His comments follow the European Commission’s plan to accelerate EU high-speed rail development by 2040, including Poland’s planned “Y” line and major cross-border projects such as the Fehmarn Belt tunnel.
The Commission expects Warsaw–Berlin travel time to fall by about 45 minutes by 2040, largely due to faster Warsaw–Poznań links on the “Y” line rather than a new Polish-German high-speed route. Malepszak confirmed that future study work on such a corridor will be explored with Berlin but stressed the need to fix what already exists.
He pointed to the Piła–Krzyż–Gorzów–Kostrzyn route as the most immediate opportunity. The line is not electrified and remains single-track in sections. Poland has proposed mirroring the Berlin–Szczecin upgrade: full electrification and expansion to two tracks to unlock unused capacity on the corridor toward Berlin.
Malepszak ruled out a broader overhaul of the E20 line between Poznań and Berlin, saying only the Rzepin–Frankfurt (Oder) bottleneck is being improved. In December, a seventh Warsaw–Poznań–Berlin connection will launch, enabling a regular two-hour service pattern.
Any decision on extending the “Y” high-speed route from Poznań toward the German border will come after Poland completes its Integrated Rail Network (ZSK) analysis in 2026. The study, led by CPK, PKP PLK and the Institute of Urban and Regional Development, is meant to define the long-term shape of Poland’s post-2035 rail system before negotiations with Germany on a preferred corridor begin.
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Source: PAP