ALLRAIL welcomes France's drive to expand its high-speed rail infrastructure to accelerate modal shift to rail.

However, like we stressed in the article, the only way to take full advantage of this is to make SNCF face more competition.

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 study contracted by Europe’s Rail Joint Undertaking (EU-RAIL) in collaboration with the Alliance of Passenger Rail New Entrants in Europe (ALLRAIL), the Community of European Railway and Infrastructure Companies (CER) and the European Rail Supply Industry (UNIFE) analyses the impact of the European High-Speed Rail (HSR) Network connecting the Capitals of Europe and the main European cities and regions. The study confirms that investing in a comprehensive European HSR network delivers added value to European society and massively reduces the environmental footprint of European passenger transport, creating a sustainable and equitable mobility.

Europe's Rail Joint Undertaking - in collaboration with ALLRAIL, CER and UNIFE - is kicking-off 2023 with a dedicated online joint press event exploring the main findings coming from the ‘Smart and Affordable High-Speed Services in the European Union’ study. The event will take place on 23 January at 11:00 CET, online.

Railway industry associations (ALLRAIL, CER, UNIFE) and the Europe's Rail Joint Undertaking research programme have signed a memorandum of understanding to undertake a study into ‘Smart & Affordable High-Speed Services in the European Union’. The study will demonstrate the benefits of a radical transformation of the rail network to provide high speed services linking all major continental cities. 

While other competing long distance transport modes are setting themselves net zero emission targets, ALLRAIL believes that rail can do it bigger and better: high speed trains with large capacities connecting places around Europe on a frequent basis will lead to low fares and high revenue. The outcomes of this study must enable high speed rail to become the backbone of long-distance travel in Europe.