Evaluating transport potential of turkey in relationship with European Union and a model suggestion for a modal shift from roads to railways

On account of Turkey?s geopolitics importance, there has a relation between Europe and Asia like a bridge. In this perspective, we evaluate the transport potential of Turkey in the view of accession to European Union in this study. We also evaluate road and railway developments in European Union and Turkey. The main purpose of this study is to forecast the level of road freight transport up to the year of 2015 in order to investigate the modal shift from road transport to railway transport. The aim of forecast is to analyze the development of increasing road freight transport in Turkey. Forecasting is based on Multiple Regression Analysis and Trend Analysis using annual data of the level of road freight transport from the year 1983 to 2004 and factors which are considered to affect the road freight transport in Turkey. Moreover, the existence of statistical relationships of these factors between each other and with road freight transport will be investigated. The statistical program MINITAB 14 is used to do this.