striking, with an increasing number of big box retail functions
locating there (see examples in picture 9.2). Moreover, residential sprawl in the
environmentally sensitive hills around Budaörs and elsewhere near the M0 is becoming a
major problem (see picture 9.3). (Note that the excellent accessibility of Budaörs with
regard to other parts of the agglomeration is of course not only due to its proximity to the
southern part of the M0 ring road, but also due to its location adjacent to the M1/M7
highways which lead straight into the center of Budapest.)

389
Besides retail and industrial parks, the southern section of the M0 has also
attracted scores of new logistical and warehousing facilities (see figures 9.3 and 9.4). Far
exceeding the space requirements even of big box retail, these new uses take advantage
of the strategic location of Budapest in Central Europe. Although problematic from a
conservationist perspective, these greenfield developments are more difficult to assess in
terms of overall transport sustainability, since several of them consist of traffic-intensive,
distributive functions that are rightfully being relocated from Budapest’s more central
districts to the ring road. On the other hand, many of the new businesses relocated from
Vienna (the current logistics hub in Central Europe) and elsewhere, thus bringing new
traffic into the region rather than relocating existing traffic from the Budapest center. A
key question in terms of longer-term sustainable transport development is whether the
logistic centers will be predominantly truck based, or whether they will also rely on rail
and combined transport. As figure 9.4 shows, so far the biggest centers developed where
the M0 intersects with both other highways and rail lines.
In the North, investments are also taking off now that the M0 link near the M3
and M2 highways is completed. The most problematic is a giant shopping center. In
October 2001, shortly after environmental challenges against the development plans had
been defeated in court, the French multinational Auchan opened their largest hypermarket
in the world (19,600 m 2 ) immediately next to the disputed, EIB and Phare-co-funded M0
junction by Dunakeszi. The environmentalists had fought the development on the
grounds that the development was planned on a wetland that should be preserved. Since
the M0 is located at the edges of the municipal boundaries of the City of Budapest, the
city has little influence on these developments, and the local communities surrounding

390
Budapest are eagerly competing for investment, frequently offering land to developers
that was not originally intended for development.
Picture 9.2
Big Box Retail along the M1/7 & M0 Highways in Budaörs: IKEA and Auchan
Auchan
Hypermarket
IKEA
Photo Credit: Deike Peters (2000)
(View from the Budaörs Hills)
Picture 9.3
New single-family homes in the environmentally sensitive hills of Budaörs
Photo credit: Deike Peters (2000)

391
Figure 9.2 New construction of warehouse/logistic facilities along the M0, M1 & M7
Supply
(in m 2 )
120000
80000
40000
0
1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002
(expected)
Source: Own compilation, using data from Colliers (2001) and Schneider (2002)
Figure 9.3 Location of the seven largest warehousing centers in the Budapest area
Source: Adapted from HVB Expertise (2001) 16 1 Rosalia Park
Size: 12000m 2 ,Completion: 2000
2 M1 Business Park
Size: 72000m 2 , Completion: 2001
3 Harbor Park
Size: 127000m 2 , Completion: 2001
4 West Gate Business Park
Size: 26000m, Completion: 2001/2
5 Airport Business Park
Size: 50000, Completion 2001
6 Business & Trading
Park Budapest
Size: 400000 (max.), In planning
7 Budapest Intermodal
Logistic Center
Size: 97 ha land, In planning

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Figures 9.4-5
Auchan Hypermarket next to the EIB- and Phare-funded Section of the M0
Source: Auchan’s Hungarian Website (www.auchan.hu)
9.5.7 The lack of integrated transport and land use decision-making
While a complete review of urban and regional development trends and their
pertaining planning strategies is beyond the scope of this chapter, a few issues with
relevance to the developments alongside the M0 deserve a brief mention. First of all, it
would of course be naïve to believe that the new developments alongside the M0 took
planners and policy-makers in Budapest by surprise. Quite to the contrary, most of them
were locally brokered deals. In the absence of any binding restrictions on greenfield
sites, local communities in close proximity to the ring road continue to compete amongst
each other for new development.
Also, the trend of residential suburbanization from the city center into the
surrounding communities did not begin with the M0 but developed quickly after the
transition (and even before). About 30,000 people move out of the city each year, and
although natural population growth is negative in the entire region, the belt around the

393
city still shows a strong upward trend in population (Ongjerth 1999:7, also see figure
9.7).
Figure 9.6 Residential Suburbanization in the Budapest Agglomeration (1900-2005)
Population changes in the Budapest Agglomeration
(100,000 Persons)
30
25
20
15
10
Budapest
Agglomeration Belt
5
0
1990 1995 2000* 2005*
* Expected
Source: Own compilation using data in Ongjerth (1999)
This trend is particularly worrisome in light of the fact that Budapest not only still
has a functioning high-density core, but also a large number of relatively low-density
districts immediately adjacent to the core (see figure 9.8). This so-called “transition
zone” largely consists of former industrial brownfield sites that became derelict during
post-communist economic restructuring. A truly environmentally “sustainable” transport
and land use strategy for Budapest oriented along EU compact city ideals would have to
concentrate on making this area attractive to investors for mixed-use urban
redevelopment, combining residential, commercial and light industry uses. In particular,
disputed ownership and fuzzy tenure issues would have to be resolved and transit access
improved. At the same time, there would have to be a regional consensus on limiting
greenfield investments in the periphery.

394
Instead, however, the current Budapest Urban Development Strategy is trying to
do a little bit for everyone, somewhat too comfortably promoting redevelopment in the
inner city areas and the transition zone parallel to an active expansion of the southern
M0-M1-M7 highway zone as a key logistical zone as well as a new focus on the so-called
Northern twin cities around the northern end of the M0 (see figure 9.9). The southeastern
area around and beyond the city limits, where residential sprawl also has become
a major factor recently, remained unidentified (at least in Phase II drafts until 1999).
Figure 9.7 The Density Pattern of the City of Budapest
Source: Bertaud (1999)

395
Figure 9.8
Budapest’s “Strategic Zones” according to its Urban Development Strategy
Sources: Pallai, Tosics et al. (1999), Pallai (2000)
Of course, it is always difficult to counteract individual household preferences for
low-density single family suburban homes over multi-family inner-city dwellings,
especially since these preferences were artificially constrained during communist times.
It is equally difficult to keep multinational investors from locating on new greenfield sites
where land is cheaper, accessibility guaranteed and no disputed ownership issues loom.
What additionally exacerbates the problem in the Budapest agglomeration, however, is
the great lack of regional cooperation between inner-city and suburban municipalities.
The city remains in a constant clinch with surrounding communities and competes with
them for foreign and national investment. In fact, the 23 Budapest districts even compete
fiercely amongst each other. Ideas for new administrative bodies in the agglomeration
have been proposed, but no actual decision-making powers have been transferred to the
regional level so far (also see Ongjerth 1999). Too many stakeholders seem to

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economically benefit from new greenfield developments along the new highways, and
established local actors are not prepared to give up their decision-making powers.
9.5.8 The EU as a partial accomplice in a problematic transformation
In sum, to date, no proper integration of transport and land-use policy-making in
Hungary exists, and no effective regional body is available to strategically direct land-use
developments in the Budapest agglomeration. This problem is not at all particular to
Budapest, of course, but rather a situation that most cities in the world are facing.
However, the key difference in Budapest is that a key EU-funded Pan-European transport
node is at the same time the most decisive factor in spurring ex-urban development.
Considering the high standards which the EU sets for itself in terms of sustainable
transport and land-use development in its policy documents (detailed in Chapter 5), one
might have expected these regional dimensions to play a larger role in the decisionmaking
process. Given its status as a key TEN-extension node, it is highly unlikely that
the EU would have ever come out in disfavor of completing at least the southern, eastern
and northern sections of the M0. However, both the EU and the IFIs might have used
their financial leverage in order to ensure that the construction of the ring road was better
complemented with a regional development strategy that minimized greenfield
development and additional motor vehicle travel. Yet so far, the fragmented, inefficient
regional governance structure has not been a factor in the decision-making process for
any of the EU-related transport funds to Hungary, nor have specific efforts been made to
address suburban-urban conflicts of interest and occurrences of urban sprawl. In light of
the EU’s sizeable and specific financial contributions for road transport infrastructure

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upgrades in and around the Hungarian capital, there is thus some justification for making
the provocative argument that the EU is at least partly an accomplice in the problematic
transformation that the urban structure of Budapest is currently undergoing.
9.6 Conclusions
This chapter also demonstrated worrying discrepancies between the general
rhetoric of sustainable development and sustainable transport in key EU policy
documents and the actual reality of EU funded transport-sector infrastructure investments
as it affects local environments. Additionally, the case of the Northern section of the M0
demonstrated important deficiencies not only in the argumentative aspects of EU-led
transport investments but also in terms of environmental and social assessment, policy
integration, transparency and public participation and information. Yet persistent
disagreements regarding the details of the planning process leading up to the construction
of the M0 notwithstanding, local citizens’ and ecological concerns could, at least in
theory, be relatively comprehensively addressed within currently existing decisionmaking
procedures. A more stringent, pro-active application of existing public
participation rules and of environmental assessment procedures would certainly have
prevented much angry reactions from local residents. Meanwhile, concerns over longerterm
land use and travel impacts currently have no legalized decision-making framework
in which they could be voiced, neither does the EU seem particularly keen on imposing
such a framework on national or local governments.
Admittedly, given the multiple and conflicting interests connected to the M0, it is
difficult to give a straightforward assessment of whether the costs of the ring road will

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outweigh the benefits. Besides the disputes over whether the costs and benefits were
calculated correctly, there is also the question of whether their distribution among local
and international actors was fairly assessed and this assessment adequately taken into
account by the international financers of the project. The M0 is therefore an instructive
case study on many levels. It was presented here with a primary view to European Union
institutions as supporters and financers of large-scale infrastructure fulfilling strategic
interests. However, even beyond the challenges of multi-level policy-making, the
dilemma of the construction of the M0 illustrated a number of daunting planning and
policy issues.
The previous section demonstrated that the growth- and mobility-oriented
decision-making rationales which currently dominate EU and Hungarian national and
local-level politics tend to disregard the detrimental long-term regional impacts of largescale
transport infrastructures such as ring roads. Moreoever, the M0 case has also
shown that a variety of alternative aspects such as public accountability, participatory
democracy, mediation of locational conflict, and environmental preservation tend to
disappear from view once the Realrationalität of ecological modernization sets in.
Finally and perhaps most importantly, the M0 case rather clearly demonstrates a key
difference between the EU’s (and the local Hungarian government’s) main eco-modernist
discourse and its closest alternative, namely the more moderate reflexive modernization
discourse prominent among many other international stakeholders (including most
mainstream environmental NGOs and even parts of the EU itself): at minimum, the latter
want to keep the precautionary promise alive. They would therefore advocate a more
comprehensive, future-oriented risk assessment of all aspects of large-scale

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infrastructures, including the problematic, and difficult to asses, regional land use and
mobility impacts which the eco-modernists perspective tends to underplay.
In the end, it is not really possible for the international promoters of the M0 to
interpret land use changes around the ring road as unforeseeable side-effects, e.g. an
outgrowth of a dynamic local economy independent of international trends. Implicit in
such an interpretation would be the admission that it was impossible to accurately assess
all key costs and benefits of the planned infrastructure investments during the project
identification stage. This, however, would in turn constitute an ex-post invalidation of
whatever cost-benefit assessment was originally used to financially and economically
justify the project in the first place.

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Printed on September 23, 2002
Last revised on Sept 15, 2002
PART IV: CONCLUSIONS &
APPENDICES

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Printed on November 17, 2002
Last revised on September 19, 2002
CHAPTER TEN
The Dilemmas of Planning for a
Sustainable Europe
.
10.1 Planning, Sustainability and the “Contextual Discourse” Dilemma............... 402
10.2 Summary of Previous Chapter Contents and Conclusions ............................. 405
10.2.1 Theory-Building: What is a “Sustainable” Europe? ............................... 405
10.2.2 Rhetoric: EU Transport Policy Discourses............................................. 407
10.2.3 Realities: EU Transport Investments in Central Eastern Europe............ 410
10.3 Cross-Cutting Conclusions on “Sustainable” Decision-Making .................... 414
10.3.1 Normative Challenges: “Interpreting” Environmental Sustainability .... 414
10.3.2 Legitimacy, Stakeholder Interests, and Mutually-Exclusive Objectives 415
10.3.3 Higher Stakes Increase the Sophistication of Alternative Discourses.... 417
10.3.4 Opportunistic Reasons for Adopting “Sustainability” Criteria............... 418
10.3.5 Different Rationalities at Different Levels of Decision-Making ............ 419
10.3.6 Different Rationalities at Different Times of Decision-Making............. 421
10.3.7 “A Bottleneck is a Bottleneck is a …”? How Language Frames Policy 422
10.3.8 The Role of Spatial Storylines and Leitbilder in Shaping Policy........... 424
10.4 Suggestions for Better Transport Decision-Making in Europe....................... 426
10.4.1 Taking Action on Strategic Environmental Assessment ........................ 427
10.4.2 Bringing the Urban and Regional Dimensions Back In.......................... 427
10.4.3 Integrated, Intermodal Thinking Instead of Bottleneck Fixing .............. 429
10.4.4 Making the “Who Benefits” Question More Transparent ...................... 430
10.4.5 Rethinking the Relationship between Traffic and Spatial Arguments.... 431
10.4.6 Strengthen Local Planning and Land Use Regulations........................... 432
10.5 Outlook: Suggestions for Further Research.................................................... 433

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10.1 Planning, Sustainability and the “Contextual Discourse” Dilemma
Problems Worthy
Of Attack
Prove Their Worth
By Hitting Back
Piet Hein
This study has covered a lot of ground, seeking to simultaneously make a
contribution to such different fields as sustainable development, transport policy,
discourse analysis, planning and policy development, infrastructure decision-making and
European enlargement. Yet my overarching motivation for carrying out the research
remained constant over the course of the entire study: My intention was to uncover the
underlying “rationalities” of transport-related planning and policy-making processes in
Europe. At the end of this quest, I remain – more than ever – convinced that detailed
case study analyses of supra-national policy arrangements and of large-scale, multi-level
infrastructure investment plans and projects continue to be the best way to unearth the
central conflicting interests of planning and policy-making in (post-)modern societies.
“Planning for a Sustainable Europe” remains an elusive concept, and especially
so in the context of an ever eastward expanding European Union. In the transport sector,
rhetorical commitments to transport sustainability only marginally influence the actual
formulation of transport investments programs. Transport investment packages are
instead mainly designed to satisfy varying sets of policy objectives related to economic
development, infrastructure expansion, social and regional cohesion and enlargement.
Environmental objectives are often treated as an afterthought, and to date, environmental
impact assessments largely remain focused at the project level, thus only having a
mitigatory, limiting impact on the planned investments rather than comprehensively

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challenging and re-evaluating planned investments from an integrated perspective (also
see below).
Overall, the decision-making processes surrounding EU transport infrastructure
investments in the context of enlargement exhibit one recurring, contradictory tendency.
This contradictory tendency, which I term the “contextual discourse” dilemma of
contemporary planning and policy-making, has particular relevance for decision-making
in contexts of multi-location politics as is the case with the European Union. This
dilemma, which I consider the central analytical insight of my study, can be summarized
as follows:
On one hand, it is true that successful planning and policy-making is dependent
on developing universally applicable, integrative guiding visions and storylines such as
“sustainability” or “cohesion” to guide and legitimize decision-making. On the other
hand, it is also true that such discursive concepts only become useful policy tools for
decision-makers if they can be operationalized into concrete local/regional agendas
resulting in specific investment choices in particular locales. In other words: in
contemporary settings of global-regional interdependence, networked economies and
multi-location politics, planners and policy-makers are increasingly challenged to justify
their actions via the development of investment and decision-making rationales that
might be simultaneously applicable both at the abstract-universal and at the concretelocal
level. Yet the more grounded planning and policy-making discourses become in
concrete local-regional contexts, the less universally applicable and the more conflictual
and contradictory they become. Conversely, general discourses devoid of any
applicability to local contexts are unlikely to gain widespread support.

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It is this constant process of rationalization and operationalization which is so
crucially important in understanding the reasons for the obvious and ongoing
discrepancies between the omnipresent environmental rhetoric of contemporary European
societies (which is not limited to governments but also includes all other sectors
including business and industry) and the ongoing environmentally unsustainable
developments observable at the local level (e.g. suburbanization, sprawl, rising transport
emissions, persistence of traffic accidents etc.). It is here, at the programmatic level,
where key sustainability agendas are formulated, revised, adapted, coopted, corrupted, or
possibly simply ignored. In the case of transport policy, “operationalizing” sustainability
usually means developing criteria that either steer transport investment choices towards
certain geographic locations (i.e. compact cities, non-ecologically-sensitive sites) or into
certain “more sustainable” (i.e. less polluting, less energy-intensive, less fossil fuelintensive
etc) transport systems. The latter can mean both, choosing between different
modal alternatives, or choosing a more efficient model or system within the same mode.
Clearly, the “contextual discourse” dilemma is a problem with several, sometimes
interlocking dimensions.
In the remainder of this concluding chapter I will a) once again briefly
recapitulate the main contents and conclusions of the different parts of the study, b)
present a variety of cross-cutting, summarizing conclusions, c) offer some concrete
suggestions for improved transport-sector decision-making in Europe, and d) provide a
short outlook for further research.

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10.2 Summary of Previous Chapter Contents and Conclusions
My study was organized around six major propositions, which were introduced
and contextualized in Chapter 1. They were not research hypotheses that demanded a
strict verification, but rather served as guiding premises for the research. The
propositions framed the investigative process in a delicate way, attempting to not
preclude certain results while at the same time limiting the interpretive freedom in
tackling such broad topics as sustainable spatial development and transport policy.
Meanwhile, the study’s empirical focus on transport infrastructure investment decisionmaking
in the particular context of EU enlargement to some extent limits the formulation
of universal conclusions as far as either sustainability or transport policy is concerned.
The results should nevertheless be seen as indicative of current trends. The key contents
of the three study parts can be summarized as follows:
10.2.1 Theory-Building: What is a “Sustainable” Europe?
Part I was dedicated to some preliminary definitions, several introductory (meta-)
theoretical considerations and the development of the middle-range concept of
“discursive frameworks” for decision-making.
Chapter 2 showed that neither
development nor sustainability are easily definable concepts. Various, internationally
sanctioned, normative definitions of sustainable development and of sustainable transport
exist, but overall, the notion of “sustainable transport development” remains a relatively
ill-defined concept. In particular, there is a continued ambiguity with regard to the
assumed relationship between transport investments and economic development (i.e.
growth). The supposedly harmonious relationship between the “three dimensions of

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sustainability” namely economy, environment, and equity, remains the most problematic
aspect of the concept.
Chapters 3 and 4 argued that EU transport sector decision-making is dominated
by the discursive framework of ecological modernization. I defined a discursive
framework as a theoretical approach consisting of an ensemble of underlying rationales
and concepts that together form the intellectual backdrop for a set of policy responses and
actions relating to a particular topic. I further defined ecological modernization as a
modernist model of development that is relatively successful in integrating a variety of
environmental and social concerns into its framework, but that nevertheless privileges
competitiveness and economic growth over alternative development goals. Ecological
modernization thus offers a win-win perspective that is best poised to incorporate wideranging
environmental critiques into an overall, positive future vision of sustainable
development. The alternative discursive frameworks of reflexive modernization and
communicative rationality also offer comparatively optimistic outlooks, in the sense that
they also fundamentally trust in the ability of modern capitalist democracies to readjust
existing decision-making to adequately include the environmental dimension and for
stakeholders to make enlightened, rational decisions about the future. The renunciation
and the political economy frameworks are more skeptical. The renunciation perspective
is eco-centric at its core and finds that nature is insufficiently respected and protected
under capitalism. The political economy framework, by contrast, is more concerned
about the social equity dimensions of the environmental problematique. Political
economy scholars see decision-making in capitalist democracies as fundamentally

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contradictory and ultimately as a win-lose affair which is exploitative of both nature and
of the weaker stakeholders.
10.2.2 Rhetoric: EU Transport Policy Discourses
Part II was dedicated to the analysis of EU transport policy “rhetoric.” The
performed discourse analyses of key EU infrastructure policy documents and statements
confirmed that growth and competitiveness considerations continue to win over
redistributive and environmental aims. Most of the key EU documents referring to
sustainable development and sustainable transport analyzed in Chapter 5 exhibited a clear
tendency to adhere to the underlying rationale of ecological modernization which
emphasizes “sustainable growth”. However, the text-oriented analysis in this chapter
also showed that the EU does not always strictly follow the discursive framework of
ecological modernization in its formulation of policy objectives. Instead, the EU borrows
rather freely from a variety of rationales, be this the result of intentional strategizing or
unintentional multifaceted rationalizing on the part of EU decision-makers. So in the
end, EU policy statements on sustainable transport are biased in favor of ecological
modernization in an inconsistent way. Quite predictably, statements coming out of the
DG Environment are often more environmentally ambitious than formulations coming
from DG Transport and Energy. Some formulations are openly contradictory. So the
accusation that the EU simply “disregards the environment” is too simple. The EU is
simply not binding itself to a more “radical” interpretation of sustainable transport the
way that political economists or environmentalists do. Measured within its own
discursive framework, the EU obviously appears less hypocritical than seen from without.

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Chapter 6 departed from the more text-oriented discourse analysis in Chapter 5
and took a more thematic approach. Three overarching guiding visions (Leitbilder) used
in EU decision-making were identified: On one hand, the EU is always torn between the
twin forces of “integration” (deepening) and “expansion” (widening). On the other hand,
the new mandate of “sustainability” has brought an additional dimension to EU decisionmaking.
None of these three general Leitbilder are specific enough to generate detailed
policies and plans in the transport sector. Yet there are in fact several different
identifiable sub-discourses influencing EU transport infrastructure investment rationales.
In analyzing these sub-discourses, I reverted to a discourse analytical concept used by
Maarten Hajer in his own 1995 study on ecological modernization and the policy process,
namely the concept of “storylines.” Put very simply, storylines are generative narratives
that give meaning to specific physical or social phenomena, and they can induce political
change and reorder understandings. Most importantly, “finding the appropriate storyline
becomes an important form of agency” (Hajer 1996:56). I adapted this concept to the
particular case of EU transport infrastructure decision-making, and identified four
different “spatial storylines” justifying EU transport infrastructure investments in the
1990s: “cohesion,” “polycentricity,” “missing links,” and “bottlenecks.” I showed how
these different storylines cluster knowledge, position different stakeholders and,
ultimately, create different coalitions for decision-making. The “cohesion” and
“polycentricity” storylines are partially complementary and mutually reinforcing, as are
the “missing links” and “bottlenecks” storylines. Yet the two pairs
“cohesion/polycentricity” and “missing links/bottlenecks” end up privileging almost
opposite types of investments. Meanwhile, the “cohesion” and “polycentricity”

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storylines are closely aligned with policies that fall within the competency of DG Regio,
while the “missing links” and “bottlenecks” storylines are more closely aligned with
policies coming out of the DG TREN. I also showed that as far as actual transport
investment plans and programs – and especially the Trans-European Networks - are
concerned, discourses related to “missing links” and “bottlenecks” continue to win over
alternative storylines.
Almost by definition, the EU’s high-priority “backbone networks” located inside
the Blue Banana core of Europe and along the ten Pan-European Helsinki corridors
privilege connections between large cities. Contrary to the EU objective of achieving
greater social and economic cohesion, this means losers are scattered in peripheral and
bypass locations, and, according to the many experts, also at the weaker of the two
corridor ends. This latter point becomes particularly important when we consider the
EU’s ambitions to extend the TENs into Central and Eastern Europe. EU transport policy
thus remains deeply conflicted and contested, and EU transport sector investments
continue to have to satisfy different aims related to growth, competitiveness, cohesion
and sustainability. Environmental concerns often take a back seat to mainstream
economic development interests, and the politically most influential core regions
continue to be able to attract a significant amount of infrastructure funding at the expense
of less economically advanced peripheral areas. I also concluded that the EU’s TEN
priority projects fundamentally contradict cohesion goals by concentrating high-profile
transport investments in already privileged areas.

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10.2.3 Realities: EU Transport Investments in Central Eastern Europe
Taking the above described contradictions and biases in EU transport investment
rationales as their starting point, Part III analyzed EU transport infrastructure decisionmaking
in the particular context of Eastern enlargement. The key objective of this
“realities” part of the study was to identify to what degree conflicts of interests
surrounding particular infrastructure investments could be related back to different
underlying investment rationales. The ensuing analysis of transport sector decisionmaking
in CEE of course had to be seen in context with the collapse of Communism in
that region, and with the transformation from centrally planned to market economies.
Socialism’s legacy of non-market infrastructures, land-uses and (intra-urban) population
densities included large, publicly-owned and -subsidized public transit systems on one
hand, and road networks which were comparatively modest in size and relatively
undifferentiated on the other. Significant backlogs in infrastructure and equipment
maintenance were built up during the 1980s. National and local governments now
struggle with rising levels of traffic congestion, noise, accidents, and pollution in
urbanized areas, and with ill-maintained and inappropriate urban, regional and longdistance
transport infrastructure systems. Under such conditions, the pursuit of
sustainable transport infrastructure decision-making appeared a particularly daunting
task. Additionally, I also anticipated that shifting political powers and insufficiently or
inefficiently distributed decisional responsibilities at the national level would further
exacerbate the challenge of multi-location policy-making for the EU stakeholders.
In Chapter 7, I concentrated on the Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment
(TINA) for CEE. In the end, this process of drawing-up and calculating the costs for an

411
internationally-linked priority transport network for the CEE region displayed quite a
different dynamic from the type of targeted “missing links” industry pet project lobbing
that went on during the development of the TEN priority projects. Both the Helsinki
Corridor and the TINA processes were steered by the EU Commission under the critical
eyes of the national governments, and without any discernable prevailing influence of
either private sector interests or civil society. Hence, I had to somewhat reconsider my
“Decisional-Power” proposition which had assumed a combined predominance of both
national and multi-national corporate interests in transport decision-making both inside
and outside the EU. Interestingly, while from the point of view of the Commission, the
TINA process was an attempt to politically and scientifically justify their foreseen
emphasis on international corridors with regard to future ISPA grant funding, from the
point of view of the participating CEE governments, TINA was their best chance to
“amend” the Helsinki Corridor commitments and to make a case for the inclusion of
additional national priority networks. Once agreed upon, the corridor backbone
prioritizations proved hard to undo.
In Chapter 8, I analyzed the first two years of EU pre-accession grant-making for
transport infrastructure investments under the EU ISPA (Instrument for Structural
Policies for Pre-Accession) program in two of the most advanced candidate countries,
Poland and Hungary. The experience of the first two years showed that the ISPA
National Strategies played very different roles in the two case study countries in terms of
re-organizing national transport policies. While Polish official(s) took the writing of the
ISPA national strategy document as a welcome opportunity to force their own
government to develop a medium to long-term, mode-specific list of priorities in the

412
transport sector and to commit to a multi-year strategy (thereby making Polish transport
policy more future-oriented, internally consistent and better integrated across sectors),
Hungarian officials saw the writing of the strategy mostly as a necessary document to
receive supplementary financial aid from Brussels. In Hungary, grave violations of
international procurement rules in the national expressway program resulted in road
sector projects being rejected by the ISPA management committee, but the government
simply rearranged their ISPA strategy and excluded the problematic motorways from the
list. The highly unusual 90% imbalance in favor of rail in the Hungarian ISPA program
therefore had to be seen in the context of a continued bias in favor of road projects both
in terms of national government funding and IFI loans. Railway projects in CEE
typically require a broader sectoral approach involving difficult questions of overall
restructuring, and are frequently more complicated to justify in terms of strict financial
and economic rates of return. However, contrary to previous EU-led funding in the
region, ISPA allocations have so far been rather evenly balanced between the road and
the rail sectors, with over half of all grants going to rail projects. Overall, program
decisions seemed still rather strongly influenced by the EU’s DG Regio. In both cases,
DG Regio placed a near exclusive emphasis on funding major corridors facing the EU
borders and was reluctant to consider non-Helsinki corridor TINA network stretches for
initial funding. In the end, the EU favors an accession-oriented focus on international
links without necessarily relying on existing traffic flows or current market demand. Key
international transport experts find that this exclusive focus on international links is
misguided.

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In Chapter 9, I looked at the M0 ring road around Budapest as an interesting case
study example of a key infrastructure node with important, partially interlocking local,
regional, national and international transport functions. I applied my typology of
discursive frameworks for “sustainable” transport policy decision-making to a concrete
case study and compared how the overarching themes, key concepts and policy proposals
of the five different discursive frameworks were reflected in the local controversies over
a large-scale infrastructure. The M0 case showed that concerns such as public
accountability, participatory democracy, mediation of locational conflict, and
environmental preservation tended to disappear from view once the Realrationalität of
ecological modernization set in. Additionally, the M0 case also demonstrated a key
difference between the EU’s (and the local Hungarian government’s) main eco-modernist
discourse and its closest alternative, namely the more moderate reflexive modernization
discourse: at minimum, the latter keeps the promise of the “precautionary principle”
alive. Proponents of the reflexive approach would therefore advocate a more
comprehensive, future-oriented risk assessment of all aspects of large-scale
infrastructures, including the problematic, and difficult to asses, regional land use and
mobility impacts.
In the end, the ring road chapter validated the “Local Impacts” proposition, which
assumed that the types of “ecological modernization” investment rationales favored by
the EU would tend to underestimate the negative local impacts of large-scale
infrastructures. The chapter also showed how each of the four alternative discursive
frameworks added an important dimension to the overall problem. Interestingly, not all
of them can be easily adequately addressed within the current decision-making system.

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10.3 Cross-Cutting Conclusions on “Sustainable” Decision-Making
10.3.1 Normative Challenges: “Interpreting” Environmental Sustainability
Many of the more daring, more radical and more original writings on transport
and environment to date are heavily influenced by post-modern ideas. They reject
mainstream environmental discourses as “totalizing” and instead advocate antiestablishment
ideals of situated, bottom-up knowledge and resource exchange. By and
large, this is good news for environmentally-minded planners and policy makers. The
bad news is that it is more difficult to establish normative meanings for abstract terms in
a postmodern world of multiple discourses. An ironic, regrettable dynamic has emerged
where many postmodern environmentalists simultaneously argue for an acceptation of
multiple, equally-valid viewpoints on “environment” and “development” on one hand
and a rejection of mainstream, eco-managerial approaches to sustainable (transport)
development on the other. Many avowed post-modernists thus in fact harbor rather
normative views on sustainable development, typically demanding the increased
protection of natural habitats, decreased motorization and tighter land use controls.
While I am very sympathetic to the idea of stricter environmental and development
norms, such an approach seems rather contradictory to me. One needs to try to be
consistent at the meta-theoretical, the theoretical and the prescriptive levels. Ensuing
definitions of transport and land use sustainability should offer as little room for
interpretation as possible. In my view, this underlines the need for empirically grounded
definitions of environmental sustainability, both at the local and at the European (or
global) level. Multiple viewpoints may be fruitful, but we have to establish certain

415
guideposts for interpreting reality or else risk arbitrariness. Most importantly, we simply
cannot afford to forego judgment on the negative consequences of our current mode of
development. And one need not be an orthodox Marxist or an anti-modern ecologist to
understand that the consumption of finite natural resources, the loss of natural habitats
and the negative environmental externalities affecting humans across Europe, and across
the globe, are all largely a consequence of the integral developmental needs of modern
capitalism.
10.3.2 Legitimacy, Stakeholder Interests, and Mutually-Exclusive Objectives
The impossibility of developing universally acceptable discourses also has a
structuralist dimension, bringing us back to Foglesong’s capitalist-democracy
contradiction. In the end, the EU seeks to adopt mutually exclusive development
objectives (e.g. “cohesion” vs. “global competitiveness,” “environmental sustainability”
vs. “accelerated industrial growth”) in order to assuage adversarial constituents. Similar
to the national level, the EU’s legitimacy as a supra-national political institution is based
on Western conceptions of democracy and public interest politics operating under an
economic system of welfare capitalism. So like its member states, the EU faces the triple
challenge of successfully safeguarding market-oriented institutional structures that
encourage profit-making entrepreneurialism, guaranteeing the provision of the public
infrastructures necessary for such activity, and lastly, shielding its citizens and the
environment from the all-too-abusive tendencies of the system by performing
redistributive welfare and environmental protection functions. History-making decisions
concerning the Single Market and the (Treaty on) European Union were designed to

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address the first of these challenges – remember that the EU’s original raison d’être was
economic, not political integration – while the decision on Trans-European Networks
showed that public infrastructure provision is increasingly being coordinated at the supranational
level. Meanwhile, the Cohesion Fund, the Environmental Action Programs and,
most recently, the Sustainable Development Strategy are all expressions of the
redistributive and mitigating functions that the EU also has to perform in order to not lose
its legitimacy as a supra-national institution. So seen from a structuralist (Marxist)
perspective, the main reason for the EU to provide structural funds to disadvantaged and
peripheral regions and adopt the precautionary principle for environmental management
is the continued assurance of the institutional prerequisites for capital accumulation for
future generations. Yet in my view, such an interpretation is overly cynical,
deterministic, and gives the EU too much credit for successfully anticipating the
structural needs of organized capitalism in a globalized economy. More importantly, my
study showed that such a “black box” perspective of the EU as a unitary decision-maker
acting – possibly even unbeknownst to itself – more or less at the services of dominant
economic agents underestimates the extent to which different decision-making arms
within the EU exhibit fundamental differences in their outlook on matters of environment
and development. Not only does there exist a significant range of approaches within the
EU’s dominant discursive framework of ecological modernization, but many stakeholders
inside the EU are even poised to adopt alternative decision-making rationales favoring
much more environmentally, socially and procedurally demanding interpretations of
“sustainability” (e.g. DG Environment officials, Green and socialist parliamentarians, the
EU Ombudsman). Structuralist perspectives provide convenient, often sweeping, ex-post

417
explanations of why “in the end, the ruling class always wins.” But we tend to learn too
little about the decision-making powers of individual agents along the way. To some
degree, this criticism can also be transferred to Foucauldian discourse analyses. 1
This is
why I supplemented my initial, more discourse-analytical propositions with several
propositions that explicitly targeted on relative power relationships as well as nationally
and locally-specific outcomes.
10.3.3 Higher Stakes Increase the Sophistication of Alternative Discourses
Ever since the EU’s decision to co-fund the TENs, transport infrastructure
funding has become a hotly debated political issue even at the Pan-European level.
Somewhat counter-intuitively – and contrary to previous scholars of EU transport
infrastructure plans (e.g Ross 1998) – I find that this has ultimately increased the
opportunities for sustainable transport decision-making, albeit only indirectly and with a
time-lag. On one hand, it is true that the higher the stakes are, the more likely
accommodating, universally comfortable “sustainability” discourses will give way to
(self-interested) power play politics, and the TENs have in fact revealed the continued
political muscle of the European pro-growth players. Yet on the other hand, the
heightened politicization of transport infrastructure investment struggles has also led to
an increasingly sophisticated articulation of alternative development approaches based on
equity, environmental and procedural concerns. Needless to say, however, that unless
1 Remember, for example, that Maarten Hajer’s “discourse coalitions,” were not defined as a group of
individual decision-makers but “as the ensemble of (1) a set of storylines; (2) the actors who utter these
storylines; and (3) the practices in which this discursive activity is based,” i.e. a strange amalgam of people,
their practices and their discourses. So by design, the concept puts little emphasis on individual agency.
Also see the long footnote 9 in Chapter 6.

418
such alternative visions are then given political and institutional “teeth,” the actual impact
of such alternative discourses remains limited.
10.3.4 Opportunistic Reasons for Adopting “Sustainability” Criteria
When it comes to preserving and expanding their own decision-making powers,
local authorities in the European Union typically like to remind Eurocrats in Brussels of
the concept of subsidiarity which the EU has adopted as its fundamental governing
principle. However, parallel to the generally observed and much discussed Europeanwide
devolution of power in favor local and regional authorities, the EU has nevertheless
expanded its reach in several key areas of planning and decision-making. As we have
seen, the transport sector is one area where EU involvement in planning and policymaking
has been most noticeable during the last decade, with EU loans and grant funds
for Pan-European transport priority projects already running in the billions of Euros, and
with much more to follow in the near future. Not surprisingly, whenever they need to
attract Pan-European funds for locally important infrastructure projects, urban and
regional authorities’ criticism of Brussels’ supposed over-involvement in planning
matters turns into a much more cajoling attitude aimed at accessing EU coffers. In the
case of the Central European candidate countries, the EU’s opportunity to influence longterm
spatial development through the co-financing of key transport-infrastructures is even
greater insofar as those countries have much fewer financial resources themselves and a
much weaker bargaining position due to their applicant status. So in theory, the prospect
of Eastern enlargement provides current EU member states with a historic opportunity to
deeply shape both the rhetoric and the reality of transport and land use policy in CEE.

419
How far this leverage is then pro-actively and positively used in actual infrastructure
support programs is another matter that is likely to vary on a case-by-case basis. My
CEE examples show that the Commission is likely to be strict about procedural issues
such as open tenders and compliance with basic EIA rules, yet less inclined to raise the
bar any further on matters concerning strategic environmental assessments or the
integration of longer-term land-use impacts into transport decision-making.
10.3.5 Different Rationalities at Different Levels of Decision-Making
Apart from the persistence of competing interests and investment rationales, there
is an additional, cross-cutting explanation for the apparent inconsistencies in EU
decision-making: different decision-making rationalities apply at different levels of
decision-making. This insight brings us back to Peterson and Bomberg’s (1999) useful
distinction of three different rationalities for history-making, policy-setting and policyshaping
types of decision (see table 1.1 in the introductory chapter). As a particular
policy issue is handed through various decision-making ranks, super-systemic policy
goals get transformed, and sometimes even perverted, at the systemic or sub-systemic
level. The policy-making process for Pan-European transport infrastructures is a salient
example of this. The decision to consider CEECs as potential candidates for enlargement
was certainly a history-making event. The subsequent history-making / policy-setting
agreement on ten Pan-European transport priority corridors to connect Europe was made
by national ministers of transport in a bargaining mode that was predominantly
intergovernmental and with a rationality that might best be characterized as
(geo)political. So actual traffic flows along the corridors were not very important, yet

420
including the capitals of all participating countries in the overall corridor list was. In
terms of storylines, the “missing links” argument was thus employed with a prevailing
emphasis on “linking Europe(an capitals).” The subsequent TINA exercise, by contrast,
was a process located somewhere between a policy-setting and a policy-shaping decision
dominated by senior officials of national ministries and by EU Commission
representatives. Here, decision-making rationalities were more political-technocratic
and, at least to some degree, consensus-oriented. In this context of inter-institutional
bargaining, criteria which were ostensibly less political but more “scientific,” such as
traffic forecasts and cost estimates, increasingly formed the basis for decision-making,
alongside the basic criterion of achieving international connectivity between national
networks. “Missing links” now primarily meant “missing infrastructure links across
national borders.” Interestingly, the later ISPA national transport programs, which were
to take the TINA exercise as their basis for selecting individual projects, were then not
lower-level (sub-systemic), merely policy-shaping types of decision following TINA, but
rather new policy-setting decisions. Hence ISPA, like TINA, was more characterized by
inter-institutional bargaining than by resource exchange. In particular, decisions
regarding the national ISPA strategies were more strongly influenced by (national-level)
political rationalities than by technocratic or consensual considerations. Consequently,
grants were also requested for national ISPA “priority” projects which had played no
significant role at the Pan-European transport ministers conferences or in the TINA
process (e.g. regional airports, axle load strengthening along secondary roads).
Meanwhile, some Commission representatives in charge of implementing ISPA at DG
Regio explicitly rejected the previous, DG TREN-led TINA input as a relevant basis for

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decision-making, and instead re-emphasized the Helsinki corridors. Others were, and
still are, mostly concerned about the maturity of individual projects. The ongoing ISPA
program is therefore faced with bringing together rather different rationales at the
national and at the EU level. And at least for the recipient national governments,
“missing links” of course mostly means “missing links (and nodes) within our national
territory.”
So once again, we see how discourses related to “missing links” serve to satisfy
different development goals. Conversely, this example also once again explains the great
appeal of the “missing links” storyline: unlike many other discursive concepts, the
imagery of “missing links” can be very conveniently applied both at the abstractuniversal
and at the locally specific level. Moreover, the term “missing” conveniently
fosters a pro-investment attitude by implying that all links are in fact needed and should
be “found.” Suddenly, the issue is not a potentially controversial choice between
different infrastructure alternatives, but merely an agreement on different priorities.
10.3.6 Different Rationalities at Different Times of Decision-Making
There is also a temporal dimension to decision-making. Infrastructure needs
change over time, and these needs change more rapidly in the Central European context
of economic transition than in the mature economies of Western Europe. As the sociospatial
transition to market-oriented, post-Fordist production and consumption patterns
progresses, new winning and losing regions and cities constantly emerge, thereby
continually rearranging inter-regional traffic flows. The general expectation that new
“missing links” and “bottlenecks” would primarily emerge along the Western borders,

422
while previous “priority connections” in the East (particularly freight rail) would
increasingly become obsolete has generally proved to be correct. Nevertheless, traffic
volumes along certain links have exceeded expectations, while they have been lagging
along others. In Hungary, the end of violent conflict in Former Yugoslavia has brought
particularly dramatic changes.
Additionally, infrastructure priorities, of course, also change over time without
any real changes in traffic flows. National infrastructure priority lists typically get
rearranged whenever national elections bring about political change in the government.
This is simply due to the fact that different political parties cater to different national
constituencies – which brings us back to the issue of legitimacy of interests and political
support (see above).
10.3.7 “A Bottleneck is a Bottleneck is a …”? How Language Frames Policy
As the “missing links” example shows, employing the “right” kinds of images,
metaphors or storylines within a particular policy discourse becomes an important form
of agency. The rhetorical framing of a particular policy problem to some extent already
limits the range of possible solutions which are allowed into the debate. In common
usage, Gertrud Stein’s famous phrase from Sacred Emily, “A rose is a rose is a rose” is
typically intended to mean that, when all is said and done, a thing is what it is.
Poststructuralists take issue with this even in the case of tangible objects such as flowers.
Yet even without having to take social constructivist viewpoints to their linguistic limits,
it seems clear from my study that such “object objectification” is particularly
unacceptable when it comes to selecting and defining abstract terms such as “cohesion”

423
or “congestion.” This is why all discourse theoretical approaches, no matter whether they
feel more inspired by Jürgen Habermas or Michel Foucault, deserve credit for unveiling
the mask of “objective rationality” behind which dominant transport and planning
approaches hide.
Of course, we cannot analytically deconstruct our way out of congestion, but
discourse analysis can help us understand why policy approaches might focus on
“congestion” in the first place, and how metaphorical terms such as “bottlenecks” gain
meaning and widespread currency. Richard Willson (2001:2) powerfully underscores
this fundamental point:
Are not measures of vehicle flows, levels of service or cost effectiveness robust
representations of reality? Gridlock is gridlock, right? For planning, however,
gridlock is not gridlock until we have defined it as a problem and decided to do
something to address it. Transportation plans depend on what gridlock means, and
establishing meaning is an inherently social and linguistically based process. The way
that transportation planners use language – understanding certain ideas and values and
excluding others, hearing some things and not hearing others, and defining roles for
themselves, their organizations, decision makers and the public – shapes knowledge,
public participation, problem definition, process design and negotiation, and the
outcome of planning.
In the case of European Union transport policy making and planning, Eurocrats in
the Transport and Energy Directorate recently forcefully resuscitated the nightmarish
vision of gridlock in favor of many other possible imagined futures, thereby also focusing
their views much more on the likely outcomes than on the underlying causes of current
transport system inefficiencies. “Safety” and “emissions” are other frequently heard
worries. The entirety of Europe’s predominantly road- and motor-vehicles-based
transport system is rarely questioned, however, since it is seen as providing the
foundation for European economic competitiveness.

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10.3.8 The Role of Spatial Storylines and Leitbilder in Shaping Policy
Given the need to develop unifying concepts for decision-making, the question of
the integrating power of spatial storylines and metaphors suggests itself. If language
frames policy, does this also mean spatial storylines and Leitbilder in turn re-shape
spatial realities? I am more skeptical here. I believe that my analysis of spatial storylines
for transport investments suggests that their usefulness as instruments for spatial planning
is ultimately more limited than planners like to believe. First of all, it seems that
Leitbilder and storylines need to have some empirical basis in reality in order to
successfully induce policy-change. A related insight is that the structural premises for the
successful spatial de-concentration or re-organization of socio-economic activity change
over time, resulting in different prospects for different spatial visions at different times.
Rather befitting for the structural premises of the post-Fordist city in the electronic
information age, spatial catchphrases such as “polycentricity” or “network society” have
gained currency in planning and policy-making circles in recent years. However, finding
appropriate spatial terms to express changes and shifts in the real-existing spatial
structures is but a first step. Proclaiming the rise of the “Zwischenstadt” (Sieverts 1998)
or the “Regional City” (Calthorpe and Fulton 2001) alone will not limit the advent of
sprawl and suburbanization. Simply finding a more benign-sounding term for an ongoing
spatial trend does not make it any less environmentally harmful. The same is true for the
even more ambitious re-issuance of the “Compact city” ideal, i.e. a mere proclamation of
the antidote. Likewise will the propagation of a simple-yet-clever drawing of a
polycentric “European grape” in and of itself not be able to counteract a further

425
concentration of economic activity along the “Blue banana” core of Western Europe, and
no Cohesion fund will actually enhance spatial cohesion across European territories if it
primarily directs funds towards national-level priority links between already privileged,
better-off agglomerations.
I agree that new, action-oriented policy consensuses best emerge via ongoing
debates over negative and positive connotations of certain spatial terms, i.e. via discourse,
but these debates must be grounded in empirical spatial analyses. Northern and Western
European countries have a stronger tradition of using spatial images to back spatial policy
proposals than Southern and Eastern European ones. Prominent examples are the “Green
Heart” (groenehart) policy of the Dutch Randstad region, the Leitbild of “decentralized
concentration” (Dezentrale Konzentration) in Berlin-Brandenburg in Germany, or, last
but not least, the “polycentricity” concept of the European Spatial Development
Perspective (which was chiefly promoted by Germany and a few other West European
countries). The experience of the Netherlands, and, to a more limited extent, Germany,
shows that if formulated with strong political backing and translated into concrete dos
and don’ts for local land use and transport investments, such spatial images may be able
to redirect spatial activity at the metropolitan level. At the present time, however, there
are no such efforts discernable at the metropolitan level in the transition countries. Local
pressures on greenfield development still overwhelm nascent regional planning efforts,
and road infrastructure investments are easily instrumentalized for greenfield
development purposes. In such contexts, spatial storylines such as “polycentricity” have
little prescriptive value at the local level. The integrating power of spatial storylines
seems further limited in Poland and Hungary because strategic geopolitical interests favor

426
certain transport infrastructures over others, and because there is no final national
consensus over investment priorities among different regional players.
10.4 Suggestions for Better Transport Decision-Making in Europe
Taking the above dilemmas and challenges into account, how might we conceive
of an improved system of transport infrastructure decision-making in Europe? It would
be presumptuous to attempt to answer such a comprehensive question in a few
concluding paragraphs. Moreover, as I have insisted again and again throughout this
study, where one sets the priorities depends on the discursive framework one adheres to.
“Better” means “more competitive” to some, “more equitable” to others and “less
polluting” to many others. Better can also mean “more integrated,” “more transparent”
or simply “safer.” Unfortunately, we can rarely have it all at the same time.
In the following sections, I take a rather pragmatic approach. Instead of
proposing to revolutionize the system, I will confine myself to addressing a few select,
relatively concrete issues which emerge from my case study research. None of these
suggestions fundamentally challenge the EU’s overarching approach of ecological
modernization, and all of them are supported by existing EU rhetoric. At most, they
demand that the EU and its current and future member states become somewhat more
“reflexive” in their approaches to ecological modernization, and begin to better deliver on
their already given promise of minimizing the future environmental impacts of transport
and land use systems.

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10.4.1 Taking Action on Strategic Environmental Assessment
Recently restated rhetorical commitments to perform strategic environmental
assessments (SEAs) on major transport infrastructure investment packages (see CEC
2001d:45) remain largely unimplemented, although there are notable exceptions
(especially with regard to current plans to perform SEAs along the Via Baltica corridor).
Unfortunately, since decisions on the TENs and their priority projects as well as decisions
on the TINA and the Pan-European Corridors were largely a fait accompli by the late
1990s, the calls for SEAs on the TENs and the TINA network were already somewhat
obsolete at the time they first became official EU rhetoric. 2
Nevertheless, environmental
advocates continue to argue that SEAs should be performed of the Pan-European
transport plans. Since the Commission itself has already developed the necessary
methodologies, this is simply a matter of mustering the political will and taking action.
As recently as May 2002, the European Parliament took a plenary vote deciding that the
TENs and the TINA network should be subjected to SEAs. So far, transport ministers
and the Commission have not followed this lead. It is time they did.
10.4.2 Bringing the Urban and Regional Dimensions Back In
Transport infrastructure funding entails win-win, but also win-lose relationships
between different geographical scales. In the “realities” part of my study, I agreed with
key international experts that the strong concentration of grant funds onto major
international corridors is problematic from the point of view of the recipient countries.
2 In the cases where SEA methodologies were applied, they were only performed on individual corridors,
but never on entire networks. Most importantly, they were never applied on the entirety of Pan-European
transport policies and plans. The DG TRENs Manual on SEA in Transport was only completed in 1999.
For additional information on SEAs in the context of environmental and transport decision-making, see the
materials provided by DG Environment under http://europa.eu.int/comm/environment/eia/sea-support.htm .

428
From a regional development perspective, the international investment focus is likely to
exacerbate the problematic trend of increasing economic disparity between the prospering
western border regions and the more struggling regions facing the eastern border. More
importantly, EU grant funding ignores what is probably the most important transport
infrastructure investment need in the CEE countries, namely urban transport. ISPA grant
funds cannot be used for urban transit projects, although most ailing public transport
systems and skyrocketing motorization pose major challenges to CEE cities. Given that
major CEE capitals like Budapest, Warsaw or Prague are the most important sites for
economic and social production in the region, it seems particularly troublesome that the
EU transport funds have no mechanism for lending for urban and regional transport.
Public transport investments are equally crucial in secondary cities.
The argument that EU grant funding for urban transport projects is precluded due
to the subsidarity principle remains an important objection. However, the problem with
this line of argument is that there is in fact one type of urban transport infrastructure
which is eligible for EU grant funding under ISPA and PHARE, and that is ring roads
and bypasses around major towns. So in the end, there is a de-facto built-in road bias in
EU lending. While these road-based new construction projects receive precious EU grant
funding, the modernization of CEE’s struggling, mostly rail-based urban transit systems,
which are often directly competing for suburban ridership along ring road alignments, are
left to the countries, or even worse: the municipalities themselves. In Chapter 8, I
showed that the fear that ISPA’s anti-urban bias is ultimately contra-productive for
developing sustainable transport systems in the CEE candidate countries is something

429
brought forward not only by many of the environmental NGOs working on these issues,
but also by key policy experts both in Brussels and in the CEE countries themselves.
On a pragmatic level, the Commission could strive to creatively address this bias
either by revising the ISPA rules and regulations or by attempting to provide Phare
“regional development” grants for urban transit systems. More generally, the EU should
strive to play a more modally-balanced and possibly more involved role in urban
transport matters. The finalization of the long-promised Green Paper on Urban Transport
would be a useful first step in this direction.
10.4.3 Integrated, Intermodal Thinking Instead of Bottleneck Fixing
Refocusing attention on urban transport problems should not mean sticking with
the kind of “bottleneck” rhetoric championed in the EU’s new White Paper on Transport
(Commission of the European Communities 2001f), because, somewhat ironically, the
urban dimension is already over-emphasized when it comes to justifying highway
expansions. Mateo Turro (1999:27) concisely summarized the problem as follows:
Most Motorway traffic in Europe is of local and regional character. A purely demandled
planning exercise would not pay enough attention to long- distance and,
particularly, international travel, so a large share of the investment in motorways
would be directed, as in the past, to relieving congestion created by short-distance
traffic. Although this traffic created bottlenecks that affect transport crossing
congested urban areas, the long-term solution for interurban traffic can only be found
in a wider geographical context.
In other words: Motorway traffic problems that are mostly home-made (i.e.
created at the local level) sometimes receive an unfair boon of national and international
funding simply because the congested areas happen to also affect international or national
travel. This scenario is confirmed by the Budapest ring road which according to experts

430
carries 90% local traffic. Yet curing the congestive symptoms of an unhealthy transport
system through highway expansion at the local level not only under-appreciates the
regional and international dimensions of travel, but it also ignores preferable approaches
to fixing transport problems in general. Even the EU’s recent emphasis on congestion
pricing only provides a partial, limited response. The problem of over-reliance on
automobile and truck travel needs to be addressed from a larger, long-term perspective
that includes the integration of land-use planning, demand management and the provision
of clear modal alternatives for passenger travel and freight. The mantra of integrated,
inter-modal network planning has been repeated by EU transport experts for decades, and
almost all EU-funded research on transport and land-use planning treats it as a foregone
conclusion. Nevertheless, implementation of this supposed consensus has still been
lacking in practice, and by focusing on congestion rather than sustainability, the new EU
White Paper on Transport even retreats from earlier, more ambitious policy approaches.
So in the future, EU transport policy should not concentrate not so much on eliminating
“missing links” and “bottlenecks” as on eliminating the predominance of the “missing
link” and “bottleneck” rhetoric.
10.4.4 Making the “Who Benefits” Question More Transparent
Trade offs, particularly between local and international beneficiaries, need to be
more clearly assessed. Even for an oversimplified case where one divides beneficiaries
into only two main groups, namely international and local beneficiaries, there are still
always at least four different argumentative scenarios describing possible outcomes.
Using the M0 ring road as an example, table 10.1 illustrates the possibilities.

431
Table 10.1 A Two-Dimensional “Who-Benefits?” - Matrix Based on the M0 Case
International Actors
Win
Lose
Local Actors
Win
Lose
Scenario A
- transit traffic effectively rerouted
and
- local access & efficiency improved
Scenario C
- transit traffic effectively rerouted
but
- impacts on local area negative
Scenario B
- no benefits for international traffic
but
- local access & efficiency improved
Scenario D
- no benefits for international traffic
and
- impacts on local area negative
Of course, the reality is much more complicated, since different sections of the
ring road have different functions and hence different main beneficiaries. Also, local
actors would necessarily have to be further distinguished into inner city and suburban
actors as well as into those actors primarily interested in economic growth and those
interested in environmental sustainability. International actors might have to be further
differentiated into the EU as a whole, (geo-political) specific member state interests,
competitive economic interests and the interests of different EU populations. In the end,
the ultimate “Who-benefits” question remains controversial and unresolved in most
cases. Including costs and benefits at a wider geographical scale and making them
transparent during the assessment stage would already do much to address this problem.
10.4.5 Rethinking the Relationship between Traffic and Spatial Arguments
Traffic arguments need to be clearly separated from spatial arguments but they
cannot be assessed independently. At first glance, such a separation sounds contradictory
to the recurring call for a better integration of transportation and land-use planning. In
fact, the demand is highly supportive of this goal, in the sense that there can be no

432
effective transport planning and policy making without adequate information and
assessment on the specific expected land-use impacts of a planned transportation
investment. Yet while many of the transport benefits are expected to be immediate
benefits, effects from changes in the land use structure only accrue over the medium to
long term. Moreover, direct and indirect effects need to be differentiated. Previous
assessment procedures never captured these effects, but many sophisticated new models
and methodologies have been developed under the EU’s 4 th and 5 th Framework programs
that successfully include spatial, long-term, and indirect effects. Now the EU needs to
ensure that these additional tools are further refined and finally applied in practice. 3
10.4.6 Strengthen Local Planning and Land Use Regulations
There is a clear need to significantly strengthen local planning and land use
regulations in order to counteract the tendencies for sprawling land uses next to bypass
exits and intersections. In particular, large-scale international road infrastructure
investments in major urban regions should not be approved without a consistent regional
development plan. The key problem with curbing ex-urban sprawl is that both inside and
outside the EU, almost all regional development bodies lack the legal decision-making
authority to successfully arbitrate between the incongruent development interest of major
cities and their surrounding communities, let alone successfully protect suburban green
3 Note that for the TENs, the SASI model is presently being updated under the EU’s 5 th Framework Project
IASON (http://www.inro.tno.nl/iason/). The project “Socio-Economic and Spatial Impacts of Transport
Infrastructure Investments and Transport System Improvements” (SASI)
aimed at the development of a comprehensive and transferable methodology for forecasting the
socioeconomic and spatial impacts of large transport investments in Europe, in particular of different
scenarios of the development of the trans-European transport networks (TETN) planned by the
European Commission. With respect to the cohesion objective of the European Union the model was to
answer the question which regions of the European Union are likely to benefit from the TETN and
which regions are likely to be disadvantaged.
See http://irpud.raumplanung.uni-dortmund.de/irpud/pro/sasi/sasi.htm

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space. Transport loans are usually either made to the national government or, in the case
of public transit, to the city. In sum, there is little opportunity in the setup of current
funding mechanisms to adequately account for the likely detrimental impacts of key
transport infrastructures at the agglomeration level. Clearly, this situation should be
rectified, if possible under EU Commission leadership. Additionally, local planning and
land use regulations need to be strengthened in order to counteract sprawling land uses
next to bypass exits and intersections.
10.5 Outlook: Suggestions for Further Research
Given the interdisciplinary scope of this study, there are a host of possibilities for
further research. Suggestions are likely to vary significantly depending on people’s
disciplinary roots. Political scientists might want to further investigate the relationship
between my developed “discursive frameworks” and other meso-level theoretical
constructs (such as epistemic communities, advocacy coalitions, discourse coalitions,
entrepreneurship), while urban geographers and regional economists might instead want
to further scrutinize the transformation of Budapest into an international logistics hub.
Meanwhile, enlargement specialists will be eager to study the further development and
de-centralization of the ISPA pre-accession instrument and its subsequent transitioning
into structural funding under member state status.
To me personally, the most appealing avenue for future research at the moment
would be a further refinement of the theory-building aspects of this study. Most
importantly, I would consider further elaborating my typology of “discursive
frameworks.” For example, does my differentiation into five different approaches for

434
“sustainable” policy-making work as well for other arenas of decision-making as for
transport (e.g. housing, urban policy, energy)? Which sub-elements in the five different
frameworks are compatible with each other, which will always remain mutually
exclusive? What does this mean for the prospects of integrating some or all of the
discursive frameworks into a larger, unifying perspective? What about the differentiation
between more process-oriented and more outcome oriented frameworks? How exactly
does the concept of “reflexive” rationality challenge prevailing planning theoretical
distinctions between “instrumental” and “communicative” rationalities, and how does this
factor into each of the five frameworks? There is much room for additional debate over
each of these questions and beyond. Closely related to this, a second key interest of mine
would lie in an expansion of the concept of “spatial storylines” to other arenas of
decision-making. Additionally, a closer comparison of the German planning concept of
“Leitbilder” and the Anglophone concept of “storylines” would seem fruitful.
Put in the most general terms, I believe that the discourse-oriented and
increasingly interdisciplinary strand in planning and policy studies of which my own
study is obviously a part will continue to provide crucial insights into the shifting
decision-making rationalities of different institutions and individual stakeholders in
modern capitalist democracies, and I hope that both my present and future research might
make a useful partial contribution to the accumulation of knowledge in that arena.
Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something.
Pancho Villa (1877-1923) Last words
Go on, get out. Last words are for fools who haven't said enough.
Karl Marx (1818-1883) Last words to his housekeeper

435
APPENDICES,
GLOSSARY,
BIBLIOGRAPHY &
CURRICULUM VITA
Annex I: Overview of IFI Lending to Poland and Hungary until 2001...................... 436
Annex II: List of Key Contacts................................................................................... 441
Annex III: List of Relevant Conferences, Seminars & Writings ................................ 446
Annotated Glossary of Terms, Acronyms and Abbreviations.................................... 449
Bibliography ............................................................................................................... 455
Curriculum Vita .......................................................................................................... 483

436
Annex I: Overview of IFI Lending to Poland and Hungary until 2001 1
Table A.1 EIB Transport Loans to Poland (1990-2001)*
Size
PROJECT
Sector (Mio €)
EIB 1994 - Rehabilitation of the highway Wroclaw - Opole; and construction of a Road 125
new highway from Opole to Gliwice (part of TEN)
EIB 1996 - TEN A-4 motorway: rehabilitation & upgrading of the 70 km road Road 100
Wroclaw-Opole to motorway standard, 56 km of new motorway Opole-Gliwice
EIB 1998 - Construction of 25 km section of A4 motorway south to Katowice Road 150
EIB 1998 - Construction of urban expressway in Katowice area Road 100
EIB 1998 - Construction of Poznan by-pass on A2 motorway Road 130
EIB 2000 - Construction of motorway south-west of Gliwice, Upper Silesia
Road
46
EIB 2000 - A2 motorway south of Poznan, Corridor II (Berlin-Warsaw link) Road 275
EIB 2000 - Modernization of road section bypassing Gdynia, Sopot & Gdansk Road 33
EIB 1993 - National Railways - Rehabilitation of Corridor II (Berlin-Warsaw line) Rail 200
EIB 1995 - Loan to finance upgrading of a 37km section of the TEN E-20 Rail 40
railway line Berlin-Warsaw-Minsk-Moscow (Corridor II)
EIB 1990 - Polish Railway Society - Modernization of railway company's own Rail 20
telecommunications network and locomotive repair centres
EIB 1992 - Polish Transport Ministry - Modernization of Warsaw (Okecie) Air & 50
airport
Water
EIB 1997 - Flood Damage Reconstruction - ECU 225 mio: rebuild roads, Other 300
municipal infrastructure, flood protection infrastructure; ECU 75 mio. to railway
company PKP: reconstruction of tracks, viaducts, electrical equipment
EIB 1997 City of Katowice: improving urban infrastructure in Katowice: two road
bypasses, a pumping station for the sewage system and a municipal landfill
Other 20
EIB 1998 - Construction of Krakow Fast Tram
Public
Transit
* By 2002, additional road & rail loans were being considered to co-finance ISPA projects
EIB Poland (€ 1634 million)
Public Transit
22%
Air & Water
3%
Rail
16%
Road
59%
Source: Own Compilation using data from the EIB website and the CEE Bankwatch
Network MDB Database
45
1 Only World Bank IBRD loans are included in the analysis. The International Bank for Reconstruction
and Development (IBRD) is the regular lending arm of the World Bank. Note that the World Bank Group
also has three other lending arms: the private sector IFC (International Finance Corporation), the IDA
(International Development Association) and MIGA (Multilateral Gurarantee Association). IDA and MIGA
do not apply to CEECs, and the role of the IFC in transport infrastructure provision is also negligible.
There was, however, one IFC loan to Hungary to Malev Hungarian Airlines in 1998 in the amount of $80
million to assist partial privatization.

437
Table A.2 EIB Transport Loans to Hungary (1990-2001)*
PROJECT
EIB 1992 –Building of a bypass road near Sopron and Szolnok as well as
rehabilitation measures
EIB 1993 - Building and rehabilitation of parts of transit-roads and bypass
road north of Budapest [i.e. the northern section of the M0 ring road]
EIB 1996 - Extension of the M3 toll motorway from Budapest to the Ukrainian
border
EIB 1997 - Hungarian Railways - to improve efficiency, service and
competitiveness of the Hungarian railways
EIB 1998 - Hungarian railways - Upgrading of 340 km of rail track on four lines
(part of the core network on the priority international corridors Dresden-
Budapest-Bucharest/Sofia and Triest-Budapest-Lvov), in addition: equipment
modernization
Sector
Size
(Mio €)
Road 50
Road 72
Road 95
Rail 120
Rail 60
EIB 1992 - Ministry for Transport - Upgrading of air traffic control system Air & Water 20
EIB 1998 - Construction of fourth metro line connecting South Buda and Pest
EIB 1998 - Improvements to urban transport, sewerage, solid waste disposal
and urban amenities in Budapest
Public
Transit
Public
Transit
50
50
* By April 2002, the following loans were under appraisal to co-finance ISPA projects:
EIB 2002 - Railways III (ISPA co-financing) for the rehabilitation and
modernization of Corridor IV Budapest-Cegled-Szolnok-Lököshaza (Phase II)
Rail 110
EIB 2002 – Roads III (ISPA co-financing) for individual investment schemes
with the aim to achieve 11.5 ton axle load bearing capacity
EIB Hungary (€ 517 million)
Road 60
Public Transit
19%
Air & Water
4%
Road
42%
Rail
35%
Source: Own Compilation using data from the EIB website & the CEE Bankwatch MDB
Database

438
Table A.3 EBRD and IBRD Transport Loans to Poland (1990-2001)
Size
PROJECT
Sector
(Mio)
EBRD 1993 - Motorway Development Project; complete motorway construction
projects, introduce highway tolls, develop a strategy for national road network Roads € 45
EBRD 1994 - Railway Modernization Polish state railways, assist with
rehabilitation and modernization of corridor (Berlin)-Katowice-Warsaw Railway € 50
EBRD 1997 - Europort Gdansk Grain Terminal Port € 29
EBRD 1998 - City of Wroclaw - flood repair - purchase of equipment, civil
works, related services for the rehabilitation of the city's tram tracks, cabling
system, road repairs, the refurbishment of flooded bus and tram depots
EBRD 1998 Krakow Urban Transport Project - to enable Poland's third largest
city to finance a fast tram link running along its north-south axis. The long-term
financing is based on a direct loan to the city with no sovereign guarantee
EBRD 2000 - Warsaw Traffic Management Project: loan to the city for an
urban traffic control system, including road improvements
Public
Transport
€ 16
Public
Transport € 45
Public
Transport € 15
Public
Transport € 17
EBRD 2000 - Gdansk and Sopot Urban Transport Project: finance urban
transport infrastructure: tram systems, road underpasses, traffic management
EBRD 2000 - PKP Restructuring and Privatization Project: improve the
productivity and competitiveness of rail transport services by funding labor
severance payments as part of restructuring. Railway € 100
IBRD 1993 - Modernization and transformation of the transport sector by
investing in the program of the General Directorate of Public Roads Roads $ 176
IBRD 1997 - Port Access and Management - improvement of land and sea
access to the ports of Gdansk, Gdynia, and Szczecin-Swinoujscie Roads $ 59
IBRD 1998 - The road sector will be modernized and flood damaged roads and
bridges will be repaired Roads € 268
IBRD 2001 - Mitigate the social consequences of layoffs of some 37,000
workers resulting from commercialization and partial privatization of the state
railways, and prepare the transport system for entry into the European Union. Railway $ 101
IBRD 2001 - This investment loan will help improve the Szczecin-Swinoujscie
Seaway and support construction of new berths and cargo-handling areas
within the existing port, resulting in reduction of cost and transit time, and
benefiting the national community. Shipping $ 38.5
EBRD Poland (€ 517.4 Million)
Road
9%
Port
6%
IBRD Poland ($ 687 million)
Shipping
6%
Rail
29%
Public
Transit
56%
Rail
16%
Road
78%
Source: Own Compilation using World Bank and EBRD websites and the CEE
Bankwatch MDB Database

439
Table A.4 EBRD and IBRD Transport Loans in Hungary (1989-2001) 2
PROJECT
Sector
EBRD 1993 - Budapest Public Transport Rehabilitation Project; for the
rehabilitation of the city's public transport
Public
Transport € 64
EBRD 1997 - MÁV railcar modernization and marketing project - to improve
services and financial performance of railway services in Hungary Railway € 40
EBRD 1998 - Hungarian railways - Refurbishment of 235 passenger coaches,
the upgrading of up to 250 freight wagons in order to reduce operating and
maintenance costs, improve quality of services, increase cost recovery Railway € 40
EBRD 1999 - Budapest Intermodal Logistics Centre, Basic Infrastructure - to
help finance private construction of a railway line connection servicing a new
private logistics centre in Budapest Railway € 10
EBRD 1992 - Budapest Orbital Motorway; Partial Financing of construction of
part of the road network, and consultancy services Roads € 21
Size
(Mio)
EBRD 1993 - M1-M15 Toll Motorways; Construction of 43 km motorway from
Györ to the Austrian border and 15 km motorway towards Bratislava, to be run
as toll roads Roads € 126
EBRD 1995 - M5 Toll Motorway - first phase of a motorway to be built and
operated by a private, special-purpose company Roads € 120
EBRD 1999 - M1-M15 Motorway Restructured Project - to ensure the
continued operation of the motorway Roads € 67
IBRD 1989 - Inv. in rail, trucking, highways, urban transport General $ 95
IBRD 1993 - Highway-rehabilitation, road-safety program Roads $ 90
IBRD 1995 - Budapest Urban Transport - (a) replacement of 50 buses with
low-polluting and energy-efficient substitutes; (b) rehabilitation of 47 km of
worn out tramway tracks and purchase of track maintenance equipment; (c)
automatic vehicle monitoring system
Public
Transport
$ 38
EBRD Hungary (€ 488 million)
IBRD Hungary ($ 223 million)
Road
69%
Public
Transit
13%
Rail
18%
Public
Transit
17%
Road
40%
General
43%
Source: Own Compilation using World Bank and EBRD websites and the CEE
Bankwatch MDB Database
2 Additionally, there was already a World Bank IBRD loan in the amount of $75 to Hungary in 1985 (Loan
Nr. 2557-HU). Besides funding the southern section of the M0, this loan also provided assistance to the
Hungarian State Railways (MÁV) and the trucking company Hungarocamion.

440
Figure A.1 TINA Needs 2000-2015 vs. IFI TINA Network Loans 1990-2000 3
TINA Needs Poland 2000-2015
(€36.42 billion)
Air & Sea
11%
Rail
40%
Terminals
0%
Road
49%
IFI Loans TINA Network Poland 1990-2000
(€ 2.79 billion)
Rail
24%
Air & Sea
6%
Road
70%
TINA Needs Hungary 2000-2015
(€10.16 billion)
Air & Sea
8%
Rail
40%
Terminals
7%
Road
45%
IFI Loans TINA Network Hungary 1990-2000
(€1.13 billion)
Air & Sea
Rail
2%
29%
Road
69%
Source: Own compilation using data from the CEE Bankwatch Network, the World
Bank, the EBRD, the EIB, and the TINA Final Report
3 The calculation of total international funds for TINA networks excluded all IFI loans for public transit,
since these are not relevant for TINA. Also, World Bank funds are somewhat underestimated in the
calculated totals, since IBRD credits disbursed in US$ were translated into € at a simple 1$=1€ exchange
rate. Since most IBRD funds were road or public transit funds, this means that the actual balance is even
more strongly biased in favor of road infrastructures.

441
Annex II: List of Key Contacts 4
ACAD University – Academic / Consultant CEC European Commission
IO International Organization (e.g. OECD/ECMT, UN) GOV National Government
For additional abbreviations (DG, IFI, ISPA, HU, PL, SEA, TEN, TINA etc.) please assume the obvious or consult the glossary.
Org. Name Last Name Position Key Area of Expertise Remarks
ACAD Andrzej Brzezinski Warsaw University of
Technology
Polish transport policy Meeting in Warsaw, July 2000
& at FIST Workshop, Jan. 2001
ACAD Eva Ehrlich Economics Professor, Institute
for World Economics, Hungary
Transport modernization,
Hungarian transport policy
Interview in Budapest, August
2000
ACAD Tamas Fleischer Economist, Hungarian Institute
for World Economics
Hungarian transport policy Interview in Budapest, August
2000
ACAD Liana Giorgi Researcher, ICCR Vienna TEN-CODE & TENASSESS
research projects
Meeting during Trans-Talk
Workshop, November 2000
ACAD Wolfgang Hager Centre for European Policy
Studies
EU transport policy,
especially rail restructuring
Interview in Brussels, June
2000
ACAD Janos Monigl Transman Ltd Consulting Hungarian transport policy,
especially rail
Meetings OECD Paris ,June
2000 & in Budapest, Jan. 2001
ACAD Rana Roy Consultant TENs, especially rail policy,
(Worked for ECIS)
Meeting during Trans-Talk
Workshop, November 2000
ACAD Wojciech Suchorzewski Warsaw University of
Technology
EU & CEE Transport policy,
especially Poland
Multiple meetings / talks in
Warsaw etc, last July 2000.
ACAD Katalin Tanczos Head of Transport Economics
Dept., Tech. Univ. Budapest
Transport modernization
Hungarian transport policy
OECD seminar, June 2000 &
Interview Budapest, July 2000,
CEC Detlev Boeing International Relations, DG
Transport / DG Enlargement
CEE Accession, Transport
Acquis
Several meetings as part of
Helcom study
4 Note that contacts made during the many European transport-related workshops & seminars which I attended during the research stage of the study (see Annex
III) are only listed here if the ensuing talks during those meetings yielded particular insights and/or supplied new, previously unavailable information.

442
CEC Ulrike Braun Task Force Accession
Negotiations
Transport Acquis Interview in Brussels with M.
Garcia Fidalgo, June 2000
CEC Douglas Carpenter Administrator Infrastructure
Projects, DG Transport
TEN policy
Two interviews in Brussels,
2000. (Now in different DG)
CEC Lewis Dijkstra DG Regional Policy EU Urban Policy Meeting in Brussels, May 2001
(Rutgers PhD cand. until 2000)
CEC Christos Dionelis TINA Vienna,, then DG
Transport
TINA (Wrote the final report) Interview in Brussels, June
2000.
CEC Jean Dropinski DG Regional Policy, Principal
administrator, ISPA
ISPA (esp. Poland)
Interview in Brussels, June
2000.
CEC Marta Garcia-
Fidalgo
Task Force Accession
Negotiations
Transport Acquis
Interview in Brussels together
with Ulrike Braun, June 2000
CEC Stephen Garland Detached National Expert, DG
Transport
Responsible for SEA manual Short meeting in Brussels,
2000. Now back in UK
CEC Winfried Grüter DG Transport TENs & TINA Interview in Brussels, June
2000
CEC Fernando Hervas
Soriano
Administrator, DG
Environment
ISPA cooperation
One interview, one meeting in
Brussels
CEC Klaus Keisel Detached National Expert, DG
Environment
Integration of environmental
concerns into transport policy
Interview in Brussels, May
2001
CEC Stephane Khelif Detached National Expert, DG
Transport
TINA, TENs, Balkan
reconstruction
Two interviews in Brussels, last
June 2000.
CEC Anders Lundström Railway Expert, DG Transport Railway policy Interview in Brussels as part of
Helcom Study, 1999
CEC Angela Martinez-
Sarasola
DG Regional Policy
ISPA and accession
preparation Hungary
Interview in Brussels, June
2000.
CEC Daniel Mouque DG Regional Policy Cohesion and Transport Interview in Brussels, May
2001
CEC Sian Prout Administrator, DG Transport International Relations Provided key TINA/TEN
materials

443
CEC Tom Robbert SCR, EU lending to nonmembers
Phare, external EU support Interview in Brussels, June
2000 (SCR Unit now dissolved)
CEC Jonathan Scheele Ex-DG TREN (Now Head of
EU Delegation in Romania)
Helsinki Corridors, Pan-Eur.
Ministers Meetings 93-97
Interview in Brussels, June
2000
CEC Brendan Smyth DG Regional Policy ISPA, long CEEC experience
as PHARE adviser
Interview in Brussels, June
2000.
CEC David Sweet DG Regional Policy ISPA Trans-Talk conference, Nov.
2000; Lunch, May 2001
EU-
CEE
Axel Badrichani EU Delegation to Hungary Transport concessions Interview in Budapest, July
2000
EU-
CEE
Hana Martinovska Program Director, Phare Multicountry
Transport Program
Phare multi-country transport
program
Interview in Prague, 2000 (just
before the unit was dissolved)
GOV- Axel Friedrich Head, Transport Policy Section, Sustainable Transport Policy, Multiple meetings (during
GER
German Environmental Agency regulatory aspects, emissions Helcom, FIST, UN CSD etc.)
GOV-
HU
Laszlo Becker General Director, Int. Funding
HU Environment Ministry
ISPA (esp. Environment) Interview in Budapest, August
2000
GOV-
HU
Gyözö Kenez International funding, Ministry
of Transport
ISPA Hungary
Interview / Meeting in
Budapest, August 2000
GOV-
HU
Katalin Pallai Budapest City Municipality,
Assistant to the Mayor
Budapest strategic urban
development / urban planning
Meetings Salzburg Seminar,
June 2000; Budapest, Jan. 2001
GOV-
HU
Jozsef Uszta Hungarian Regional
Environment Ministry
Phare regional environment Interview in Budapest, August
2000
GOV- Jan Friedberg Undersecretary of State, Polish Polish transport policy, Polish Interview in Warsaw, July 2000
PL
Transport Ministry
ISPA strategy
& prev. contact via NGO work
GOV- Malgorzata
Mokranzka Section Head, EU Integration, Polish road transport, EU Interview in Warsaw, July 2000
PL
Public Roads Directorate integration / int. cooperation
GOV- Jaroslaw Waskiewicz Division Chief, Finance Polish transport policy, EU & Interview in Warsaw with
PL
Department, Transport Ministry IFI loans to Poland
Stanislaw Zielinski, July 2000
GOV- Stanislaw Zielinski Deputy Director, Finance Polish transport policy, EU & Interview in Warsaw with J.
PL
Department, Transport Ministry IFI loans to Poland
Waskiewicz, July 2000

444
IFI Peter Carter Environmental Coordinator,
Projects Directorate, EIB
EIB environmental policy,
relation to transport policy
Meeting / email contacts as part
of Helcom study 1998-1999
IFI Philip Cornwell Deputy Director, Transport
Team, EBRD
Transport policy
& appraisal
Meeting / informal talk, FIST
Vienna, January 2001
IFI Bill Kennedy Senior Environmental Adviser,
EBRD
Environmental Appraisal Repeated talks & meetings
1998-1999 as part of Helcom
IFI Slobodan Mitric Senior Urban Transport Staff,
World Bank
International Transport
Policy, CEE and beyond
Repeated talks & meetings
1995-, last in Vienna, Jan. 2001
IFI Eva Molnar Transport Sector Manager,
ECA Region, World Bank
Transport Infrastructure in
Central Eastern Europe
Interview in Washington,
February 2000
IO Ann Dom Project Manager, Transport and
Environment, EEA
SEA, transport and
environment
Several meetings 1998-1999, as
part of Helcom study
IO Jack Short OECD/ECMT Secretary
General
OECD Sprawl Seminar, Paris,
June 2000, additional lunch talk
IO Peter Wiederkehr OECD environment directorate Environment and Transport,
OECD EST study
Repeated meetings (Helcom,
FIST Vienna), last Jan. 2001
NGO Paul Beeckmans Community of European
Railways
Railway policy
Interview in Brussels, June
2000.
NGO Jiri Dusik Regional Environmental Center
for Central Eastern Europe
Environmental Scoping of
TINA corridor, SEA
Interview / Talk in Budapest,
August 2000 & FIST, Jan. 2001
NGO Frazer Goodwin Policy Officer, European Fed. EU Sustainable Transport Multiple meetings in Brussels
for Transport & Environment Policy
NGO Joszef Feiler CEE Bankwatch, Hungary IFIs, Hungarian transport
policy
Interview / talk in Budapest,
August 2000
NGO Ferec Joo Hungarian Traffic Club and
T&E Board Member
Hungarian and CEE
Transport policy, esp. Rail
Multiple meetings in Budapest
and elsewhere, 1995-2001
NGO Andras Lukas Clean Air Action Group,
Hungary
Hungarian environmental and
transport policy, urban sprawl
Multiple meetings in Budapest
and elsewhere, 1995-2001
NGO Pavel Pribyl National coordinator, CEE
Bankwatch Czech Republic
IFIs in CEE Meeting in Prague, June 2000.

445
NGO Hana Rihkovsky Comm. of European Railways, European Rail Policy Meeting in Brussels, July 2000
Ex-Belgian Transport Ministry
NGO Frank van Schaik ASEED transport coordinator NGO Anti-TEN transport
activism, MATE map
Meeting in Amsterdam, July
2000
NGO Beatrice Schell Director, European Federation
for Transport & Environment
EU Sustainable Transport
Policy
Multiple Meetings in Brussels
and elsewhere
NGO Magda Stoczkiewicz CEE Bankwatch Network, EU
Coordinator, c/o FOE Europe
Environmental Advocacy Multiple talks in Brussels,
Amsterdam & CEE 1995-
NGO Janos Zlinsky Regional Environmental Center
for Central Eastern Europe
General environmental policy
in CEE
Interview / Talk in Budapest,
August 2000

446
Annex III: List of Relevant Conferences, Seminars & Writings
I. Relevant academic conferences/seminars attended during the research period:
“Planning and Policy-Making in the EU: A Typology of Five Different Discursive
Frameworks for Decision-Making.” and “Sustainable Mobility – An Elusive Concept?
Interpreting EU Transport Policy as a (failed?) Example of Ecological Modernization”
Papers presented at the XVI AESOP Congress, Volos, July 10-15, 2002
“The future of sustainable development in the European Union: An analysis of four
different storylines.“ Paper presented at the Urban Affairs Association Annual Meeting,
March 20-23, 2002, Boston
“Bourgeois Utopias Budapest-Style Or: The Rise (and Fall?) of Suburbia in Central
Europe Paper presented at the Young Housing Researchers Workshop in Warsaw, June
22-24, 2001 and presented at the ACSP conference, Cleveland, Ohio, 6-11 November
2001
“Does Brussels help finance urban sprawl in Budapest? EU Infrastructure support seen
from a critical local perspective.” World Planning Schools Congress, Shanghai, China,
11-16 July 2001.
“Transport investments and regional development: Myths and realities in the New
Europe.” ACSP conference in Atlanta, Georgia, November 2-5, 2000
“Center-Periphery Dynamics in the New Europe and Their Impact on Transport
Infrastructure Planning in the Baltic Sea Region.” International Planning History
Conference, Helsinki, Finland, August 20-23, 2000 (available under
http://www.itdp.org/pub.html)
“The EU’s Role in Transport Infrastructure Development in Central & Eastern Europe in
the Context of Enlargement,” AESOP Congress, Brno, Czech Republic, July 18-22, 2000
Pre-Conference AESOP PhD Workshop, Brno, Czech Republic, July 14-17, 2000
(Recipient of Fannie Mae/ACSP dissertation travel grant)
”Trans-European Network Expansion and Sustainable Regional Development: The Via
Baltica Example.” XIII AESOP Congress, Bergen, Norway, July 7-11, 1999
Pre-Conference AESOP PhD Workshop, Finse, Norway, July 3-6, 1999
“Review of Transport Infrastructure Decision-Making in Helcom PITF Member
Countries: Case Studies of Latvia and Poland.” Second Helcom PITF Workshop on
Transport, Swedish Environmental Protection Agency, Stockholm, March 3-5 1999.

447
”Poverty Alleviation through Sustainable Transport Development? Recent Initiatives at
the World Bank.” ACSP Conference, November 4-8 1998, Pasadena, California.
The Use of Policy Analysis in the European Union. NYU Robert F. Wagner School of
Public Service, European Summer Institute in Lyon, France & Brussels, Belgium.
Participant in a 3 week summer seminar, June/July 1998
“NGO's Institutional Role in Advancing Sustainable Transport Development.” Transport
Working Group, UNCHS International Conference on Governance and Participation,
Urban Poverty Forum, Florence, Italy, 9-13 November, 1997
II. Relevant professional conferences/meetings attended during the research period
United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development, Ninth Session (CSD 9), New
York, April 16-27, 2001. Member of the National Delegation of Germany (NGO
Transport Expert).
World Bank Institute / LGI Urban Management Course, Open Society, Budapest,
Hungary, Nov. 26 – Dec. 1, 2000 and Jan. 22 –27, 2001. Participant in a training course
for urban professionals in CEE.
Financing Sustainable Transport Infrastructure and Technology: CEEC and NIS (FIST
Workshop), International workshop organized by the Austrian Energy Agency
(Energieverwertungsagentur – EVA) on behalf of the United Nations Department of
Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA), the Central European Initiative (CEI), and the
Austrian Transport and Environment Ministries, Vienna, January 25-26, 2001 (also see
http://www.eva.wsr.ac.at/(en)/service/veranst/fist.htm)
International conference on EIB policies and projects in Europe from an environmental,
access to information and public participation perspective, Hosted by GUE/NGL (the
confederal group of the European United Left/Nordic Green Left), Brussels, European
Parliament, November 9-10, 2000
2 nd Trans-Talk Expert Workshop for the Thematic Network “Policy and Project
Evaluation Methodologies,” organized by the Interdisciplinary Center for Comparative
Research in the Social Sciences (ICCR) and the EU Directorate General Transport &
Energy, Brussels, November 6-8, 2000. (Presentation on “Old Myths and New Realities
of Transport Assessment: Implications for EU interventions in Central Europe.” Edited
contributions to be published in book format in late 2002.)
Symposium on Intelligent Mobility in Urban Regions, Urban 21 Global Conference on
the Urban Future, Berlin, July 4-6, 2000

448
Evaluation Methodologies for Infrastructure Investments and Urban Sprawl: Invited
Expert Seminar, European Conference of Ministers of Transport/OECD, Paris, June 29-
30, 2000
Environmentally Sustainable Transportation Investment Decision-Making in the Baltic
Sea Region: Proposals and Recommendations. Workshop organized for the Helsinki
Commission at the European Commission, Directorate General for Transport, Brussels,
March 2, 2000
III. Additional writings related to the dissertation topic
“Cohesion, Polycentricity, Missing Links and Bottlenecks: Conflicting Spatial Storylines
for Pan-European Transport Investments” European Planning Studies (forthcoming in
the February/March 2003 issue).
“A Sustainable Transport Convention for the New Europe.” In: Dodds, Felix (ed.). 2000.
Earth Summit 2002 – A New Deal. London: Earthscan, pp. 109-123.
Major Transportation Infrastructure Investment Decision-Making, and Its Impact on the
Long-Term Sustainability of the Baltic Sea. Helcom PITF Project #298 25 161. Written
with Walter Hook, with contributions from W. Suchorzewsky, and M. Stoczkeiwicz.
Berlin: Umweltbundesamt, April 1999

449
Annotated Glossary of Terms, Acronyms and Abbreviations
€ Euro, European unitary currency since January 1 st , 2002
acquis
communautaire
“The Community acquis or Community patrimony is the body of
common rights and obligations which bind all the Member States
together within the European Union. It is constantly evolving and …
comprises not only Community law in the strict sense, but also all acts
adopted under the second and third pillars of the European Union and,
above all, the common objectives laid down in the Treaties. Applicant
countries have to accept the Community acquis before they can join
the European Union. Exemptions and derogations from the acquis are
granted only in exceptional circumstances and are limited in scope.”
EU Glossary
CAAG
CEC
CEE
CEE Bankwatch
Network
CEEC
CEPS
Committee of the
Regions
Clean Air Action Group, an environmental NGO in Hungary.
http://www.levego.hu/angol.htm
Commission of the European Communities, see “Commission”
Central Eastern Europe
A Central European watchdog NGO set up in 1995 monitoring IFI
activities in the region. http://www.bankwatch.org/
Central Eastern European Countries
An EU policy think tank. Founded in 1983, the Centre for European
Policy Studies is “dedicated to producing sound policy research
leading to constructive solutions to the challenges facing Europe
today.” http://www.ceps.be/
Set up by the Maastricht Treaty. It consists of 222 representatives of
local and regional authorities appointed by the Council for four years
on the basis of proposals from the Member States. It is consulted by
the Council or the Commission in areas affecting local and regional
interests, including social and economic cohesion, the environment,
and transport. The CoR may also issue opinions on its own initiative.
http://www.cor.eu.int/
Community acquis See “acquis communautaire”
CSD
a) Commission on Sustainable Development, the United Nations
Commission responsible for implementing the Rio Earth Summit
Agenda 21. http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/

450
CSD
CTP
DG
b) Committee on Spatial Development, the EU Committee responsible
for dealing with the “ESDP”
Common Transport Policy “The aim of the common transport policy is
to lay down common rules applicable to international transport to or
from the territory of the Member States or passing across the territory
of one or more of them (Articles 70 to 80 of the EC Treaty).” EU
Glossary
Directorate General
DG Enlargement EU Commission Directorate General for Enlargement
http://europa.eu.int/comm/enlargement/
DG Regio EU Commission Directorate General for Regional Policy
http://europa.eu.int/comm/regional_policy/index_en.htm
DG TREN Directorate General for Transport and Energy, merged in 2000
http://europa.eu.int/comm/dgs/energy_transport/index_en.html
EAP
EBRD
ECMT
ECU
EEA
EIB
EMU
ERT
Environmental Action Program
European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
http://www.ebrd.com
The European Conference of Ministers of Transport (ECMT) is an
intergovernmental organization established by a Protocol signed in
Brussels on 17 October 1953. It provides European forum for policy
cooperation at the ministerial level.
http://www1.oecd.org/cem/about.htm
European Currency Unit, the old, virtual European unitary currency
unit before the Euro, 1 ECU = 1 €
European Environment Agency http://www.eea.eu.int/
European Investment Bank. Created in 1958 under the Treaty of
Rome, the European Investment Bank is the financing institution of
the European Union. Its task it “to contribute towards the integration,
balanced development and economic and social cohesion of the
Member Countries. To this end, it raises on the markets substantial
volumes of funds which it directs on the most favourable terms
towards financing capital projects according with the objectives of the
Union. Outside the Union the EIB implements the financial
components of agreements concluded under European development
aid and cooperation policies.” http://www.eib.org
Economic and Monetary Union. “Economic and monetary union
(EMU) is the process whereby the economic and monetary policies of
the Member States of the Union are being harmonised with a view to
the introduction of a single currency.” EU Glossary
European Round Table of Industrialists. Created in 1983, the ERT is
“a forum of 42 European industrial leaders aiming at promoting the

451
competitiveness and growth of Europe's economy.” See
http://www.ert.be/
ESDP European Spatial Development Perspective. http://europa.eu.
int/comm/regional_policy/sources/docoffic/official/space_en.htm
EU Commission “The European Commission is a body with powers of initiative,
implementation, management and control. It is the guardian of the
Treaties and the embodiment of the interests of the Community. It is
composed of twenty independent members (two each from France,
Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom and one each from all
the other countries), including a President and two Vice-Presidents. It
is appointed for a five-year term, by agreement among the Member
States, and is subject to a vote of appointment by the European
Parliament, to which it is answerable, before it can be sworn in. The
Commissioners are assisted by an administration made up of
directorates-general and specialised departments whose staff are
divided mainly between Brussels and Luxembourg.” EU Glossary
http://europa.eu.int/comm/
EU Council
EU Parliament
Green Paper
“The European Council is the term used to describe the regular
meetings of the Heads of State or Government of the European Union
Member States. … Its existence was given legal recognition by the
Single European Act, while official status was conferred on it by the
Treaty on European Union. It meets at least twice a year and the
President of the European Commission attends as a full member. Its
objectives are to give the European Union the impetus it needs in order
to develop further and to define general policy guidelines.”
EU Glossary http://ue.eu.int/
“The European Parliament is the assembly of the representatives of the
370 million Union citizens. … It considers the Commission's
proposals and is associated with the Council in the legislative process,
in some cases as co-legislator, by means of various procedures
(codecision procedure, cooperation procedure, assent, advisory
opinion etc.); it has the power of control over the Union's activities
through its confirmation of the appointment of the Commission (and
the right to censure it) and through the written and oral questions it can
put to the Commission and the Council; it shares budgetary powers
with the Council in voting on the annual budget, rendering it
enforceable through the President of Parliament's signature, and
overseeing its implementation. It also appoints an Ombudsman
empowered to receive complaints from Union citizens concerning
maladministration in the activities of the Community institutions or
bodies.” EU Glossary http://www.europarl.eu.int/
“Commission Green papers are documents intended to stimulate
debate and launch a process of consultation at European level on a
particular topic. These consultations may then lead to the publication

452
of a White Paper, translating the conclusions of the debate into
practical proposals for Community action.” EU Glossary
Helsinki Corridors The ten multi-modal priority transport corridors agreed as at the Pan-
European Transport Ministers Conference in 1997.
HUF
IBRD
IFI
ISPA
KÖVIM
LISF
NGO
M0
Hungarian Forint, national currency
The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development “aims to
reduce poverty in middle-income and creditworthy poorer countries by
promoting sustainable development, through loans, guarantees, and
nonlending -including analytical and advisory-services.” Part of the
“World Bank” Group
International Financial Institution (e.g. World Bank, EIB, EBRD)
Instrument for Structural Pre-Accession ISPA is the EU program
providing pre-accession grants to the CEE candidate countries in the
areas of transport and environment.
http://europa.eu.int/comm/regional_policy/funds/ispa/ispa_en.htm
Hungarian abbreviation for the former Hungarian Transport Ministry,
now restructured as the Ministry of Economy and Transport.
http://www.gm.hu/
Large-Scale Infrastructure Facility, a PHARE-funded pre-cursor to
ISPA. From 1998-99, the LISF was intended to cover the transition
from PHARE to ISPA by funding select large-scale infrastructure
projects in the candidate states, with an emphasis on co-financing with
the IFIs.
Non-governmental organization. Usually used to label environmental
or civic organizations.
(Planned) ring road around the Hungarian capital of Budapest
Maastricht Treaty Treaty of the European Union (1992) a.k.a. TEU
Ombudsman
OECD
“The European Ombudsman is appointed by the European Parliament
after each election for the duration of Parliament's term of office. He is
empowered to receive complaints from any citizen of the Union or any
natural or legal person residing in a Member State concerning
instances of maladministration in the activities of the Community
institutions or bodies…. Where the Ombudsman establishes an
instance of maladministration he refers the matter to the institution
concerned, conducts an investigation, seeks a solution to redress the
problem and, if necessary, submits draft recommendations to which
the institution is required to reply in the form of a detailed report
within three months.” EU Glossary
The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Also
see http://www.oecd.org

453
Pan-European
Corridors
See “Helsinki Corridors”
PHARE PHARE is a key source of EU grant funding for CEECs. The
(francophone) acronym PHARE meant “Poland and Hungary -
Assistance for Economic Reconstruction.” The acronym became
common usage and was kept even after the program was extended to
include other CEECs.
http://europa.eu.int/comm/enlargement/pas/phare/
SAPARD
Pre-accession instrument for agricultural and rural development aid to
the candidate countries http://europa.eu.int/comm/agriculture/
external/enlarge/back/index_en.htm
SDS Sustainable Development Strategy of the EU, published in 2001.
http://europa.eu.int/comm/environment/eussd/
Subsidarity
“The subsidiarity principle is intended to ensure that decisions are
taken as closely as possible to the citizen and that constant checks are
made as to whether action at Community level is justified in the light
of the possibilities available at national, regional or local level.
Specifically, it is the principle whereby the Union does not take action
(except in the areas which fall within its exclusive competence) unless
it is more effective than action taken at national, regional or local
level. It is closely bound up with the principles of proportionality and
necessity, which require that any action by the Union should not go
beyond what is necessary to achieve the objectives of the Treaty.”
EU Glossary
TENs Trans-European Networks. Usually the generic term for
interconnected networks and services available on a pan-European
basis, in this study, “TENs” is frequently used as a short-hand for the
EU’s Trans-European Transport Networks (TEN-T).
http://www.europarl.eu.int/factsheets/4_6_1_en.htm
TEU
TINA
ToA
Treaty of the European Union (1992) a.k.a. Maastricht Treaty
Transport Infrastructure Needs Assessment for the CEE candidate
countries. The TINA exercise was completed in 1999.
“The Treaty of Amsterdam was adopted at the Amsterdam European
Council on 16 and 17 June 1997 and signed on 2 October 1997 by the
Foreign Ministers of the fifteen Member States. It entered into force
on 1 May 1999 after ratification by all the Member States in
accordance with their respective constitutional requirements. From
the legal point of view, the Treaty amends certain provisions of the EU
Treaty, the Treaties establishing the European Communities and
certain related acts. It does not replace the other Treaties; rather, it
stands alongside them.” EU Glossary

454
T&E
European Federation for Transport and Environment. The European
umbrella organization for NGOs working in the field of transport and
the environment. http://www.t-e.nu
UN-ECE United Nations Economic Commission for Europe. Set up in 1947,
UNECE has 55 member states. UNECE is one of five regional
commissions of the United Nations and its activities include policy
analysis, development of conventions, regulations and standards, and
technical assistance. http://www.unece.org/
White Paper
World Bank
WSSD
Zl
“Documents containing proposals for Community action in a specific
area. In some cases they follow a Green Paper published to launch a
consultation process at European level. Examples include the White
Papers on the completion of the internal market, on growth,
competitiveness and employment and the approximation of the laws of
the associated states of Central and Eastern Europe in areas of
relevance to the internal market. When a White Paper has been
favourably received by the Council, it can become the action
programme for the Union in the area concerned.” EU Glossary
One of the world’s largest sources of development assistance, the
World Bank “works in more than 100 developing economies with the
primary focus of helping the poorest people and the poorest
countries.” http://www.worldbank.org
UN World Summit on Sustainable Development. The WSSD took
place in Johannesburg, South Africa, from August 26 to September 4,
2002. http://www.johannesburgsummit.org
Polish Zloty, national currency

455
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DEIKE PETERS
EDUCATION:
CURRICULUM VITA
RUTGERS UNIVERSITY, New Brunswick (NJ), USA
Ph.D. candidate in Urban Planning and Policy Development (January 2003)
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, New York (NY), USA
Master of International Affairs (February 1996); M.Sc. in Urban Planning (May 1995)
TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY HAMBURG-HARBURG, Germany (1992-1993)
Department of City Planning and Urban Design; Int’l Project ”Olympic Village Barcelona”
UNIVERSITÄT DORTMUND, Germany
Pre-Diploma in Spatial Planning (“Vordiplom Raumplanung,” May 1992)
SORBONNE, UNIVERSITÉ PARIS IV, Cours de la Civilisation Française
Diploma in French Language and Cultural Studies (May 1990)
EMPLOYMENT HISTORY:
TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY BERLIN, Dept. City & Regional Planning (ISR), Germany
Lecturer / Researcher ("Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin") (Nov. 2000 - present)
GERMAN ENVIRONMENT MINISTRY (BMU) / UNED Forum, Berlin / London
Consultant (Nov. 2000 - Jan 2001)
INSTITUTE FOR TRANSPORTATION & DEVELOPMENT POLICY, NY, NY
Director of Environmental Programs (Dec. 1995 – Oct. 2000, full-time until Sept. 1997)
Assistant Program Director for Central Eastern Europe (Sept. 1994 – Nov. 1995)
RUTGERS UNIVERSITY, The State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick, NJ
Instructor, Dept. of Urban Studies and Community Health (Sept. 1998 – Dec. 1999)
Research Assistant, Department of Urban Planning (Sept.-Dec. 1997, Jan.- May 2000)
THE WORLD BANK, Washington, DC
Consultant (Summer 1998, Summer 1999)
UNITED NATIONS CENTER FOR HUMAN SETTLEMENTS, New York, NY
Research Assistant (January - May 1996)
EUROPEAN FEDERATION FOR TRANSPORT & ENVIRONMENT (T&E), Brussels
Consultant (Summer 1995)
PLANQUADRAT DORTMUND, Dortmund, Germany
Project Intern (Summer 1993)
PUBLICATION LIST AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST
For a select list of articles, papers and recent conferences & workshops, see Annex III