Cars and lorries

The United States has the highest car ownership in the region with 776 cars per 1000 population. Malta, Cyprus and Portugal all have 100 or more lorries per 1000 population which is more than double that of most other ECE countries. Luxembourg has the highest rate of new cars registered in the region in 2001 (Table 8.1).

Fuel consumption and prices

Even in some of the least developed countries in the region, road transport accounts for a sizeable portion of total energy consumption (Table 8.2). In several countries leaded petrol is no longer used and everywhere else the share of unleaded petrol is growing. Governments encourage the use of unleaded petrol by keeping the price lower than leaded petrol (Tables 8.3 and 8.4).

Car production

Germany and the United States were the highest car producers in the ECE region in 2001, producing over 400 000 cars per month. France is the third with over 250 000 cars per month (Table 8.5).

Road accidents

In 2000 almost 150 000 people died as a result of traffic accidents in the ECE region. This is an improvement over the 1998 figure of approximately 165 000 and particularly over the 1990 figure of over 215 000 deaths (it is too early to say anything about 2001 as data from several countries were not yet available). Latvia, Russian Federation, Lithuania and Greece experienced the highest rates of persons killed per population. Each of these countries had approximately, or exceeded 20 deaths per 100 000 population. The safest places to drive in 2000 were the United Kingdom, Norway and Armenia where approximately six persons per 100 000 population were killed in road accidents (Table 8.6 and Figure 8.7).

Railways

United States and the Russian Federation transport the highest tonnage of freight on their railway systems, while the number of passengers-kilometres transported is highest in the Russian Federation, France and Germany. From 1992 to 2001, most CIS countries experienced a considerable decrease in freight and passenger rail transport, although there was a slight upturn after 1995 in freight transport in a few CIS countries (Table 8.8). Nearly 80 per cent of goods are transported by road in western Europe, and the trend is increasing, while rail transport is used for less than 20 percent. In central and eastern Europe the share of road transport has grown substantially from 1990 to 2000. In 2000 approximately 55% of goods were transported by road compared with approximately 45% by rail. In the CIS countries, goods are shipped predominantly by rail (Figure 8.10). The Czech Republic, Belgium, Luxembourg and Germany are the countries with the most comprehensive railway systems. They all operated at least 10 kilometres of railway lines per 100 square kilometres (Figure 8.9).

Air Transport

In 2001 the largest airport in the ECE region in terms of numbers of passengers serviced was in Atlanta, Georgia, in the United States. The European airport with the largest number of passengers in 2001 was London-Heathrow in the United Kingdom. The busiest airport for cargo activity in 2001 was in Memphis, Tennessee in the United States. (Table 8.11).

Tourism

France is the most visited country in the ECE region with more than 75 million tourist arrivals in 2000. It is followed by the United States, Spain and Italy, which had 40-50 million tourist visits in 2000 (Table 8.13). Domestic tourism is gaining popularity in many countries. Most notable in this regard are Germany, Italy and France with more than 100 million overnight stays in hotels by domestic tourists (Table 8.13). The United States, Spain, Italy and France were the highest earners from tourism in terms of tourism expenditure in US dollars (Table 8.16). Cyprus had by far the largest tourism receipts per capita in 2000. Along with Malta, Austria and Switzerland, it earned over 1000 US dollars per capita from tourism. In 2000 Icelandic travellers spent the most in per capita terms for tourism and travel (over 1600 USD on average), followed by Austrians (over 1100 USD) (Table 8.18).

Tables and charts

The following tables are available in the restricted area (if you do not have a user ID and password, register here.):

8.1 Roads, passenger cars and lorries

8.2 Share of road traffic in total energy consumption, 2000

8.3 Share of main fuels for motor vehicles, latest year

8.4 Motor fuel price data for selected countries, 2000

8.5 Production of passenger cars, 2001

8.6 Road traffic accidents

8.7 Number of persons killed in road traffic accidents, 2000/2001

8.8 Railway networks, staff and traffic, 1991-2001

8.9 Kilometres of railway lines operated per 100 square kilometres, 2000/2001

8.10 Transport trends in ECE subregions

8.11 ECE airports with 20 million passengers or more, by total passengers and cargo, 2001

8.12 Airports in the ECE region having more than 15 million international passengers

8.13 International and domestic tourism, 1996-2000

8.14 Average annual change in outbound tourism, 1996-2000

8.15 Number of international departures per capita, 2000

8.16 Tourism expenditure, 1996-2000

8.17 Tourism receipts per capita, 2000

8.18 Tourism expenditures abroad per capita, 2000