Polish high speed train business plan under development

POLAND: High speed rail and airport project promoter Centralny Port Komunikacyjny has appointed EY to prepare a business plan for the procurement and management of its future train fleets.

CPK plans to establish a rolling stock company which would finance, own and manage the trains, and lease them to future operators under long-term agreements. It said similar approaches have been successfully used in the UK, Germany, Scandinavia and the Benelux countries.

CPK has adopted this approach after concluding that the purchase of high speed trains was a high barrier to market entry for potential operators. When combined with relatively low margins, it could not be sure that operators would be ready to supply rolling stock for the scheduled opening of …