What are traffic nodes?

Answer 1

Without traffic nodes, international road and railway connections as well as vessels and airlines cannot be connected to a region. That is why the localisation and quality of transport nodes for passengers and goods are of strategic importance for the accessibility and mobility of the Öresund region. Examples of traffic nodes are airports, railway terminals for passengers and goods, industrial harbours, transport centres, distribution terminals and the like. These nodes function to assure the supply of specific forms of transport to the region; they also serve as places of coordination for different modes of transport and transfers concerning destinations for passengers and goods. Because of the increasing globalisation for trade in goods and the increasing distances of passenger trips, there is an increasing need for passengers to use different forms of transport; there is also an increasing need to reload goods from container vessels to road transport. Therefore internationally oriented transport nodes will play an especially important role for the coordination between many different forms of transport and the connections to and from the Öresund region in order to assure smooth mobility.

The most important traffic node for the international accessibility to and from the Öresund region is Copenhagen's Kastrup airport. 21.5 million passengers used the airport in 2008. An important strength of this airport is its central location in the Öresund region- not only in relation to the geography of the region but also in relation to the population density of the region. In addition, the airport has good accessibility considering public transport, which is reflected in passengers' choice of transport to and from the airport. 54 percent of all passengers to and from Copenhagen airport used public transport in 2008, while the European ave-rage was 32 percent.

The airport runways at Kastrup have sufficient capacity far into the future. With the right construction of the airport's other facilities, we can assume that the airport can handle up to three times more passengers than what it can today. Today Copenhagen airport acts as a centre for European and intercontinental flights of Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS); nearly half of the airport passengers in 2008 flew with SAS. On the one hand, the function as a transit hub for SAS is attractive for many travellers, but on the other hand, it means the airport is also sensitive to changes within SAS (ibid).