POLAND: Transport planners are seeking feedback from international train operators on regulations for public service obligation and commercial contracts, capacity allocation and train timetabling, to help inform plans for the liberalisation of the Polish long-distance passenger rail sector.
A consultation to be launched shortly will feed into the Horizontal Timetable project to plan a network of predefined clockface train paths on the existing network. It will also apply to routes to be built or upgraded under the CPK high speed rail programme.
The work is being undertaken ahead of the December 2030 expiry of incumbent PKP Intercity’s current PSO contract. The government plans to replace this with tendered multi-year PSO contracts to operate subsidised services, and to allocate capacity for unsubsidised services to be operated on a commercial basis.
Piotr Malepszak, Undersecretary of State at the Ministry of Infrastructure, said the overall aim is to increase the number of services running without subsidy and ‘enable competition among railway operators ultimately leading to ticket price competition for the fastest trains’.
The Horizontal Timetable is being jointly developed by the Ministry of Infrastructure, which is responsible for the PSO contracts and market framework; infrastructure manager PKP PLK, which is responsible for capacity allocation and framework agreements with operators; CPK which is responsible for co-ordinating the technical work and the construction of new high speed lines; the Centre for EU Transport Projects; and regulator the Office of Rail Transport.
A traffic forecast for 2031-40 has been developed using a simulation tool, but ‘even the best theoretical model will not be successful if not validated by practitioners’, CPK CEO Filip Czernicki said on July 25. ‘That is why the project provides for extensive market consultations, to which foreign conventional and high speed railway operators already operating in the market and brand new entities interested in entering the Polish market are invited.’
