High speed train a loss business according to researchers

"High-speed trains in Sweden have proven to be robust socio-economically unprofitable," write researchers Maria Börjesson, Harry Flam, John Hassler, Lars Hultkrantz, Per Kågeson and Jan-Eric Nilsson in the DN debate.

In the article, they address the Christian Democrats' parliament, where a decision on the issue will be made this weekend. But the debate has been going on for a long time and the tours have been many.

The Social Democrats, the Environment Party, the Center Party and the Left Party remain positive, while the Moderates and the Swedish Democrats have said no and the Liberals are faltering.

S has wanted to have a broad agreement on the matter, but now the government has said that they are prepared to move forward with the plans without agreement.

The big question about the fast trains is precisely the costs.

According to Maria Börjesson, professor of economics with a transport focus at the Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute, VTI, high-speed rail is a loss business:

- The big argument against this is that it is so poor profitability, that taxpayers get back so little money, she tells SVT.

"Each krona invested is expected to give 25 cents in revenue and social benefit," she writes with the other five researchers in Dagens Nyheter.

The price tag on the new tracks was also around SEK 230 billion from the beginning, but the project now risks costing around SEK 400 billion, according to the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce.

- It's such an incredible amount of money and the budget also seems to be constantly increasing, so you really wonder where this is going to end. It is a concern about how public funds are used.

According to the researchers, high-speed railways also take climate policy resources from more efficient climate measures. In the debate article, they write that the high-speed railways will not repay the climate debt from building them until the end of the century.

- You don't really talk about the environmental costs of steel, concrete and road transport for new tracks. It's a big environmental cost, but it goes a little under the radar.