DANUBE STREAM - BOARD of director`s

On 17 September 2019, more than 70 participants gathered in the center of Budapest to discuss the results of the EU co-funded project Danube STREAM. For two and a half years, the waterway administrations of Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, Romania and Bulgaria had worked in this project to improve sustainable transnational waterway management and user information.

During the event, the participants could test the new FIS Portal (www.danubeportal.com) providing actual fairway information for the Danube, from a transnational perspective. It also includes the Danube Waterway Marking Application with information on the current marking system in Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, Romania, and Bulgaria. Furthermore, the D4D portal had been relaunched (www.d4d-portal.info), offering Inland Electronic Navigational Charts for the Danube waterway further European corridors.

The Directors of the Danube Waterway Administration formally signed Service Level Agreements, in which they committed to certain quality levels in waterway management and user information. This shall make sure that project results remain effective also after the end of the project.

PANEL DISCUSSION

The event closed with a panel discussion, with the following panel speakers: Mr. Comanici Radu, from Danube River Cruises, Mr. Skoff Gerhard, from Danube Tourist Commission, Mr. Stoean Antonio, from TTS Group, Mr. Tibor Mátyás, from DDSG Mahart and Mr. Mihailović Ljubisa, from Plovput.

The panelists discussed the potentials and needs of goods transport and passenger shipping on the Danube and reflected on the results of the Danube STREAM project. Sufficient fairway depth was mentioned to be the key issue, information services are seen as important puzzle pieces as well. Reliability, interoperability, and fast transport services were underlined to be of main interest to the users. Commitment to waterway transport from the policy side was strongly demanded.