Ireneusz Merchel, CEO of the PKP PLK subsidiary, which manages national rail infrastructure, said on Thursday: “We expect that in 2020 we will make investments roughly 30 percent larger than those we made in 2019, and this should total PLN 14-15 billion (EUR 3.3-3.5 billion).”
Almost a third of the money will be spent on improving rail links with the Baltic ports of Gdańsk, Gdynia, Szczecin and Świnoujście in northern Poland.
The remaining projects will include upgraded links from the capital Warsaw to the cities of Poznań in the west of the country and Radom in central Poland, in addition to an improvement in capacity around the southern city of Kraków and the redevelopment of Warsaw’s Zachodnia (West) station.
According to Merchel, there are already 200 railway construction sites active across Poland.
The investment in rail infrastructure comes amid rising passenger numbers, with state-owned PKP Intercity expected to close the year having carried 50 million people.
There is also an ongoing drive to modernise rolling stock, with more than PLN 7 billion (EUR 1.6 billion) recently allocated for this purpose.
(sl/gs)
Source: PAP