The European Parliament has definitively approved measures to finish major trans-European transport projects such as roads, railways, bridges and tunnels. Among the high-speed railway routes that will be able to benefit from European funding as part of the Ten-T networks there is also the Bologna-Ancona-Pescara-Foggia route. This was announced by Pasquale Cataneo, transport expert and current representative of Southern Italy, on the sidelines of the sit-in held today in front of the Foggia station to celebrate the 160th anniversary of its foundation.
“About four years ago, as head of the Fast-Confsal Studies Office and of the ‘Infrastructure, Transport and Services’ Department of Confsal, I coordinated the drafting of a position paper entitled “Italy quickly connected”. In this document, among the various proposals presented at a national conference in Rome on 8 October 2020, there was the extension of the Italian section of the Baltic-Adriatic multimodal corridor to Foggia. We note with extreme satisfaction that yesterday the EU Parliament approved the measures to complete the projects. Therefore, while RFI and La Freccia forget about Foggia and its transport and logistics centrality, the EU relaunches its role as a crossroads of two TEN-T multimodal corridors”, comments Cataneo.
Other priority works include, in addition to the Milan-Treviglio-Verona high-speed railway section, also the bridge over the Strait of Messina, both of which are hoped for in the Fast-Confsal position paper. As we learn from EU sources, these transport infrastructure projects, included among the main ones on the TEN-T core network, will have to be completed by the end of 2030, in order to guarantee a global network by the end of 2050. To accelerate the implementation of the project throughout the EU network, an intermediate deadline of 2040 is introduced.
Other priority lines established in the EU regulation are: a) faster trains and safer parking for truck drivers, b) ending cooperation with Russia and Belarus with a focus on Ukraine while also strengthening ties with Moldova; c) better conditions for military mobility. Once the Council has formally adopted the new rules, the regulation will enter into force 20 days after publication in the EU Official Journal.
“The mayor of Foggia, speaking at the Sit-in promoted by Fast-Confsal and in which we from IdM, the members of the Capitanata.Neo Association and several citizens participated, underlined the value of the historic station, its technological updating and the importance of sustainable and safe transport infrastructures, their best functionality to guarantee greater connectivity, accessibility and services to citizens together with the strengthening of the attractiveness of our City, specifying – underlines Cataneo – also the role and importance of the new AV station and other specific infrastructures such as the two airports, civil and military, the two motorway toll booths, the Incoronata logistics platform, etc. We are, therefore, united in the need to make them valorise for the growth and development of our Community”.
“These arguments – concludes the municipal councilor – are present in the 2023-2028 programmatic lines, – the mobility and logistics part of the so-called City of Sustainability – approved last 27 February by the municipal administration which have implemented many indications in this regard provided by us at IdM with the convinced assent and full sharing of the other political forces”.
