Poland’s high-speed rail ambitions depend on Brussels opening its wallet.
Poland is readying itself to ask the European Union for billions of złoty to build its first proper high-speed railway line. The supplicant is Centralny Port Komunikacyjny (CPK), a state-owned vehicle tasked with delivering what would be not only Poland’s largest infrastructure project but Europe’s biggest greenfield airport. That the country must look to Brussels for help is hardly surprising. The entire scheme is expected to cost somewhere between 30 billion and 38 billion euros.
The CPK project is, in essence, three things bundled into one politically fraught package. First, a gleaming new airport 37 kilometres west of Warsaw, designed to handle 34 million passengers annually when it opens in 2032 (expandable to 65 million by 2060). Second, a 480-kilometre ‘Y-shaped’ high-speed rail network connecting Warsaw, Łódź, Poznań and Wrocław, with trains running at up to 350 kilometres per hour. Third, an ‘Airport City’ complete with logistics hubs, hotels and conference centres. It is meant to transform Poland into Central Europe’s transport nexus.
CPK has already secured approximately 500 million złoty (117 million euros) in EU support for feasibility studies and design work on the Warsaw–Łódź section, the most advanced segment of the network. Now comes the hard part: persuading Brussels to fund actual construction. The company intends to submit applications under the Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) for two particularly expensive bits: the 140-kilometre Warsaw–Łódź line and a 4.6-kilometre twin-track tunnel beneath Łódź. The tunnel alone is proving to be one of Europe’s more challenging railway engineering projects. A consortium led by Porr won the contract in 2024, worth 1.76 billion złoty.
‘A triple leap into modernity’
The sums involved are eye-watering. Rail accounts for more than 76 billion złoty—roughly two-thirds of CPK’s entire investment plan. That breaks down to about 18 billion euros for the high-speed network alone. Poland’s government reckons that between 30 per cent and 40 per cent of the airport construction costs will come from shareholders (CPK itself and Polish Airports, the operator of Warsaw Chopin Airport). The rest will require bonds and other debt instruments. For the railways, EU grants are essential. Without them, the project risks becoming a monument to ambition rather than achievement.
Brussels has reason to be receptive. The Warsaw–Łódź line forms part of the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T), specifically the Baltic–Adriatic corridor linking Gdynia to Ravenna. Poland’s high-speed ambitions also fit neatly into the EU’s Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy, which aims to double high-speed rail traffic by 2030. Maciej Lasek, the government’s plenipotentiary for CPK and a deputy infrastructure minister, insists the project is advancing “according to plan” and will attract “strong EU support.” His boss, Prime Minister Donald Tusk, has called CPK a “triple leap into modernity”—quite the accolade for a scheme he once subjected to withering audits after taking office.
That auditing process is instructive. When Tusk’s Civic Platform government returned to power in late 2023, it immediately reviewed CPK, a flagship project of the previous Law and Justice administration. The audits uncovered “irregularities” and “very long delays,” particularly concerning the Łódź tunnel. What emerged was a scaled-back, more realistic version: the airport opening pushed from 2028 to 2032, and a focus on connecting Poland’s largest cities rather than funnelling everything through Baranów. The project’s survival, albeit in modified form, suggests both political consensus on Poland’s need for better infrastructure and the sobering realisation that walking away would waste billions already spent.
Stretched finances
The promised benefits are substantial. Once complete, journey times between Warsaw and Łódź would fall from around 70 minutes to 40. Passengers could reach the new CPK airport from central Warsaw in under 20 minutes. The full Y-network would cut travel times between Warsaw and both Poznań and Wrocław to just 100 minutes—less than half the current duration. Poland currently has 700-800 kilometres of track suitable for speeds of 160 kilometres per hour—respectable, but hardly world-class.
Yet scepticism is warranted. Grand infrastructure projects have a habit of overrunning on both time and budget. Poland’s experience with EU-funded transport schemes has been mixed. The Warsaw–Gdańsk line, upgraded with three billion euros partly from the European Investment Bank, did reduce journey times dramatically when Pendolino trains began running in 2014. But other projects have stalled or failed to deliver promised benefits. CPK’s complexity—integrating airport, rail and road on a massive scale—multiplies the risk.
Financing remains the thorniest issue. EU grants typically cover 30-50 per cent of eligible costs for TEN-T projects, meaning Poland must find substantial co-financing. The country’s public finances are stretched. Its deficit exceeded five per cent of GDP in 2024, well above the EU’s three per cent threshold. Rising defence spending (Poland aims to spend four per cent of GDP on its military) further constrains fiscal space. Relying on debt markets for tens of billions of euros adds interest-rate risk to construction risk.
A favourable context
Then there is the question of demand. CPK’s business case assumes that a gleaming new airport 37 kilometres from Warsaw will attract passengers away from Chopin, the congested inner-city facility. Whether LOT Polish Airlines and other carriers will embrace the new hub with sufficient enthusiasm remains to be seen. High-speed rail faces competition from budget airlines on longer routes and cars on shorter ones. Poland’s motorway network has improved markedly in recent years, and Germans have demonstrated that even excellent rail can struggle to lure drivers out of their vehicles.
Still, the broader European context is favourable. The EU is keen to shift freight and passengers from road to rail. Poland’s geographical position—linking the Baltics to the Adriatic, Germany to Ukraine—makes it a natural transit hub. If CPK succeeds, it could catalyse economic development across central Poland and strengthen connections with neighbouring countries. The project also includes international links: Rail Baltica to Lithuania and eventually Estonia, and high-speed connections toward Prague and Berlin via the Czech Republic.
For now, the focus is on securing those multi-billion-złoty grants. Filip Czernicki, CPK’s chief executive, frames EU support as essential for “efficient and effective implementation” using “the latest innovative solutions.” That is corporate-speak for: we need the money. The applications are expected next year. Whether Brussels will prove as enthusiastic as Polish officials hope will determine whether CPK becomes a model for European transport integration or a cautionary tale about overreach. Poland is betting big on high-speed rail. The EU’s wallet must now do the talking.
Photo: Dreamstime.
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