International Road Federation

FAIR COMPETITION IN TRANSPORT:

WHY GOOD ROADS MATTER

www.IRFnews.org

IRF Then: Foundations &

Milestones
1948: IRF is chartered
in Washington, DC
1949: First IRF Fellowships awarded
1951: First IRF Professional of the Year
awarded
1952: 1st IRF World Meeting
1954: Establishment of IREF
1975: IRF begins accepting Governments
2001: Establishment of the GRAAs
1991: Establishment of IREF Future Fund
2006: 1st Regional Congress in Latin
America
2011: 1,250th IRF Fellow enters Fellowship
2013: 17th IRF World Meeting & Exhibition
WWW.IRFNEWS.ORG
2014: Launch of IRF Examiner
2014: 100th GRAA presented

IRF Today
Membership Base: 92 countries (73 new members in
2014)
Fellowships Awarded: 1,347 to Fellows in 118
countries worldwide
4 Regional Congresses / year
Capacity-strengthening industry partner for
Multilateral Institutions

Why Good Roads Matter:

An Asset for Europes Economies
Network Quality Affects Trade
A Converging Agenda

Europes Roads
Length of network 5.5 million km
Estimated asset value: 8.000 bn
(replacement value source: ERF)
0.8% of GDP invested in road
infrastructure (1.5% in 1970s)

Europes Roads

EU GDP: 12.700 billion

Roads: 8.000 billion

An Ageing
Network
Functional qualities decrease under the combined
effects of weather and traffic

Theoretical life expectancy of road elements:

upper layer/ wearing course: 8 - 26 year
bearing layer/ base course: 55 - 60 years
bridge: 50 - 110 years
tunnel: 90 - 130 years

An Ageing
Network
Time scale of infrastructure vs political calendars:
Deferred maintenance investments seen by some
governments as a way to present balanced books
Effects on level of service (congestion, safety,
environmental, etc.) typically appear a few years later,
with higher costs for users and road agencies
The need for costly maintenance increases over time

Impact of backlog
For road
agencies

Impact of backlog
and for
road users

Impact of backlog

Why Good Roads Matter:

An Asset for Europes Economies
Network Quality Affects Trade
A Converging Agenda

Network Quality vs.

Trade
Transport

Transport

Infrastructu

Services

re Index

Index

Source: Global
Enabling Trade
Report, 2014

Network Quality vs.

Trade
Ambitious but feasible road upgrade in ECA could
increase trade by 50% over baseline, exceeding the
expected gains from tariff reductions or trade
facilitation programs of comparable scope
Total intraregional trade could be increased by 30%
by upgrading roads in just three countries - Albania,
Hungary and Romania.

Source: World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 4104

Network Quality vs.

Trade
Evaluating Turkeys road upgrade program:
Distance elasticity of trade flows between lowquality and high-quality roads lies between 0.1 and
0.27
Program generated a 10-year discounted stream
of additional export revenues that amount to 919% of the value of the investment.

Source: A. Kerem Cosar, Banu Demir, July 2014

Why Good Roads Matter:

An Asset for Europes Economies
Network Quality Affects Trade
A Converging Agenda

Communication is
Key
Time for a societal
discussion on roads
& road transport
Are we
communicating with
all these publics?
Source: E-Motion, inspiring action for
better roads in Europe

Communication is
Key

Communication is
Key

IRF Europe & Central Asia

Congress
Istanbul, September 15-18
Dual focus on infrastructure and
transport corridors
Scientific & Policy Tracks
Training workshops & partner
sessions

www.IRFnews.org