Barrier Function and Transport Accessibility of State Border as Factors of Cross-Border Interactions

The intensive integration and cross-border regionalization observed at many interstate borders in Europe in recent decades have made the concept of barriers at the state borders extremely popular. Low border barriers are rightly perceived by researchers as one of the necessary conditions for intensive cross-border cooperation, and as its regular outcome. However, when assessing barrier properties, many researchers focused exclusively on the state border line itself, ignoring the transport and communication properties of the adjacent territories. The authors of the article propose their own, combined method of assessment of transport accessibility and barrier capacity of the border, tested on the Russian−Kazakhstan and Russian−Belarusian sections of the border. The essence of the method consists in calculating the transport accessibility of border crossing points for the populated areas of border regions, taking into account the configuration of the transport network. The advantage of the method is that it allows to compare borders of varying degrees of openness and to obtain an idea of what part of the territory and population on both sides of the border can be involved in cross-border relations. The study showed that due to the almost complete absence of border controls, the Russian−Belarusian border has higher transport permeability and better preservation of the transport network. All this ensures a high level of transport accessibility for the border population. In the Russian−Kazakhstan border region, where the number and density of border crossing points are lower and the state of the network of border roads is much worse, a relatively high level of transport accessibility of the border is characteristic of a small number of regions. With the reduction in the number of checkpoints in the 2000s, the length of “deadlocked” borders has increased: they are borders that are difficult or inaccessible to the regional population. A comparative analysis of the population’s cross-border practices and calculations of transport accessibility showed that the transport accessibility of the border and the neighbor there, barriers and permeability of the border are of a potential nature, that is, they do not account for cross-border contacts in themselves. The specific territorial context, the fundamental socioeconomic and political characteristics and the current situation, as well as historical and cultural factors also influence the implementation of the potential for the border and neighbor accessibility.