Ballis A., Yannis G., Tsamboulas D., “The changing face of the European operational environment in the freight transport”, Proceedings of the 2nd Convention “Conflict and cooperation”, European Association for the Advancement of Social Sciences, Nicosia, March 1997.

The severe environmental and safety problems that the continuous increase of the road traffic creates in the European network, require the shift of  the transport patterns to the environmental friendly modes.  For the freight transport this means a shift from road to combined transport.  In the macro-scale, regulatory initiatives should provide the framework for the efficient competition environment, making transport system fairer and more efficient, whereas transport chain actors should adjust their transport behaviour and redefine their strategies inside this new environment. The associated decisions must be based on a multi-criteria approach since strong  lobby interests and severe social reactions are conflicting in this  -very sensitive for the whole economy- sector. Significant decisions must also be taken in micro-scale. The reorganisation of the traditional transport companies requires new market strategies and imposes personnel restructuring and new working environment that are opposing the today’s organisational structures. In the long run, the application of new technologies in the intra- and inter-organisation of the transport companies has the potential to transform radically the sector structure, even redefine the transport concept.