EU Welcomes New TEN GuidelinesThe European Parliament and Council adopted 30 priority projects of the Trans-European transport Network (TEN) on 21st April, a few days before the enlargement of the EU to ten new members (Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia). The new guidelines include a list of 30 priority projects which are declared to be of European interest. The cost of these projects is approximately EUR225 billion. The extension of major European corridors to the new member states should help make enlargement a success and provide the Union with a new opportunity to reduce congestion, improve accessibility and encourage intermodality. The list of projects aims at ensuring modal shift and more sustainable mobility patterns by focusing investments in rail and sea transport. Strong focus is put on cross-border projects as these are typically the most difficult ones to implement. The total cost of completion of the trans-European transport network, including the projects of common interest not identified as priority projects, will be EUR600 billion. Implementation of the priority projects should produce time savings for international transport, help reduce the growing pollution due to transport and contribute to more balanced spatial development. The fact that the priority projects are declared of European interest will make it easier to grant financing from the Cohesion Fund and the Structural Funds. New rules increase the co-funding rate from 10% to 20% for those projects which cross borders and natural barriers. This rate should provide a greater incentive for implementation of public-private partnerships. The investments in the TEN projects would reduce congestion on roads by 14% and the monetary value of time savings to international traffic is approximately EUR8 billion per year. These benefits would stimulate the economy of the enlarged EU, increase the GDP between 0.14% and 0.30% and create half a million to one million new jobs. Noticeable projects including extensive tunnelling are for example the Lyon Turin high speed link, the Brenner base tunnel, the Kufstein-Innsbruck line, the Lisbon-Porto-Madrid high speed line, the Figueras-Perpignan high speed line, the Helsinki-Turku motorway or the new high-capacity rail axis across the Pyrenees. 20/04.