PLANNING FOR A SUSTAINABLE EUROPE? - TU Berlin

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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