Quote:
Originally Posted by jaro
Also tunnels would be much more expensive to maintain than simple surface railroad. When speaking about high speed rail network - there were already locomotives 50 years ago that could reach 200km/h, the problem was always track quality, reliability, maintenance cost of such high speed railway.
There is also high speed connection between Prague, Bratislava and Wien via Pendolino, although its top speed is only ~200km/h. Probably higher speed is not needed right now.
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I have heard of the Pendolino but actually I have never seen one in Vienna. I just know that the train connections to all new EU memberstates are pretty bad. The connection to Bratislava for sure is at least. The rail line towards Prague would also need a modernization I guess.
Actually high speed rail lines would have large potential in central Europe, with so many larger cities in a relative vicinity. But to which railwaystation are they heading at? Maybe to the South Station, I hardly ever get to that one.
Anyway, I looked at the ÖBB homepage and the faster connections there were 4 hours long. For roughly estimated 300 km thats not an extremely fast connection in fact. An thoroughly upgraded 200 km line should manage a travel time of not more than 2 hours for express trains. A true high speed line could manage it in somewhat 1 and a half hour.
I guess the reason why no central European high speed network is in the make is because its so fractured with all this small countries and no ambition so far to join up forces for this aim. The potential from a geographic point of view might be there however.