As someone from a country neighbouring russia, I wish my country decided to do this as well.
Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
111–120 of 465 posts
Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
#112> 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?
> 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.
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.
Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
#113Here's a much better article from the Finnish public broadcaster giving more context: https://yle.fi/a/74-20161606 My comments: The important thing to note that at this point it's just a political posturing and an announcement of intent. They haven't shown any concrete technical plan how this would actually be executed. > "Of course, we are very pragmatic and realistic, we cannot do this in five years. Planning will…
Also it is one party (The Finns) presenting a rail initiative competing with their government partner's (National Coalition) older initiative. It is very unlikely that they both will be implemented.
Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
#114Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I am not convinced this project is ever going to pay for itself. The subtext is not economic: it's "in the event of being invaded by Russia, can we minimize the delays in moving NATO materiel by rail to the front while denying Russia equally easy access to the rails".
I understand that but it is still economic: I highly doubt fixing a minor delay in material movement is the most effective use of these billions.
It is not a minor delay and in case of war such a delay can easily cost billions.
And if there isn't a war, the benefits of a interconnected and integrated european railwail network are potentially huge. 300 km/h trains connecting Finnland with Spain with no delay or bumps? That would be something.
Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
#115Is this connected to NATO & not being able to move military stuff fast? Timing sure seems to suggest that
Russian military logistics are train based. If Finland switches away from their rail gauge, it's safer from Russian attack, since Russia wouldn't be able to easily carry supplies farther inside Finland.
Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
#116Here's a much better article from the Finnish public broadcaster giving more context: https://yle.fi/a/74-20161606 My comments: The important thing to note that at this point it's just a political posturing and an announcement of intent. They haven't shown any concrete technical plan how this would actually be executed. > "Of course, we are very pragmatic and realistic, we cannot do this in five years. Planning will…
Underestimating the Finns' ability to just get stuff done seems to be a common motif throughout history.
Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
#117Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Once they have the cost estimates and effects on existing rail traffic studied, I bet construction will never start. It is not that hard. Countries like Spain have already two different gauges and have the necessary technology in the trains to change between different systems.
One of the main goals of this is to not have the russian gauge available in case russians attack, so that logistics deeper into Finland cant happen easily with the same train, so backwards compatability is not desired.
It's not like this results in a categorical difference in difficulty. Gauge switching infrastructure is common at borders. Yeah stopping and switching is slower than driving right through but it's not the end of the world in the long tail of military logistics.
Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is little benefit for the cost for Finland. Currently I believe that there are no railway between Finland and the rest of the EU, with the first one to Sweden under construction (and obviously a huge detour since the only land connection is through the North of the country).
The connection between Finland and Sweden was built in 1919, however it was recently electrified(January 2025). It's dual gauge(four rails).
Ok so it's passengers link that is under development. Doesn't change the big picture, though.
Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Once they have the cost estimates and effects on existing rail traffic studied, I bet construction will never start. It is not that hard. Countries like Spain have already two different gauges and have the necessary technology in the trains to change between different systems.
One of the main goals of this is to not have the russian gauge available in case russians attack, so that logistics deeper into Finland cant happen easily with the same train, so backwards compatability is not desired.
But if the Spanish can muster dual gauge trains, what's to prevent the Russians from doing the same? Or is the Finnish gauge a state secret?
Re: Finland announces migration of its rail network to international gauge
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
In Spain it's ongoing, very slowly, since the first international gauge high-speed rail line started operation in 1992. It's a slow and quite annoying process. For example, to reach my region, trains from Madrid have to change gauge because my region still has the old one. Apart from spending around 10 minutes doing this, this has caused a lot of problems because it essentially means there is a single model of 300 km…
I wonder if those trains was imported from Italy ? During the Danish transition to IC-4 some of those trains ended up with Gaddafi in Libiya ( https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/2021/02/this-was-gaddafis-pers... )
No, they're Spanish trains: the Talgo Avril (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talgo_AVRIL, https://youtu.be/6iFfVpZwLJ4?si=ahxuQnauNw1-ucqR). It's a model specifically designed for that.
As an armchair expert, I think it turned out badly because they had to develop cutting-edge technology (no trains with that top speed and support for gauge change existed before, and it also has other quirks, like being uncommonly wide to support five seats per row) but, at the same time, make it very cheap (the project started in the context of harsh austerity in the years after the financial crisis, with PIGS accused of overspending, etc.). They promised too much for the budget and ended up delivering a half-baked train. At the beginning, a year ago, it was a disaster (lots of incidents with trains stopping mid-way, etc.), now they seem to be ironing out the problems and things are getting better but they're still much more unreliable than other trains.
I hope at least the lessons learned help towards making a better model in the future.