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Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge

(yle.fi)
461 points axelfontaine | 2 comments | 20 May 25 07:40 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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thih9 ◴[20 May 25 08:17 UTC] No.44039085[source]▶
> will cost billions of euros, affect more than 9,200 km of track, and take decades

How is a change like this going to be implemented? E.g. are they going to mainly update some tracks everywhere (and have two systems running in parallel), or all tracks in selected areas (and have passengers change), or something else?

Was there a comparable large scale rail infrastructure change in some other country?

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anticodon ◴[20 May 25 08:20 UTC] No.44039111[source]▶
> Was there a comparable large scale rail infrastructure change in some other country?

Baltic states attempted this (project Rail Baltica). Lots of EU money were spent with no visible result. I guess, several people in Baltic states became super rich, but in terms of rail infrastructure nothing was done.

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1. rmind ◴[20 May 25 09:59 UTC] No.44039753[source]▶
The work is very much ongoing in Lithuania: 114 km of railway is under construction, with tracks already laid in large parts of it. That is 43% of the initial phase (links to Poland and Latvia).

Let's keep in mind that it's not just standard gauge track. It's a high-speed rail project (200-250 km/h) and, for any country, it takes time to build such a huge infrastructure.

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2. euroderf ◴[20 May 25 18:31 UTC] No.44044469[source]▶
I've read that (not tracks but) stations are the sources of big overruns for Rail Baltica.