France opened two new high-speed rail lines last year, but they may be the last for awhile because the country is running out of cash to pay for them. A recent review by the European Court of Auditors seems to question whether any more high-speed rail lines should be built anywhere in Europe.
The audit reviewed 30 high-speed rail lines and found:
- Construction costs averaged 25 million euros per kilometer (about $46 million per mile);
- Much of this money was wasted because trains run at an average of just 45 percent of the design speed of the lines;
- Cost overruns and delays are the norm rather than the exception: overruns averaged 78 percent and several lines have been delayed by more than a decade;
- Benefits in many cases are negligible: many of the lines cost more than 100 million euros ($116 million) per minute of train time saved.
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The auditors cite an academic study that concluded that high-speed rail was a “success” if it carried 6 million passengers its first year rising soon to 9 million passengers. But this study wasn’t based on the profitability of the lines; instead, nearly all of the benefits it calculated went to business travelers who saved time by riding the trains. The study assumed that time to those travelers was worth 40 euros ($46 dollars) per hour. But if it is really worth that much, why aren’t the trains priced that high? Continue reading
