CPK presents variant of Katowice–Ostrava HSR line
The proposal is for a maximum speed of 250 km/h.
After careful consideration of thousands of public comments and nearly 100 meetings the CPK held with residents and local authorities since 2020, and taking into account the environmental impacts of the construction, Centralny Port Komunikacyjny (CPK) decided on the Katowice–Ostrava HSR route. The line, indicated as W72, will include the 90-thousand city of Jastrzębie-Zdrój, the largest city in Poland with no railway.
The selected option balances the line’s demanding technical, operational, and financial parameters on the one hand and numerous social and environmental aspects as well as the use of land on the other. The W72 variant ensures a maximum speed of 250 km/h and is the most environmentally friendly of all the variants considered, CPK experts agree. It will include building several new railway stations, new railway sections, and possibly an intermodal terminal. The Czech infrastructure manager Správa železnic and CPK have previously agreed that CPK will manage the Ostrava – CZ/PL border section.
HSR Katovice – Ostrava. Credit: CPK
The new line will bring a significant reduction in journey times. The existing connection from Rybnik to Katowice will take 25 minutes as opposed to the current 42–59 minutes, and the current one-hour connection between Wodzisław Śląski and Katowice will be shortened to a mere 40-minute ride. The journey time between Jastrzębie-Zdrój and Katowice on the new line will take 35 minutes by a fast train or 50 minutes by a regional train.
The Katowice-Ostrava line is an important section of the Three Seas HSR network that will connect Poland and the Czech Republic to other major cities in Central and Southern Europe. “The Katowice–Ostrava section is a part of the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T), which will ultimately connect Katowice, Krakow, and Warsaw with Brno, Prague, Bratislava, Vienna, and Budapest. Our investment is of a cross-border nature and is closely coordinated with the investment activities of Správa železnic, our Czech partner,” says CPK CEO Mikołaj Wild.