Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-02-11-Speech-2-270"
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"en.20030211.11.2-270"2
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"Mr President, I would firstly like to thank and congratulate the rapporteur, Mr Izquierdo, on his excellent work. Secondly, I would like to apologise to the Commissioner, because this is the first time in this legislature that this Member will refer expressly to his region, Andalusia.
Andalusia – as you know – is one of the most extensive territories of the European Union, with almost 8 million inhabitants and in 2002 it received 21 million visitors who generated EUR 13 200 million. As you know, it is one of the Union’s Objective 1 regions, with one of the lowest levels of income, but it survives thanks to agriculture and tourism.
The report itself talks of the substantial impact of transport on European tourism and the need to create north-south corridors in order to facilitate the free trade area between Europe and the Mediterranean, as well as the development of the outermost regions. Well, what do you make, ladies and gentlemen, of the fact that Algeciras, which is the European Union’s largest Mediterranean container port, has just one connection, by rail, with the interior, which follows a route which is more than a century old and which allows an average of no greater than 17 km/h? Did you know that the only Mediterranean coastal area in the whole of the European Union which does not have a motorway is between the provinces of Malaga and Almeria? Well, between them is located the province of Granada, which has the lowest income in Spain and in Europe. If infrastructures do not get there, how are we going to develop? These are examples of the infrastructure deficit of the peripheral regions of the Union.
While the different Community policies allow these bottlenecks, there is little or nothing we can do to create cohesive transport and intermodality from social and environmental points of view.
I am glad that this report has not forgotten users of two-wheeled vehicles, who are extremely important in terms of individual transport and its sustainability in cities, which, thanks to them, are more human places to be. We must continue to work to increase safety standards in transport and its infrastructures, pinpointing black spots and protecting them. Ladies and gentlemen, if only for money, let us work, let us invest more in safety. One death costs us EUR 1 million and we have 40 000 deaths a year on the roads.
The report does not mention non-transport. We must work on an innovative aspect, which is the pedestrianisation of the cities."@en1
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