Europe’s Rail Joint Undertaking – in collaboration with ALLRAIL, CER and UNIFE – commissioned a study exploring the socio-economic and environmental benefits of the establishing of a European High-Speed Rail (HSR) connecting the main European cities and regions, combining investments in constructing creating/upgrading new HSR lines and upgrading the digitalization and automation of existing ones, i.e. ERTMS.

The study’s report confirms that investing in a comprehensive European HSR network will deliver added value to European society and massively reduce the environmental footprint of European passenger transport. The report proposes a master plan for HSR network connecting all EU capitals and major cities and calls for the Commission and Member States for a coordinated implementation with sufficient funding in the next decades. Such comprehensive network equalling at least tripling of the existing HSR network will certainly require high investment costs averaging to €550 billion but in return deliver a net positive benefit in the range of €750 billion to society.

The executive version of the report can be found here.

The technical versions of the report can be found here (market assessment) and here (impact assessment).