The key factor in establishing truly intelligent transport systems (ITS) is to link the different information and communication technologies systems and applications together. The large transport companies have managed to organise their own door-to-door information systems, because they cover the entire transport chain themselves. Project THEMIS is monitoring all these developments towards a user-desired end, and develops a system architecture that will be necessary in order to fully integrate freight transport within the emerging European ITS. A special 'architecture workshop held in Brussels in 1999, identified a number of practical and legal problems for a uniform European freight architecture, and recommended that interested parties take more part in, and ensure the coherent ongoing standardisation of, freight transport IT. Many of the systems concerning the intelligent transport systems aim at making intermodal freight transport chains more attractive by the use of advanced ICT applications for transhipment, storage, and transportation.