More than 15 speakers from across Europe will gather in Riga in the First Day of the Forum to contribute to the main topic of this year’s milestone event for the Rail Baltica project – Rail Baltica – Building a New Economic Corridor. The event will bring together the best ideas, practices and solutions for further implementation of the Rail Baltica Global[1] Project.
The participation at the First Day of the Rail Baltica Global Forum has been confirmed by the Prime Minister of the Republic of Latvia Māris Kučinskis, Lithuanian Minister of Transport and Communications Rokas Masiulis, the Minister of Economics and Communications of the Republic of Estonia Kadri Simson and the Minister of Transportation of the Republic of Latvia Uldis Augulis.
Baiba Rubesa, CEO and Chairperson of the Management Board of “RB Rail AS”, will present her vision on Rail Baltica – a unique, complex and large-scale trans-national infrastructure project forming a new economic corridor.
Strategic and tactical issues regarding the implementation of the “Project of the Century” will be addressed not only from the perspective of national and regional level, but also from the European Union perspective – Catherine Trautmann, European coordinator for the North Sea-Baltic TEN-T Core Network Corridor, and Herald Ruijters, Director for Investment, Innovative and Sustainable Transport, DG Move, EU Commission, have both confirmed their attendance at the event.
Emile Quinet, associate member of Ecole des Ponts-Paris Tech, will give a keynote introduction on the impact that transport infrastructure leaves on regional economic development and connectivity from the international experience. He will be followed by Nauris Kļava, director of the Management Consultations Department of Ernst & Young Baltic Ltd., with the premiere of the Rail Baltica Cost-Benefit Analysis.
Within the plenary session, Rail Baltica – enabling new freight logistics and supply chain solutions, various logistics experts will explore the freight business opportunities that Rail Baltica will bring to the Baltics, Finland and Poland. The topic will be covered by Jorma Härkönen, director of LIMOWA Logistics Center Claster (Finland), Normunds Krūmiņš, chairman of the board of the Latvian Logistics Association (Latvia) and Jakub Kapturzak, deputy director at the Department of Railway Transport of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Construction of the Republic of Poland (Poland).
The necessary focus on the future projections for passenger mobility in the Baltics will be given by Dr. Raimonds Aronietis, a policy analyst at the International Transport Forum at the OECD. He will be followed by Emils Rode, senior expert at the Live Baltic Campus project, on the topic urbanisation of knowledge economy in the Baltic region.
The event will also discuss a variety of topics on the potential for regional connectivity and secondary economic benefits, including benefits of a fast conventional railway – the French story will be presented by Dominique Deau, railway expert, former development director of NExTEO SNCF Reseau and SNCF Mobilites.
Andrew Rees, Chief Economist at HS2 in the United Kingdom, will give an introduction on the macroeconomic benefits from high speed rail infrastructure, sharing the UK experience in a panel discussion on the potential for regional connectivity and secondary economic benefits. The British experience with railway infrastructure as a catalyst for secondary economic benefits as well as the role of commercialization of the project will help to expand the understanding on the impact large scale infrastructure projects leave on the state economies in a broader sense.
However, the topic of Rail Baltica urban impacts and improved city planning in a connected region will be covered by Oskars Redbergs, architect, educator and curator, PhD candidate of Brandenburgische Technische Universität.
A live video stream from both Forum days will be accessible via the event’s website www.railbaltica.org/forum as soon as the event starts.
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[1] Implementation of the Rail Baltica project in the Baltic States.