Trans-European Transport Networks (TEN-T)
The Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) plays a crucial role in securing the unrestricted mobility
of people and goods across the European Union. It includes all modes of transport and carries about half
of all freight and passenger movements. One of the key objectives in creating a multimodal network is to
ensure that the most appropriate transport mode may be chosen for each stage of a journey: intermodality
makes better use of existing infrastructure and resources. This gives users more options, and promotes a
modal shift away from road transport that is foreseen to suffer from increased congestion, accidents, and
environmental damage in the future. By 2020 the TEN-T will include 89500 km of roads, 94000 km of railways (
including some 20000 km of high speed rail lines allowing for speeds of at least 200km/h), 11250 km of inland
waterways (including some 210 inland ports), whilst there are a further 294 sea ports and some 366 airports.
The network will be completed by the construction of the so-called “missing links” and the upgrade of the
existing infrastructure since for each mode the infrastructure requirements and the main problems to be
addressed are different. It is expected that TEN-T will have a huge impact in reducing journey time
for people and goods, to handle the rapidly increasing volumes of freight, and to bring important
dividends to the environment.
For further information on Trans-European Transport Networks visit:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/ten/transport/index_en.htm