Short and Long-Term Consequences of Further Regulation of the European Union Road Haulage Market

The objective of this paper is to assess short and long-term consequences of the new regulatory framework in the European Union road haulage market as proposed by the European Commission in the “Mobility package”. The initiative comprises a number of regulations aimed at technical and social aspects of the road haulage market. This study is based on qualitative research and takes into consideration different perspectives of expert knowledge. On the basis of their own methodological background (the evaluation framework and assessment criteria) the authors compare the expected impacts of the regulations on large and small transport enterprises. The assessment is based on a focused group study within Polish and Hungarian transport companies and several external experts’ views (the list of the consulted experts is given in the acknowledgments section) and finalises with conclusions for different EU regions: the central and peripheral EU countries. The aim of this research is to show different aspects of the impact of the proposed measures on different types of transportbusinesses in Europe and to demonstrate diverse and sometimes opposite effects. The impacts are assessed against different enterprise types (small vs large transport companies) and a company’s base of operation geographical location (core vs periphery). While the Commission states that the regulation is aimed primarily at equalizing companies’ competitive chances, this study argues that the proposal may in fact lead to the more fragmented and less competitive internal road transport market.