ALPENCORS - Alpen Corridor South
Overview
Background & policy context:
The Alpencors Project plan stems from the crossover of two fundamental Community conceptions:
- The European Space Development Perspective (ESDP - 1999);
- The documents on the Trans-European corridors produced in the '90s under the TEN-T strategy.
The first conception is based on principles, the second on objectives: both are subject to integration and developments by the Commission, the Parliament and the Council. In particular, the transport policy appears to be one of the most dynamic sectors of the Community framework.
Alpencors Project integrates this thematic approach by using as an instrument the programme Interreg III B Alpine Space (2000-2006), but with a bottom up attitude: that is construing principles, objectives and processes as a complex of interests at the local level to build a common strategy of economic and space development for a part of the European territory.
Objectives:
To the concepts of continental centre, near-to-centre and periphery we can associate, with good approximation, basic infrastructures and economic development rates proportionally different in quality and intensity, decreasing from the centre to the periphery. The Alpencors Project plan concerns a number of regions which can be considered near-to-centre, but that aim at strengthening their centrality and at representing a bridge with the more peripheral areas westward, eastward and southward of that portion of corridor taken into account. The relations between centre and periphery, in the framework of a perspective of balanced and cohesive continental development, are a relevant element from the economic, social and environmental points of view, and the corridor policy is a spreading instrument for a more balanced develpoment.
The project aims to contribute to the Corridor Policy elaborating Guidelines based on a bottom up multidisciplinary approach.
Methodology:
The peculiar approach suggested by Alpencors is based on the following premises:
- The fact of being a multimodal corridor which aims at strengthening both the multiple modality and the logistics of the transport system;
- The fact of being constituted by a territorial belt of which existing urban and industrial systems are an integral part;
- The fact of involving regions and cities with extremely different economic bases;
- The fact of being an instrument which aims at contributing to the economic integration among European countries and regions, both eastern and western;
- The fact of contributing to build a more balanced and cohesive European space. Actually in Europe there is a precise relation between ongoing economic development, infrastructures and access and exchange opportunity within market economy.
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