European countries will have to provide “substantial” extra funding for new high-speed rail lines across the continent to achieve the EU’s targets under the Green Deal project to make transport more sustainable.
A report, published by German rail giant Deutsche Bahn with contributions from other major European train operators, has proposed the creation of a Metropolitan Network of high-speed rail lines which would serve 230 metropolitan regions across Europe.
DB said that such a network would help the EU to achieve its targets of doubling high-speed rail passengers by 2030 and tripling this number by 2050 as part of the Green Deal.
But the report said this would require the continent’s high-speed rail network to be extended from the current 11,000 kilometres of track to 32,000 kilometres by 2050.
The Metropolitan Network proposal goes “far beyond” current plans to build new rail links through the EU’s TEN-T (Trans-European Transport Network) scheme.
“If the Green Deal is to succeed, the EU and its member states must provide substantial additional funds and invest in expanding the HSR (high-speed rail) network throughout Europe,” said DB in a statement. “The rail companies involved want to discuss this with politicians in the autumn.
“The infrastructure measures currently being planned or built are not sufficient to achieve a doubling of high-speed rail traffic by 2030.”
The report, which also includes contributions from rail operators such as France’s SNCF, Trenitalia in Italy and Spain’s Renfe, said that current and planned high-speed railway infrastructure “leaves many metropolitan regions in Europe unconnected and the 2030 targets will likely not be achieved”.
“Therefore, this initiative is to build on and go far beyond the current plans of the TEN-T network or the infrastructure to be opened by 2030,” it added.
Earlier this year, the European Commission announced support for ten pilot projects to establish new cross-border rail links and to improve existing international services as part of TEN-T.
DB’s far more ambitious proposals would provide high-speed rail links to the 60 per cent of Europeans who live in metropolitan areas, “even in regions where there are no fast rail links at all today”.
“Several countries, especially in the eastern regions of Europe, are inadequately connected or not connected at all by high-speed lines, which leaves much of the potential for traffic growth untapped,” added the report.
Michael Peterson, member of the management board for long distance passenger transport at DB, added: “A tripling of high-speed rail traffic in Europe is possible. Once the infrastructure is in place, millions of people on the continent will benefit from attractive connections and faster travel times.
“The countries in central and western Europe, and even more so in southern and eastern Europe, will enjoy the advantages. According to our calculations and simulations, this will result in faster travel times on entirely new corridors and via new traffic hubs on rail.”
The DB report concludes that “considerable action and financial investment in infrastructure” is needed in “nearly all” European countries to achieve the growth in high-speed rail needed to meet the Green Deal targets.
“This will probably exceed the scope of the current funding mechanisms,” it added. “To unlock the needed budgets, new tailor-made financing procedures should be implemented Europe-wide.”