Evolution of Transport Connection Across the Border the Role of TGV and Future of the Lorries

Evolution of transport connection across the border The role of TGV and future of the lorries

Border landscapes across Europe Girona 2013

University of Girona University of Eastern Finland Adam Mickiewicz University

Michal Fortuniak Kamil Jawgiel Tomi Nokelainen Kinga Mikolajczyk Isaac Poch Almar Jukka Räsänen Contents

Introduction

Theoretical background Land use Landscape Border Landscape ecology Data and methods Results 1. The evolution of the railway and road network after the World War II 2. Land use changes and impact on landscape 3. The future.Possible scenarios. 3.1 1st scenario: the TGV is useful and dynamizes the region.

3.2 2nd scenario: the TGV is not useful, people prefer road transports.

Conclusions References Introduction Catalonia is a country with a really long history that starts with the Catalan counties and the Aragon crown in the middle Ages. Since then, it has suffered many changes on its political, social and economical organization that have configured the actual situation.

Nowadays, Catalonia is facing a new change that can be very positive if it's well managed, the arrival of the high-speed train and the connection with some of the most important European cities –as Madrid, Lyon or Paris– with this infrastructure.

The construction of this infrastructure have had an effect on the territory, generating many reactions for and against its construction, but we don't want to discuss about the need of the high-speed train, as it is already constructed.

In this report, we will focus on the effects that the high-speed train can have over the area of study, which includes the municipalities of Le Perthus (France) and La Jonquera (Spain). It's a border area with many affections of this border in its economy and society, and we want to know if the arrival of the high-speed train will cause many significant changes on it, specially focusing on the mobility of people and goods.

Another topic we are interested in is the project of the Catalan Eurodistrict creation. This region has a common historical background, but it was divided by the Treaty of the Pyrenees (1659) to end the 30-years War, that confronted Spain and France. With this treaty, the Catalan region was divided into 2 states and this division currently remains.

Now, the arrival of the high-speed train brings the opportunity to have a better communication between the two parts of this region increasing the cooperation and the exchanges between them. It is supposed that the common historical background and the similarities of the people on the two sides of the border will stimulate this relation and will make the creation of the Catalan Eurodistrict possible. Theoretical background

Our report stands between the field of cultural and landscape geography because we examine how transportation on the border areas effects to cultural and landscape structure. The report approaches the concept of landscape through the land use. The report focuses on high speed train and lorry transportation near border area. Since our hypothesis is that land-use of the border region has affected the landscape, it is essential to examine the basic concept of landscape and border. In addition to aforesaid definition of terms we open the concept of landscape ecology which is “a tool” to examine the landscape changes.

Land use

Concept of land use means the different ways for human to use land cover in different meanings (Markuszewska, 2013). This concept is important for the study, because it is one of the main factors which shape the landscape.

Landscape

The concept of landscape can be approached from different viewpoints and different methods. For example landscape can be seen from a holistic point of view where everything is connected with each other in a complex system . On the other hand we can divide the landscape to different components and examine only the specific parts or structures of landscape. (Antrop 2006, 35) In our report we approach concept of landscape from point of view that cultural and natural elements of landscape are connected to each other, especially how human actions effects to the landscape via transportation.

In our study case we also observe how the economy has affected to the improvement of transportation and onwards to border landscape. Especially abundant lorry traffic has generated several truck stops which have a direct impact on the local landscape. The place where train tracks and highway cross the border is part of the Mediterranean corridor from Gibraltar to central Europe. It is the lowest point of Pyrenees and it is the easiest way to Europe from Spain and especially Catalan area. On the southern side of Pyrenees landscape is quite flat and the high speed train track and the highway can be seen far away so transportation has direct impact to the landscape. (Feliu, 2013) New road and train network have also increased the number of people in passing through the border area, for example in La Jonquera thousands of people stop to eat in restaurants (Cabezas, 2013).

Transportation has also indirect impacts to the landscape via land use. For example housing markets along the road and train tracks has increased because of good transportation connection. Traveling time with TGV from Figueres to Barcelona is now 60 minutes but before high speed train time was almost double. This fast connection with Barcelona’s metropolitan area has increased urbanisation along the TGV track. (Feliu, 2013) These different impacts in landscape we are going to study in our report and we try to make some hypothesis how landscape will change in the future. Border

The term border has different meanings and forms. It can be for example natural, cultural or political frontier between two different areas. It can be clearly visible barrier or invisible line that divides. Sometimes border divides area that normally could be considered as one but for particular reasons it is split. (Pastor, 2013) In our report we study border between two country, but also border which divide culturally united Catalan area in two pieces. We concentrate in significance of transportation network for this border area.

The concept of border is important for our study to understand the train and lorry traffic from Catalan side to French side and vice versa. The border crossing transportation plays an important role for local people and also for economy. French people are coming across the border for shopping cheap products like alcohol and tobacco from Spain. (Cabezas, 2013) This movement across the border also has impact on above- mentioned term of landscape.

Landscape ecology

This report examines the concept of a landscape and changes in landscape through landscape ecology. International Association of Landscape Ecology defines term landscape ecology as “study of spatial variation in landscapes at a variety of scales. It includes the biophysical and social causes and consequences of landscape heterogeneity”. In the center of our report is the relationship between human actions and nature as presented as one of the principle of landscape ecology (IALE 2013). Landscape structure is in continuous change because of interactions and conflicts between natural system and human system (Markuszewska, 2013). Data and methods

For the research we had spatial data from the border area, which consisted maps and land use data. We also had articles and oral information from different authors. To support this material we also made interviews in the city of La Jonquera. We interviewed several customers, local people and truck drivers and asked about their opinions and perceptions about future of high speed train connection and its influence on lorry transportation. We have also counted lorries which were going in to the Spain and France to measure day traffic and after two hours we have estimated intensivity per day.

For the evolution research of transportation in the border region we used maps from 1945, 1975 and 2012 to find out how the road and trail network has changed. We made a descriptive comparison between the maps and through the analysis of them, we were able to see where and how transport network has evolved in the border region after the Second World War.

F or the future view of high speed train and the traffic of lorries in the border area we used interviews of people from La Jonquera and information from experts. From the analysis we aim to make different hypothesis considering the future of transportation in border region.

For a land-use change analyze we used land usage maps from Catalonia. For the analysis of land use data we used geographic information systems (GIS). Data was from three different time periods between 1987 and 1997. Results

1. The evolution of the railway and road network after the World War II. Traditionally, the border area between Girona and Pyrenees Orientales has been well connected due to its strategic situation near to the easiest pass across the oriental Pyrenees. This has caused a concentration of infrastructures along the coastal plain. All the main transport infrastructures cross this area: roads, highways, railways.

But this region is not homogeneous, while the southern part has developed a polycentric urban network with good connections between its medium and small cities, the north part has been concentrated into the city of Perpignan and doesn’t have developed so many infrastructures to connect with smaller cities.

In this region, there are a lot of kinds on transport infrastructures that are operative at a different scale. In general, the infrastructures north-south are better developed than the east-west ones, because of the physical characteristics of the territory the interior area is too mountainous to have a good communication network easily.

The local road network is important either in the north than in the south, but in the south it’s in better conditions, it’s denser and there are more fluxes that use these roads.

Then, there are the regional infrastructures –train tracks and national roads–, which connect this area to some important citiesas Barcelona, Montpellier or Toulouse. This corridor is a very ancient heritage, as the Roman Via Augusta passed almost for the same place as these infrastructures.

Finally, there are the supraregional infrastructures, which connect different regions. In this area, the most important infrastructures of this kind are related to the Mediterranean corridor -AP7 and A9 highways and TGV-. These kind of infrastructures are thought to connect big cities as Madrid, Barcelona and Paris, so they facilitate the communications between them, but creates a lot of discontinuities on the territory depending on the connection of each area with this lines.

The facility of communications along the coast (north-south) has marked the mobility tendencies in this area, prioritizing this communications and leaving the communications between the coast and the inland in a second term. This is reflected on the actual infrastructures: as the north-south are being improved constantly, the connections between the coast and the inland doesn’t evolve, or even regress. That’s the case of the narrow-track train Olot-Girona and Girona-Sant Feliu de Guíxols, that was operational between 1892 and 1969. On the French side, we found another example in the Yellow Train, which connects Perpignan and Villefranche de Conflent with la Tor de Querol, but today this transpyrenean line has mostly a touristic use.

2. Land use changes and impact on landscape From land use maps we are focusing to find the influence of transportation network on local land use and thus how it has affected the border landscape. Due to availability of the data we were only able to examine the Spanish side of the border. Unfortunately land use maps cover only time period from 1987 to 1997 so we were not able to observe the recent changes in land usage, neither we can see the impacts of fast growth of lorry traffic in the last decade. Despite the quality of material we can still do some comparison between land use maps. Our study of land usage focuses on area of three counties: la Jonquera, Agullana and Capmany. Since high speed rail wasn’t build at time of the maps, we have to focus on impact of lorry traffic. When examining the maps, we can see that there hasn’t been any remarkable changes in land use. Small changes in size of urban areas can be seen alongside the highway in city of la Jonquera. There are also visible changes in Capmany in the southeastern part of the map. In northern parts of la Jonquera, near border we can see some increase in woods and meadows class. One reason for small land use changes is that large part of the la Jonquera county is conserved area (Cabezas, 2013). However as we have mentioned earlier we have to take into account that high speed rail is yet to build. Although the rail largely follows the highway it would have direct impact on land use and thus on landscape.

3. The future.Possible scenarios. 3.1 1st scenario: the TGV is useful and dynamizes the region.

Factors:

ƒ People think that the price of the TGV tickets is acceptable. ƒ Fuel price increases. ƒ Schedule’s combination is well-designed. ƒ Cooperation between north and south regions is intensified. ƒ People from big cities move to medium cities with TGV stations.

In the future, the role of TGV will increase so much that people will replace their travels by other transports and will use TGV. That will be the result of a change of the urban structure and of the mobility of people, that will have the possibility to go to further cities in less time, and they will have more influence of these cities’ markets on their daily life. Perpignan and Figueres will become cities on the metropolitan time area of Barcelona –less than 1 hour–, so people will be able to live in these cities looking for a better quality of life while they keep their jobs on the big city. With these urban changes, the role of the medium cities with TGV station will be intensified and the urban system of the region won’t be so unequal, the big cities will lose some weight in favour of the medium ones. That change on the urban network will cause the phenomenon known as urban sprawl, causing the urbanization of new parts of the territory, with all the implications it has on the rural areas and generating a lot of periurban space, which is very difficult to plan. The whole agglomeration will extend, generating a huge urban area along the track of the TGV, with important poles of this urban network on the cities with a station. This urban growing may be very positive for these cities, but has a high risk to generate a lineal urban structure with many imbalances between the areas near the TGV stations and the rest of the territory –an urban structure with many discontinuities–. This urban sprawl will have a direct effect on the construction sector and the housing market of the areas near to the stations, revaluing these areas and making them more likely to suffer speculative processes.

With a schedule and price adapted to the people’s needs, they’ll use the TGV more often and it will replace other transports on many kinds of travels (for entertainment, for work, for transporting goods). And the economy of the medium cities would have opportunities to be more dynamic, taking advantage of the influence of big cities which whom it’ll have direct connection.

The first sector to note the changes –apart from construction– is the sector of hotels and restoration. That can experiment huge increments if there’s a good strategy to promote the values of the medium cities and use the new opportunities that the TGV brings. Travel agencies will also note the effects of this new infrastructure, as a new way to travel and because of the creation of new tourist destinations. Cities with a station will be able to receive more visitors from more distant places, so they’ll be able to develop an important tourist sector. The construction of a TGV will have an effect into the urban structure of the city, because the area surrounding the station will be constructed and will begin to offer new services, specially commercial and recreational ones.

People mobility will change, as they can have access to more services from the big cities. It can have a positive effect on the quality of life of people in these smaller cities, but can also have a negative effect on the local services, that might not be able to compete with the ones on the biggest cities. New consume habits on the local people of medium cities may cause the disappearance of the local commercial offer, with very negative effects on the local economy.

The TGV won’t have an impact on the localization of industries or companies at short term, but maybe at long term can be a determining factor to consider, favouring the areas near to TGV stations.

It also can have an impact on the mobility between the medium cities in the TGV line, not only between them and the big cities. The proximity between Girona, Figueres and Perpignan will make the cooperation programmes become more usual and frequent, and the three cities will progressively start to work as an urban unit with more than 250.000 inhabitants, sharing a lot of services and specializing to have a role into this urban system.

Perpignan will have more difficulties than Figueres or Girona to fit in this new urban network, as it’s mainly located in the Spanish part of this region and probably the most used languages tot exchange will be Catalan and Spanish. So the increase of the relationships between these cities will have an effect on the language in Perpignan, where Catalan and Spanish will start to have a more important role in the activities in the city. It also can happen in the opposite way, but is less probable.

In the further future, when the whole line from Barcelona to Paris is finished, high- speed trains will be able to compete even with aerial transport in the continental scale, because there won’t be much difference of travelling time and the train is more comfortable, as it moves you between the city centres, you don’t have to move to the airport (that’s usually located quite far from city centre).

3.2 2nd scenario: the TGV is not useful, people prefer road transports.

Factors:

ƒ People think that the price of the TGV tickets is too expensive. ƒ Fuel price doesn't increase so much. ƒ Schedule’s combination is badly-designed. ƒ Cooperation between north and south regions is not intensified. ƒ People from big cities don't move to medium cities with TGV stations.

According to this scenario, people won't use the TGV and they'll keep using road transports and the normal train. The main factor that can lead to this scenario is the high price of the TGV train tickets compared to the earning of time that it represents, as well as a little raising on the fuel price, that allows a cheaper transporting using road transports. A bad planning of the schedules can cause this lack of use of the TGV. For example, nowadays it's impossible to go by TGV to Barcelona and arrive before 8:00am to go working.

This low use of the TGV causes a huge effect on the expectations of cities like Figueres and Perpignan, that had planned big increases in their economy and population as a consequence of the arrival of the TGV. People don't use the TGV on their daily lives, only on holidays or to travel in some special occasions. As people don't use this transport, the communications between Barcelona and these cities don't increase and the Barcelona's market doesn't have a growing influence on the medium cities. The plans of the small cities don't become real and TGV doesn't contribute to their development, it has no impact on the location of companies and industries. The housing market is not affected and a lot of projects that have already been started fail and produce important losses on this sector. It takes to a difficult situation for the creation of the Catalan Eurodistrict, because even thought Perpignan is still on the periphery of France, the influence of the French cities keeps being bigger than the influence of Barcelona.

Because of the kind of products that they carry -most of all fresh products as oranges or vegetables-, the transportation of goods keeps using lorries as the main way to move this goods. It generates another fail for the TGV strategy, because it can't replace the lorries and create a new corridor between the south and the north of Europe.

Another determining factor that can stop the Eurodistrict project development is the opposition of the French and Spanish governments. These institutions have a lot of power over the region and in the EU context and will determine the future of this region. For now, the French government has show a complete lack of interest in the creation of the Mediterranean corridor and in the connection with Spain, so it may have a big effect on the project.

The role of the language difference can be more important than expected firstly and it may difficult the cooperation. This fact, added to the increase of the French influence over Perpignan that will represent the connection with Montpellier and Lyon with TGV can represent another negative impact.

The benefit of that scenario would be the avoiding of the urban sprawl that it's expected that the TGV could cause. It will be possible to move faster between the cities, but too expensive to do it regularly, so people don't change their place of living and the periurbanization of the territory is not so intense. Conclusions The conclusion of our report is that the high-speed train will not have a significant impact on the area of study (La Jonquera and Le Perthus), but will have an enormous impact in a biggest scale, the relations between north and south Catalonia.

The evolution of the communications in the area of study will continue its historical dynamics of communicating in a north-south direction, but with lots of lacks in the east- west communication. This is not seen as a problem, as there is not a need of this communications for now. The most important infrastructures follow a tendency of concentration on the line named as the Mediterranean Corridor, that will win importance with the finishing of the high-speed train line between Barcelona and Paris, expected for 2020.

With the already constructed part, the influence of the city of Barcelona will increase a lot, and it will empower the relations between this city and the border regions, traditionally forgotten. We think that it will take a long time to see real changes in the society and economy, because the high-speed train construction is just finished and right now, people is only thinking about the possibilities it has, but not applying real projects using this train. We expect an increase of the use of this kind of transport helped by the Spanish government's politics of lowering ticket's prices and encouraging people to use this train.

We are uncertain on the impact that the train will have over Perpignan, Figueres and Girona, because it is too soon to see the real impact or to study any tendency and make future scenarios based on objective data. Even thought, we think that it will have a very positive impact on Girona, specially on the tourism of the town, that is already experimenting some increases since the arrival of the high-speed train. In our opinion, Perpignan and Figueres will have to work harder to take advantage of the connection with Barcelona, as they are smaller and further towns than Girona, they are less attractive to companies and people from Barcelona, but if they design the correct strategies, they can receive positive inputs from this infrastructure.

About the future of lorries, we think that the train will not have an important impact on the transporting of goods. As almost all the goods that lorries carry are fresh goods that need to be transported fast and directly to the points where they will be consumed, they will keep going by lorries, not using the high-speed train. References

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