Trans-European transport network: progress and implementation of the 14 Essen projects, December 1994. 1998 report

Rapporteur CAMISON ASENSIO notes that the progress and implementation of the 14 TENs projects, decided at the Essen Summit in December 1994, is far from being staisfactory. He therefore calls on the Commission and the member states concerned to take a wide integrated range of measures related to the funding of these projects, to enable them to make progress (private/public partnership, forms of long-term funding, availability of venture capital etc). The Council should convene an extraordinary European Council for the purpose of finding solutions to the problems. With regard to the state of progress on the 14 priority projects, three have reached the final stage: - the rail link Cork-Dublin-Belfast-Larne-Stranraer (project 9) - the Malpensa airport (project 10) - the Oresund fixed road/rail link (project 11). Six projects will be completed in 2005 with their funding largely guaranteed: - the HST link Paris-Brussels-Cologne-Amsterdam-London (project 2) - the two parts of the HST South link: Madrid-Barcelona-Perpignan-Montpellier and Madrid-Vitoria-Dax (project 3) - the HST East link (project 4) - the Betuwe line (NL) combined transport/rail link (project 5) - the Greek motorways project (project 7) - the West Coast Main Line rail link (UK) (project 14). Five projects will be completed only after 2005, but their timetables and funding remain uncertain: - the HST North-South link (Brenner axis) (project 1) - the Lyon-Trieste HST link (project 6) - the multimodal link between Portugal and Spain and the rest of Europe (project 8) - the Nordic triangle multimodal corridor (project 12) - the Ireland-UK-Benelux road link (project 13). The Committee responsible adopted an amendment, emphasizing that the proposal on project 8 (Spain/Portugal) as amended by the Spanish and Protugese governments must be put to the codecision procedure with Parliament. In another amendment, the Commission and member states concerned are urged to speed up the preparations to the CTRL, the British part of the Paris-Brussels-Cologne-Amsterdam-London HST and the Betuwe line, including the northern section and in connection to the German network.�