Official Journal of the European Union

C 285/11

(Case C-156/07) (1)

(Reference for a preliminary ruling - Directive 85/337/EEC - Assessment of the effects of certain public and private projects on the environment - Construction of a road in Milan)

(2008/C 285/17)

Language of the case: Italian

Referring court

Consiglio di Stato (Italy)

Parties

Applicant: Salvatore Aiello and Others

Defendants: Comune di Milano, Sindaco di Milano, Comitato tecnico-scientifico per l'emergenza del traffico e della mobilità nella città di Milano, Provincia di Milano, Regione Lombardia, Ministero delle Infrastrutture e dei Trasporti, Ministero dell'Interno, Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri

Interveners: Euromilano SpA, Metropolitana milanese SpA

Re:

Reference for a preliminary ruling — Consiglio di Stato — Interpretation of Articles 2 and 4 of Council Directive 85/337/EEC of 27 June 1985 on the assessment of the effects of certain public and private projects on the environment (OJ 1985 L 175, p. 40), and of Annex III thereto — Selection criteria to be taken into account in evaluating a project — Construction of a road (‘the Interquartiere Nord’) in Milan

Operative part of the order

1.Article 2(1) of Council Directive 85/337/EEC of 27 June 1985 on the assessment of the effects of certain public and private projects on the environment, as amended by Council Directive 97/11/EC of 3 March 1997, must be interpreted as meaning that it does not require any project that may have a significant effect on the environment to be made subject to the impact assessment provided for in that directive, but only projects of a kind listed in Annexes I and II of the directive, as provided in Article 4 of the directive and subject to Article 1(4) and (5) and Article 2(3) of the directive;

2.Member States are under an obligation to take into account the relevant selection criteria set out in Annex III of Directive 85/337, as amended by Directive 97/11, when they determine, for projects listed in Annex II of the directive — on the basis of a case-by-case assessment or on the basis of thresholds or criteria that they lay down — whether the project at issue must be made subject to an environmental impact assessment;

3.Where a Member State chooses to determine on a case-by-case basis which of the projects listed in Annex II of Directive 85/337, as amended by Directive 97/11, must be made subject to an environmental impact assessment, it must ensure — either by having its national rules refer back to Annex III of the directive or by incorporating the criteria set out in Annex III in its national rules — that, as long as a particular one is relevant to the project at issue, all of those criteria can effectively be taken into account, and cannot explicitly or implicitly exclude one of them.

(1) OJ C 140, 23.6.2007.