Cabinet decision: Environmental Report 2010 commits to modal shift

Berlin. The Pro-Rail Alliance has said that it is satisfied with the government's decision to increase rail transport's market share to up to 25 percent in the future. The cabinet confirmed this target on Tuesday with its approval of the Environmental Report 2010. "This means that the Environmental Report stipulates more demanding targets for the transport sector than the coalition agreement, and even more than the Action Plan for Freight Transport and Logistics recently published by the Federal Transport Ministry," said the managing director of the Pro-Rail Alliance, Dirk Flege on Tuesday in Berlin. On the whole, the federal government obviously has a different attitude towards important transport policy issues to the transport ministry, which produced a position paper that has not been approved by cabinet.

Flege pointed out that today's resolution by the federal government puts it clearly into line with the original Master Plan for Freight Transport and Logistics that was approved by Angela Merkel's cabinet in 2008. With the reference to the external costs, traffic reduction, modal shift and making the cost of transport transparent are all explicitly mentioned in the report on the environment. "Today's cabinet decision has certainly put the brakes on the one-sided position in favour of the roads that is taken in the Action Plan Freight Transport and Logistics.