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The Treaty of Rome, the agreement establishing the structure of what is today the EU, recognized the important role that transport policy could play in developing a European common market. The Treaty called for the development of a common transport policy that would provide a framework within which member countries could develop their own transport networks, while at the same time improving the performance characteristics of the European transport system as a whole. By providing well-matched system improvements whose benefits will assist any individual country, the EU was targeting strategic investments whose net impact would be of benefit to the entire EU. Given that national transport networks serve as the foundation for the prospective European network, it is not surprising that one of the initial challenges facing the EU in the transport sector was establishing the interconnection of services and infrastructure for trans-European travel.

Europe is now facing a problem of managing en ever growing stream of good and freights coming in and going out of the countries inside the UE as well as in international sector when trading with foreign countries. Most problems however are caused by the elimination of the borders inside Europe, which led to tourists’ boom, what caused a problem though was not tourists, but the increasing number of freight hauling throughout all of Europe. At that time Europe was not ready for such a huge change in cargo transportation. Currently European government which comprises of many countries is trying to implement changes that would help distribute evenly the amount of cargo. The Common Transport Policy which was introduced a couple of years ago mainly focused on the transport safety, rail, roads, maritime and aviation systems; all of the constituents had also to be made interoperable and it was essential to make much better use of what already existed at the time. For Europeans the issue was to reduce the use of the roads which was overcrowded due to the borders elimination and to continue on the inland water ways and railroads. The solution to this problem would also resolve another matter of energy conservation which is a vital concern of modern Europe. This Common Transport Policy is aimed at lowering risks of those transporting goods as well, as the new system assumes that there will be no bottleneck in a newly structured scheme. According to the approximate figures with the use of the new policy, transporting by railroads and inland waters ways will grow by 15%, and the pressure on the roads will reduce by 12% which would lead to a better coordinated work without congestions and storing of goods for days without moving. Concluding all of the said above, Europe has found a way to solve their transportation problems, although it still needs a lot of work it definitely will pay back soon with an economic growth and happier citizens.

What America faces now is a real transportation crisis. It is a matter of passenger carrying as well as freight transportation. Although the statistics show that international trade has been growing steadily in the United States, there are issues that can not be neglected. The UE example shows that a critical role for multinational efforts is to foster open competition and open borders (for instance between Canada and the US, or Japan and US). Free access allows the market to take advantage of productivity economies and results in market-reflective decisions, which will boost American and other countries economies and result in overall improvement. The European experience suggests that there might have to be different market incentives and rules for different segments of the transportation system (e.g., inter modal terminals, national rail service, inland water, etc.). The US having a lot of land unused contrary to the Europe or Japan, has to make the most of what is has, thus developing railroad infrastructure and inland water ways, through rivers and canals. Too much weight has been put on the roads in the US these days and they have been damaged severely by trucks hauling tones and tones of goods each day. This weight has to be distributed more evenly between the transportation channels.

Another important issue in the American transportation system s lack of trained personnel. In case of Europe, it has incorporated human resource development and training as an important component of any public and private initiative aimed at improving freight movements. This training has been done primarily to raise the quality of life of the communities that are affected by freight facilities and operations. Consequently is people working in this business have a better life, it will result in a better performance.

Overall investigation of both American and European (international) transportation systems showed that they need thorough improvements. First there needs to be some general strategy identified, and then it should be implemented in regard to the national economic/infrastructure factors and international trends.