Understanding Road Transportation in Austria
Market Monday - Week 49 - Facts, figures and insights into road transportation in Austria
About this series
The European transportation market is a diverse and complex landscape, encompassing over thirty distinct countries, each with its unique characteristics. In this series, we delve into the most significant transport markets in Europe, providing insights and comparisons.
The data presented primarily draws from activities from the Transporeon platform and official sources such as Eurostat. Unless otherwise described, the information relates to full truckload transport, but is typically applicable to other road transport segments as well.
The Austrian road transportation market
Austria has one of the densest and developed road transport networks in Europe. This fact and strategic central location on the continent ensure great importance of Austria for many major European transport market players facilitating both domestic and international logistics operations.
Download the country overview in the highest available resolution including a description of all values:
Let us further examine the features of local transport market and see how they impact all parties active there:
Demand characteristics
The demand for transport services within Austria is unsurprisingly concentrated around its economic hubs and regions with higher population density. The circle around Vienna, Austria's capital, is the most significant area for transportation demand due to its high population density and concentration of industries. Additionally, access to major international airport is ever important for time-critical goods deliveries and the presence of modern cargo handling facilities on the Danube ensures Vienna connections with inland river hubs spanning from the North Sea to the Black Sea.
Other important agglomerations have centers in Graz, Salzburg and Linz. Western Austrian regions of Tyrol and Vorarlberg are crucial for transit traffic, particularly for goods moving between Germany, Italy, and Switzerland, holding access points to A13 Brenner Autobahn, by far the busiest road transit routes through the Alps and the defining feature for a large share of international transport crossing the country.
Regional imbalance is dictated again by industry density correlating with population density on the map, with the exception of Vienna, with data showing that the capital consumes more goods delivered by road transport than produces.
Almost 60% of total observed international demand is coming to or from Germany, Italy and Czechia. Notably, German share is larger on inbound transports and Italian - on outbound.
Toll characteristics
Austria operates a government-regulated kilometer-based toll system that applies to all motorways and expressways. The toll rates for vehicles over 3.5 tons are classified based on vehicle weight, the number of axles, and EURO CO2 emission class.
The toll system, managed by ASFINAG, applies to all motorways and expressways in Austria. Vehicles are equipped with a GO-Box, which electronically records the toll charges as the vehicle passes through toll points.
Average toll rate is approximately 0.47€/km for a standard 40t EURO VI truck and is typically adjusted yearly. For 2025 there were plans for a further increase of road tolls by 12-13%, but as of late November 2024 they were not confirmed and were facing considerable opposition from local groups.
Infrastructure characteristics
Having approximately 1,750 km of motorways, Austria ranks 14th in Europe with 21.2 meters of motorway per square kilometer, and is in the middle ranking in utilization statistics, ranking 11th there, with 223 thousand tons of goods transported per motorway kilometer in 2022, a bit below European average.
Key transport corridors include the A1 (West Autobahn), connecting Vienna to Salzburg and further to Germany, and the A2 (South Autobahn), linking Vienna to the southern regions and Italy. The A12 (Inntal Autobahn) is another critical route, facilitating transit through the Tyrol region to Germany and Switzerland and to Italy through A13 (Brenner Autobahn).
While extensive, Austrian motorways and bridges were mostly planned and built decades ago and are now showing signs of wear and tear, necessitating significant investment in repairs and upgrades. According to the Austrian government, there is active work ongoing on long-term strategies to modernize the infrastructure, but budget constraints and the scale of the required work present significant challenges.
Traffic controlling measures
A significant issue around Austrian transportation is the ongoing dispute with Italy over the Brenner Route, where Austria has implemented measures like night-time driving bans, winter driving limitations and sectoral restrictions for some goods, to limit truck traffic and to reduce environmental impact and congestion. This alpine route is one of the most important transit corridors in Europe, connecting Northern Italy with Austria and Germany. This dispute was escalated to the European Court of Justice in 2024, with the European Commission along with German and Italian carrier associations now supporting Italy’s legal action.
Another measure taken by Austrian authorities, which is opposed by Italy, is block handling in Tyrol. It applies during designated days (up to 5 in a month) and involves regulating the number of trucks that can pass through an entry point on A12 Inntal Autobahn, allowing a maximum of 250 trucks per hour. Once this limit is reached, trucks must stop and wait, resulting in significant traffic jams. Only trucks over 7.5 tones are affected by this measure.
Capacity characteristics
Austria's transport capacity is robust, supported by the significant fleet of newly registered heavy trucks in 2023: 7,800, marking a 29% increase compared to 2022, which is significantly higher than the European average growth of 15%.
Ease of access to Austrian market from foreign carriers allows it to boast a 6.9% share of cabotage - third rank in Europe, which helps to reduce rejections rates within the country during scarcer capacity periods.
Rate characteristics
Transport rates in Austria are influenced by several factors, including the imbalance between inbound and outbound flows, regional demand variations, and the impact of toll costs. On average, rates on routes within and from/to Austria are on the middle level of European countries.
International rates for northeast-bound transports are generally lower, offering cost-effective opportunities for shipping goods to Eastern European countries in general direction to Poland and Lithuania. Naturally, westbound transports tend to be more expensive due to higher toll costs on the way, possibility of border crossing with Switzerland and fewer return shipments opportunities. The same explanations bar toll costs can be applied to transports from Austria to Balkan peninsula, which are also relatively expensive.
Observed spot rate variation on Austrian domestic spot market is moderate at 10%, being a function of comparatively good capacity situation.
Conclusion
Austrian road transportation market is a very important hub in Central Europe, driven by its strategic location and well-developed infrastructure connecting key transport corridors in the EU. The demand for transport services in Austria is heavily influenced by cross-border movements, with a significant portion of international transports in overall traffic. The country's toll system and infrastructure support efficient logistics operations, although the influence of transit traffic presents challenges and opportunities in balancing demand and capacity.
Current economic problems in the European Union are also not avoiding Austria: more and more players on the transport markets point to diminishing transport demand, driver shortages and rising high costs as main problems and mention additional concerns about ongoing support and maintenance of existing extensive infrastructure, for example on the Brenner route and the renovation of the Lueg Bridge, where single-lane traffic is planned from January 2025.
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Oleksandr Kulish
Consultant