Madam, - I write in support of Prof G.L. Huxley's plea (November 11th) that the derogation allowing the Irish monopoly on rail freight should end when it expires in March 2009. Road freight in tonne-kms has grown by 30 per cent in Europe in the past 10 years. In the same period, rail freight has grown by only 4 per cent. If these trends continue, we can expect far greater numbers of trucks and/or much bigger trucks on our roads.
The European Commission has predicted that trucks will have overtaken cars by 2030 as the greatest polluters in the transport sector. Railways are much cleaner and far more energy-efficient than roads. They can also be electrified, although Irish Rail's lack of ambition in this direction is most disappointing.
The only European countries that have had some success in moving freight from road to rail are those where deregulation has been implemented, such as the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. If rail is to have any chance of reaching its potential to reduce our overall carbon emissions from transport, it must be deregulated now. - Yours, etc,