Challenges to implementing motorways of the sea concept—lessons from the past

Abstract

Establishing a European wide high-quality shipping links and integrating them with the trans-European Transport networks has been the vision of the European Commission (EC) to reduce land transport congestion under the Motorways of the Sea (MoS) concept. However, in spite of strong political backing and favourable policy initiatives, MoS projects have met with limited success. Establishing MoS is complex because of its international scope and involvement of a number of public and private stakeholders with conflicting objectives and goals. The paper attempts to identify critical factors for establishing viable MoS projects. The paper reviews the development of the MoS concept to understand the expectations of the EC and the concerns of the important stakeholders. The present status of these policy actions is reviewed and their possible effect on the performance of MoS projects is estimated. Case studies of short sea shipping initiatives in different parts of Europe and the world are reviewed to learn from their successes and failures. This knowledge is applied to find critical factors for the success of MoS projects in the European context.