Transporte marítimo de mercancías de corta distancia y responsabilidad del transportista. Una aproximación jurídicointernacional en el contexto de su promoción en el ámbito comunitario

The EU transport policy is trying to promote short sea shipping (SSS) in order to bring it up to a modern shape and as an alternative to the carriage of goods by road under certain circumstances. It is neither a short-term task nor an easy one and, additionally, it brings about some legal uncertainties which derive from the structural complexity of the transport operations which include SSS (contract overlapping), as well as from the divergent legal regimes applicable in each case to those operations. In order to overcome those uncertainties, transport operators dealing with SSS should, on the one hand, get acquainted with rules such as the one contained in article 2 CMR, which covers an special kind of roadsea combined transport (ro-ro) that fits ideally in regular operations with SSS. And, on the other hand, they should get a better knowledge of the similarities and differences between the road and sea liability regimes. With this article we will try both to describe the basic meaning of article 2 CMR and to compare those two liability regimes.