Transport in the European Union

The European Union (EU) is a family of democratic European countries, its member states having set up common institutions to which they delegate some of their sovereignty so that decisions on specific matters of joint interest can be made democratically at European level. Starting with 6 member states in 1957, the EU increased in size to 12 in 1986, 15 in 1995, 25 in 2004 and 27 in 2007.

In 2006, the population of the EU15 was 388 million and of the EU25, 462 million. In 2004, the GDP per head was 25,675 Euro for the EU15 and 22,592 Euro for EU25. These compare with 34,114 Euro for the USA and 26,387 Euro for the UK. In 2004 the total GDP of EU15 was similar to that of the USA.

Statistics for the EU are provided by Eurostats. In addition to data for individual countries, Eurostats provides collected data for the EU15 and EU25 states. It also provides data for candidate countries such that data for EU25 and EU27 can be derived for the period before any increase in the size of the European Union.

Car ownership per person varies greatly between states, ranging in 2005 from 660 per 1,000 in Luxembourg, 590 in Italy, 242 in the Slovak Republic and 287 in Hungary. Some of the countries with the best road safety in the world are members of the EU, notably Sweden, the Netherlands and Britain, with fatality rates of 45 to 55 per million persons and 45 to 50 per 100 million vehicle kilometres. However, some countries such as Poland, Greece, Latvia and Lithuania have poor records, with fatality rates of 140 to 220 per million population and 220 to 405 per 100 million population vehicle kilometres.

The information you see above is just a sample of what we have available in the Transport Statistics Database. Additional information can be accessed by using the Table & Graph Builder. Data about the EU can be found in the following data sets:

• General & Infrastructure
• Energy & Emissions
• Safety
• Traffic & Travel
• Vehicle Stock

• European Conference of Ministers of Transport (ECMT) - Road Fatalities 2005
• International Traffic Safety Data and Analysis Group (IRTAD)
• International Transport Forum
• EU Energy and Transport in Figures - 2006
• EU Energy and Transport in Figures - 2007
• EU Energy and Transport Trends to 2030
• United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UN ECE) Transport Statistics
• United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UN ECE) Road Traffic Accidents
• International Road Federation (IRF) - World Road Statistics 2007
• London School of Economics (LSE) Library - Transport Statistics
• European Road Assessment Programme (EuroRAP)