The European Parliament released “Transport at a crossroads”, a report on the environmental impact of public transit, shipping, and freight, this month. The findings ranged the gamut from encouraging- air pollutants from vehicles are on the decline- to less than- that greenhouse gas emissions have increased 26% from 1990 to 2006. Lead researcher Jacqueline McGlade perhaps summed it up best when she said:

We know the technology exists to tackle impacts of the transport sector on Europe’s environment. However, many vehicles rolling off production lines are anything but green, the freight sector still favours the least efficient transport modes and railways across the EU still do not have a unified system.

The report urged European nations to develop transport policies that make transport more efficient and to respond to consumer demand, which the report often linked to rising fuel costs- the report shows a 25% increase in bus usage when fuel prices increased by 10%.

Image: European transport