Denmark - Transportation

Transportation is highly developed in Denmark. The road system is well engineered and adequately maintained. Among the most important bridges are the Storstrom Bridge linking the islands of Sjaelland and Falster, and the Little Belt Bridge linking Fyn and Jutland. A new train and auto link joins Sjaell and Fyn (18 km/11 mi); a new series of bridges connecting Denmark to Sweden— spanning 4.9 mi across the Oresund Strait and costing Kr13.9 billion—opened in July 2000. The link reduces transit time between the two countries to 15 minutes for cars and trucks and less than 10 minutes for high speed trains. Cars travel on the upper tier and trains on the lower. As of 2002, Denmark had 71,474 km (44,414 mi) of paved roadways, including 880 km (547 mi) of expressways.

The railway system had a total of 2,859 km (1,777 mi) as of 2002, of which 508 km (316 mi) were privately owned and operated.

The Danish merchant fleet as of 2002 was composed of 301 ships of at least 1,000 GRT, for a total of 6,258,959 GRT (8,143,520 DWT). The majority of these vessels belonged to the Danish International Registry, an offshore registry program allowing foreign-owned vessels to sail under the Danish flag. Denmark, which pioneered the use of motor-driven ships, has many excellent and well-equipped harbors, of which Copenhagen is the most important.

There were 116 airports in 2001, of which 28 had paved runways. Kastrup Airport near Copenhagen is a center of international air traffic. Domestic traffic is handled by Danish Airlines in conjunction with SAS, a joint Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish enterprise. In 2001, 6,382,100 passengers were carried on scheduled domestic and international airline flights.