State-owned co to control traffic from 2019

Transport Agency, which is now responsible for traffic control in the road, maritime and railway sectors will be incorporated into a state-owned limited company as of January 1, 2019.

The Ministerial Committee on Economic Policy at a meeting on Tuesday took the decision, said a government press release on Wednesday.

The Ministry of Transport and Communications will be the responsible for steering the special assignment company entirely owned by the state.

In future, the Transport Agency will acquire traffic control services from the new company. The relationship between the Transport Agency and Finrail Oy, which is already in charge of traffic control on railways, will also be clarified.

The incorporation of the traffic control functions is part of the preparations for changes brought about by digitalisation, the growing role of services, automation, and the increasing importance of information and data. It also lays the groundwork for improving customer-orientation.

Further goals of the incorporation process are to clarify the related official duties, streamline regulation in the transport sector, and promote the use of transport-related data in support of new digital services.

Another aim of the move is to improve the financial efficiency and profitability of the operations and to increase the transparency of the operations and pricing.

The corporatisation process will not cause any interruptions in traffic control functions and the quality, reliability and safety of the operations will be ensured during and after the change. The aim is that the costs of traffic control services used by the authorities will not increase as a result of the incorporation.

As of January 1, 2019, Transport Agency personnel working on December 31, 2018 in traffic control functions and their tasks will be transferred to the new company in accordance with the transfer-of-business principles. At this stage of the process, the number of employees to be transferred is estimated at 150 to 180.

In the following stages of the incorporation process, the tasks that involve significant exercise of public powers as referred to in Section 124 of the Constitution of Finland and can only be delegated to public authorities will be specified.

From the beginning of 2019, the new company and the present companies involved in traffic control, i.e. Air Navigation Services Finland Oy and Finrail Oy, will form a group with subsidiaries for each transport mode. Services shared by the companies will be centralised and provided at the group level.