Directive 2011/76 - Amendment of Directive 1999/62/EC on the charging of heavy goods vehicles for the use of certain infrastructures - Main contents

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

L 269/1

The promotion of sustainable transport is a key element of the common transport policy. To this end, the contribution of the transport sector to climate change and its negative impacts should be reduced, in particular congestion, which impedes mobility, and air and noise pollution, which create health and environmental damage. Moreover environmental protection requirements must be integrated into the definition and implementation of other Union policies, including the common transport policy.

The objective of reducing the negative impacts of transport should be achieved in such a way as to avoid disproportionate obstacles to the freedom of movement in the interest of sound economic growth, the proper functioning of the internal market and territorial cohesion.

To optimise the transport system accordingly, the common transport policy should use a variety of instruments to improve transport infrastructure and the use of technologies and to enable the more efficient management of transport demand through, in particular, the promotion of the renewal of the fleet, a more efficient use of infrastructures and co-modality. This calls for further recourse to the ‘user pays’ principle and the development and the implementation of the ‘polluter pays’ principle in the transport sector in all modes of transport.

Directive 1999/62/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council (4) called on the Commission to present a model for the assessment of all external costs arising from use of the transport infrastructure to serve as the basis for future calculations of infrastructure charges. That model was to be accompanied by an impact analysis of the internalisation of external costs for all modes of transport and a strategy for a stepwise implementation of the model and, if appropriate, by proposals for further revision of that Directive.

In order to move towards a sustainable transport policy, transport prices should better reflect the costs related to traffic-based air and noise pollution, climate change, and congestion caused by the actual use of all modes of transport, as a means of optimising the use of infrastructure, reducing local pollution, managing congestion and combating climate change at the least cost for the economy. This calls for a stepwise approach in all transport modes, taking into account their particular characteristics.

Transport modes have already started to internalise external costs and the relevant Union legislation either phases in such internalisation or at least does not prevent it. However, this process needs to be monitored and encouraged further for all modes of transport applying common principles while taking into account the specificity of each mode.

In the road transport sector, tolls calculated as distance-based charges for the use of infrastructure constitute a fair and efficient economic instrument to achieve a sustainable transport policy, since they relate directly to the use of infrastructure, the environmental performance of...