G-4 Europa
De belangrijkste doelstelling van de stedelijke vertegenwoordigingskantoren is het actief monitoren van ontwikkelingen in het EU beleid.
ID: 978915225123-90
Lobbying Activity
Response to Connecting Europe through high-speed rail
8 May 2025
Amsterdam calls for a high-quality and connected European rail network The City of Amsterdam calls upon the European institutions to support the development of a high-quality, integrated rail network that effectively connects all major European cities and urban centers. Rail transport plays a pivotal role in the transition toward sustainable mobility and is essential in advancing the EUs objectives of climate neutrality, territorial cohesion, and economic resilience. Urban centers such as Amsterdam function as critical nodes within the European transport system and bear the responsibility of integrating long-distance rail into their local mobility networks through coordinated planning and strategic investments. The Amsterdam Metropolitan Area is one of Europes principal economic regions, home to more than 2.5 million inhabitants and over 4,000 international businesses. The region accounts for approximately 25% of the Netherlands gross domestic product and owes much of its economic strength to its international connectivity. To safeguard and further develop this position, it is vital to ensure reliable, efficient, and sustainable rail connections at both the European and regional levels. Amsterdam is strongly committed to advancing sustainable mobility across all scales from local to international. This commitment is driven by both environmental responsibility and the imperative to maintain a high level of livability and an attractive business environment. One of the current key projects enhances the extension of the metro line connecting Amsterdam with Schiphol Airport and Hoofddorp. This development will enable a separation of long-distance and regional public transport flows and create capacity for three additional high-speed international trains per hour a shift that could replace up to 10% of daily air travel with rail. In parallel, Amsterdam is investing in the expansion and modernisation of its international train station to increase capacity and improve connections with the urban core. Looking ahead, freight transport by rail is expected to grow significantly. The region of Amsterdam is directly linked to two of Europes largest seaports, which serve as essential cargo hubs between maritime and inland freight flows. Additionally, the population of Amsterdam is projected to grow by 21% by 2050. Combined with climate-induced challenges to river transport and the green transformation of our economy, these developments will increase the strategic importance of a well-functioning, international freight rail system. Passenger and freight rail largely share the same infrastructure, particularly in and around urban areas. As such, the European ambition to enhance long-distance passenger rail cannot be addressed separately from the need to strengthen freight rail. Both must be developed in tandem to ensure a balanced, efficient, and future-proof mobility system. In this context, the City of Amsterdam respectfully urges the European Union to: Recognise rail transport as a top priority and a key enabler of EU-wide economic development, territorial cohesion, and climate goals; Optimise existing rail capacity, including by enhancing the frequency of international trains on established routes (e.g. AmsterdamLondon, Paris, Brussels, Berlin, and Frankfurt), thereby relieving pressure on airports such as Schiphol; Encourage and support Member States in investing in long-distance rail connectivity between economic and urban centers, including dedicated support for urban hub authorities; Involve cities in decision-making processes concerning railway development and management; Establish a regulatory framework that ensures fair competition in cross-border high-speed rail and promotes affordable fares and interoperable, multi-operator ticketing systems; Support the expansion of night train services across Europe by increasing available time slots, modernising rolling stock, and ensuring adequate capacity
Read full responseResponse to Working Programme of the ITS Directive for the period 2024-2028
26 Aug 2024
We read the draft act with great interest. We applaud the actions being undertaken with regard to the delivery multimodal access nodes identifiers. This is sorely needed to make sure the different organizations active in the domain of mobility are able to reference the same location with ease. As such this will enable faster, better and more reliable deployment of systems related to these access nodes. Additionally we see that the support organized for C-ITS solutions will enable systems to support cross border solutions. This will definitely be helpful in border regions, but also across the continent, because solutions will be able to tap into standard data streams and solutions. This will lead to a more robust set of solutions available to EU citizens and organizations. On the other hand, we find that the text explaining the reasoning behind the support actions seems to ignore the role of ITS Directive in the ability to support cities and regions in two major aspects: 1. The role of enhanced traffic and incident management to not only enable optimizations (see statement Enhanced traffic and incident management services offer the opportunity to better balance and manage traffic on the road network leading to optimised use of road capacity.), but rather to develop solutions that enable cities and regions to be able to maintain a high livability standard. As roads in and around urban areas are more intensely used year over year, the need for solutions to enable mode shift to more sustainable modes is needed. Given the ambitions in the green deal, it makes sense to spend time and resources to create solutions explicitly for this purpose. We suggest that the supporting activities more prominently focus on these use cases. 2. The obligations specified in Annex III of the ITS Directive will force all European road authorities to share data. While this is needed for many solutions to materialize, most road authorities are simply not ready. Moreover: the societal and economic benefits of the data will not be felt by the departments burdened by these law. This means that the increased cost associated with these actions will be difficult to organize. A support program to share best practices and to share end user solutions around the EU would help these organizations to meet these obligations. 3. Finally there is the wish of the European Commission for better public-private cooperation in the domain of mobility management, as formulated in one of the delegated regulations related to the ITS Directive: the Realtime Traffic Information regulation. As one of the cities that has participated in Socrates 2.0, we see that there is great potential if public and private organizations work together. In order for cities and regions to be a serious partner in the discussions relating to the interpretation of the regulations and to make sure the vision of the European Commission is realized, additional support is needed. The root cause for the need for additional support, is the fact that the private organizations active in this domain are experts in this field. Since most cities and regions have a multitude of obligations and digitization is just a means to an end, the pooling of expertise and insights is necessary. Support from the European Commission would be very welcome. We look forward to the final wording of the act.
Read full response27 Jun 2023
The City of Amsterdam is committed to sustainable (international) travel. We strongly encourage the proposal to achieve an improved, unified, and easier way of (international) ticketing for public transport. This will greatly increase the ease of use for travellers. An improved way of ticketing, with more uniformity, will lead to more ease of use for travellers, leading to more international train travel. This furthers the ambition of the City of Amsterdam to have travellers travel more by international train than by plane ("substitution"), contributing to sustainability. It is also important to include urban public transport ticket sales in individual EU countries. In addition, this initiative ensures further integration of European railroads, it leads to improved cooperation of different transport companies. This contributes to unity within Europe and allows for a more coordinated and a common managed approach. We see that the harmonization of travel information through national access points not only enables organizations to create better information services for travellers facilitating them in finding relevant information. It also empowers organizations such as cities in gathering information to evaluate the effect of policy or do analyses before implementing new policy. Furthermore, Amsterdam applauds the inclusion of vehicle occupancy information for scheduled transport and transport on demand (Article 5.4, Annex 2.3). This is particularly useful information for cities who deal with peak amounts of travelers, enabling them to take the necessary measures to accommodate this. Even though many scheduled transport lines operate based on a concession (through public funding), weve seen that obtaining occupancy information is not always easy. However, we see that no formal timetable requirements for this data have been stated in the legislation, which makes this difficult to enforce. Does this mean that the member state is also in charge of the timetable for the occupancy data? We would like to see article 5 of the legislation expanded to include either the timetable for such data or further elaboration making clear this is also a role for the member state.
Read full responseResponse to Review of EU rules on the allocation of slots at Union airports
18 Nov 2022
As far as the city of Amsterdam is concerned, further growth of air traffic in our region is not a given due to reasons of climate, safety, nuisance and public health. Aviation too often limits the building ambitions of Amsterdam and the region. For us, quality of life, climate and housing always take precedence over air travel. We remain committed to fewer night flights and replacing short flights with more international train connections. We are committed to good connectivity as this is necessary for the economy in the metropolitan region. The City of Amsterdam supports the decision the Dutch cabinet has recently made on decreasing air traffic capacity in favor of the living environment. It is a search for balance between the various public interests and tasks. As a multimodal hub with many destinations, the airport contributes to the international connection of Amsterdam and is a source of employment in our region. On the other hand, the impact of aviation on noise pollution, CO2, nitrogen gas emissions and (ultra) fine particles is disproportionately great. A healthy and safe living environment for our residents is paramount. That is why emissions of aviation must be reduced across the board, in line with the EU Green Deal. To also make space for, for example, our housing ambitions. Flying is not a goal in itself for the City of Amsterdam. Not for the environment, not for the climate and not for the people who work at airports. In the discussion about future mobility, Amsterdam continues to put the residential and living environment in first place. This means that the City wants to reduce emissions. In the future, there may be more European airports that will have to downsize air traffic movements for the sake of the living environment and/or to align with the EU Green Deal. If this is the case, it is crucial that a plan is put in place for smart downsizing. After all; if the number of flights decreases, but this smaller number is then filled with larger, polluting and noisy aircrafts, there is little improvement for the living environment. That is why the City of Amsterdam thinks it is important that more instruments are introduced to influence the type of flights; the flights that are important for our regional economy and not just private jets or another 'price stunner'. One important way forward to mitigate the abovementioned on the living environment around airports is by giving Member States the opportunity to implement additional national slot allocation criteria that can be taken into account by the independent coordinator. Relevant criteria for Amsterdam in this context are sustainability and retention of network in relation to a decrease in air traffic. That also means that we have to move towards a fair price for aviation. A pricing system in which the actual costs of flying are included, for example by means of a ticket tax or tax on kerosene. Arrangements must be made about this at a European level, to avoid an uneven playing field between international airports. As far as Amsterdam is concerned, this includes all aviation, including private jets. The enormous increase in air traffic and passengers over the past decade has had a major impact on the quality of life in our city centre. Amsterdam urges the European Commission to take this into account in your regulations. Amsterdam expects the Commission to structure the EU Slot Regulation in such a way that it becomes more flexible. And that exceptions are made for airports in cities where the living environment is under pressure. This includes strong sustainability criteria in relation to economic growth. We would like to take this opportunity to call upon the Commission to incorporate these elements in the revision of the Slot Regulation. Please find enclosed our Position paper with a more detailed explanation. Appendix: Position Paper in English and Dutch.
Read full responseMeeting with Helena Braun (Cabinet of First Vice-President Frans Timmermans) and Eurocities and
29 Nov 2017 · Discussion on affordable housing in EU