Telematics applications for transport in Europe

The purpose of the Commission communication is to define the measures needed in order to develop telematics infrastructures for all modes of transport, together with proposals for their deployment so that: - transport operations can be made more efficient, safer and less polluting; - the transport market can be opened to telematics services and products which are industrially efficient; - new public/private partnerships can be promoted in order to implement telematics applications in the transport sector. The EU therefore needs to decide on standardisation measures and to take action, with the Member States, to harmonise the regulatory and legal framework, promote joint solutions and coordinate regional and local efforts, the aim being to implement telematics systems and services which will benefit the entire European transport sector. The objectives of the overall EU programme of measures to apply telematics to transport are therefore as follows: - to develop the telematics infrastructure, the first step being to set up an open network architecture which allows the various elements in the system to interact. The Union needs to act on three fronts in order to set up and exploit a telematics infrastructure (legislation and standardisation, financial support and coordination); - to define priority telematics applications in the transport sector (road transport, rail transport, sea and inland waterway transport, air transport, intermodal transport); - R&D for transport telematics (advanced information and ship management systems, air traffic control, European rail traffic management systems and road, urban and multimodal transport management systems); - to establish a coordination framework to promote the action needed (by organizing fora of all the interested parties and operators within the framework of public/private agreements).�