Mauro Moretti, Chief Executive of the Italian railways Ferrovie dello Stato (FS), was unanimously re-elected as Chairman of the Community of European Railway and Infrastructure Companies (CER) on 4 February. Meeting in Brussels, the CER General Assembly also confirmed the newly composed CER Management Committee and welcomed the private freight and passenger operator OKD Doprava from the Czech Republic as the 74th member of CER.
CER Chairman Mauro Moretti, who had been acting in this position since January 2009, and the CER Management Committee take office for a two-year term ending in December 2011. New members of the 14-strong CER Management Committee are János Berényi, Chief Executive of the Hungarian rail association Hungrail, and Kaido Simmermann, Chief Executive of Latvian railways EVR. Roger Cobbe, Chief Executive of private passenger operator Arriva and representative of the British rail passenger operator association ATOC, was elected as a new CER Vice-Chairman alongside Jan Komárek, Director General of the Czech infrastructure manager SŽDC and Andrzej Wach, President and Chief Executive of Polish railways PKP.
After thanking the 73 delegates of the General Assembly for their renewed confidence in his work, Mauro Moretti stated the main goals for his term to be achieved in the coming two years: “The railways and transport infrastructures need to play a major role in the European Union’s 2020 strategy and the upcoming white paper on transport. An appropriate funding for common rail projects must be ensured through Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) and Structural Funds. We furthermore have to work towards the elimination of national market barriers and proactively support the Single European Transport Area proposed by European Commission Vice-President Siim Kallas. At the same time, the recast of European railway legislation should guarantee proper compensation to railway companies for their public service obligations and adequate financing of rail infrastructure.”
Referring to the European Commission’s plans of decarbonising transport, Mauro Moretti made clear: “The internationalisation of external costs for all transport modes and effective and sustainable mobility must be realised as soon as possible on European level. We need a better integration of the various transport modes, privileging those with the smallest environmental impact, not least to shift heavy traffic from European roads to rail. The railways’ own 2020 objective supports the Commission objective of decarbonisation: we aim for a 30% reduction of our specific CO2 emissions by 2020. A goal to which railway companies and suppliers will contribute by providing more efficient products.”