92002E1230

WRITTEN QUESTION E-1230/02

by Luciano Caveri (ELDR) to the Commission

(29 April 2002)

Subject: 'Telepass' standard

For some years now an automatic toll collection system called Telepass has been in widespread use on the Italian motorway network. Can the Commission state whether this standard could be exported to other EU countries, or whether it would be preferable to develop a new and more modern single standard for Union-wide application, in the context of infrastructure charging?

Answer given by Mrs de Palacio on behalf of the Commission

(3 June 2002)

Telepass is the first automatic toll collection system in widespread use in Europe. It was introduced in the early 1990s and now has over 2 million subscribers in Italy.

However, general application of this system beyond the frontiers of Italy raises a series of problems:

- first, several European countries have already installed other systems nationwide: Portugal, France and Spain. Others, such as Germany or the Netherlands, are also moving towards other solutions;

- second, the European standardisation bodies have repeatedly refused to adopt Telepass as the European standard;

- finally, this system is now ageing and more sophisticated technologies have emerged which make it possible, for example, to avoid radio interference between adjacent tollbooths, one problem encountered with Telepass in certain cases.

In response to the failed attempts at national level and by the standardisation bodies and drawing on, inter alia, the technical work carried out in recent months on research projects and the trans-European networks, the Commission will be submitting a proposal for a directive on the interoperability of electronic road toll systems in Europe as part of its work programme for 2002. As announced in the September 2001 White Paper European transport policy for 2010: time to decide1(1), the objective is to make a pan-European automatic toll collection service available on the entire toll network in Europe and for vehicles of all types between 2005 and 2008. Such a service by no means rules out using other systems alongside it to cater for local or national requirements. The system will have to be based on modern, efficient technology available all over Europe and capable of offering other value-added services to motorists and travellers.

(1) COM(2001) 370 final.