Reflections on the Construction of a New Railway in the Baltic States

Will there be production capacity, the necessary workforce, experience and knowledge to build a new railway along with money? Which mode of transport is more efficient for freight? When the cars are so easy to measure, then rail transport is much more complicated. Here is the deciding distance and also time, must be taken into account also the weight and dimensions of the goods, the location of the sender and the receiver. The decisive factor, however, is still money, the total expenditure. How is it better to transport goods from the Baltics to Western Europe, either by car or by train? Regarding the European Union's (EU) major financing opportunities, there is a chance to build a railway motorway. Next, we're doing SWOT analysis for construction capacity and railway key indicators, while also taking into account subjective factors. The goal of the publication is to analyse the Baltic countries construction capacity and rail freight transport key indicators, but also the contradictions of the Rail Baltica (RB) project. We do a SWOT analysis of the RB. In recent years, volumes of rail freight traffic have shrunk considerably, especially in Latvia and Estonia. The trend in Europe is that rail freight is reduced almost everywhere. It should also, in the context of the UK leaving from the EU it budget is significantly reduced, which was to be the majority of the RB construction expenses. The problem is therefore whether it is a large, economically viable project, not to mention the environmental damage and social sphere. The RB is not an economically and financially reasonable project, but only a political decision.

Keywords: Construction of a new railway, SWOT analysis for construction capacity and railway goods transport, Baltic States, Economy, Rail Baltica.