Prague Railway Junction 2025

The Prague railway junction and its limits. Prague is a major hub for rail transport. Since the first horse-drawn tram in 1830, Prague has transformed over the past nearly two hundred years into a railway junction of European significance. It is crisscrossed on all sides by suburban, regional, and long-distance passenger and freight rail lines. Rail transport is experiencing a global renaissance, so it is no surprise that demand for new and reliable connections is growing in the Czech Republic as well. Although the railway in Prague is integrated into the public transit system and offers a frequently used, fast, and high-capacity mode of transport, its further development is hampered by inadequate transport infrastructure. In other words, this means that any new trains would have nowhere to run, as the capacity of existing tracks is fully utilized. Furthermore, various types of transport must share the tracks in Prague—commuter, long-distance, and freight trains all run on the same tracks, which inevitably leads to delays and irregularities. Commuter rail transport also lacks fast connections from all major directions and links to all metro lines. Many stops and stations are outdated and do not offer passengers sufficient comfort. That is why a number of state and municipal investments are currently in the works, thanks to which transportation in Prague will undergo a significant transformation in the coming years.

In the following chapters, we will illustrate the most important changes using a diagram of the future state of Prague’s rail transport in 2050.

High-Speed Lines

The planned expansion of long-distance high-speed rail is creating significant pressure to upgrade the Prague rail hub. Prague will be connected to the pan-European network of high-speed lines. On these so-called high-speed lines, express trains reach speeds of over 300 kilometers per hour. Such an express train will travel from Ústí nad Labem to Prague Main Station in twenty-six minutes, and from Roudnice nad Labem in just eighteen. High-speed rail lines will connect Prague with Europe from three directions—from Dresden, Wrocław, and Vienna. Construction of the first sections will begin in the coming years, and the entire system is expected to be operational by 2050. For Prague to connect to the high-speed rail network, it needs not only new tracks for high-speed trains but also improved passenger distribution for those arriving in the city via long-distance transport.

Railway Tunnels Beneath the Center of Prague

A key element of the future design of the railway hub is the project for two new railway tunnels running beneath the very center of Prague, which will primarily serve suburban lines designated by the letter S. The two tunnel routes, approximately 11 kilometers long, will connect the central area between Smíchov, Vršovice, and Masaryk stations. Up to sixteen trains per hour in each direction will pass through the new tunnels, and four new underground stations will be built along their route—in Karlín, at Florenc, and at Wenceslas and Charles Squares. The heart of the system will be the Main Station, where two underground platforms will be added. The new tunnels will help separate regional and long-distance transport routes and improve transport from the Central Bohemian Region to the city center—after all, the challenge for Prague is not so much traffic within the city itself, but rather that coming from its surrounding areas.

Rail Service to Kladno and Václav Havel Airport

Most people from the Central Bohemian Region commute to Prague from the direction of Kladno and its surroundings. However, the current single-track line to Kladno has long since been unable to handle the daily influx of tens of thousands of passengers. As a result, most passengers traveling from this direction to Prague do so by bus or car. During the modernization of the Prague–Kladno line, a number of existing stations will be renovated, and six new ones will be added along the route. An important part of the project is also extending the tracks to Václav Havel Airport and connecting it to the city center. Further development is planned for the Ruzyně and Hradčanská areas along the modernized line, as well as the creation of the new Bubny-Zátory district, where construction of a new station is currently being completed. The project also includes the modernization of Masaryk Station, including the creation of a new, convenient connection to the most important transfer station in the entire rail hub—Main Station.

Main Station

The central hub of Prague’s railway network is the Main Station, where a large number of commuter and long-distance rail lines terminate. This allows passengers to reach the city center quickly and comfortably by train. Another important feature of the Main Station is its throughput capacity, offering a number of advantages over mainline stations where the trains have to terminate. Plans are currently underway to build a new passenger concourse, in front of which a tram stop will be located. As part of the railway hub’s renovation, a two-level underground station will be built beneath the Main Station, where the tunnels of the so-called Metro S will converge. Plans also call for the new Metro D line to be extended to the Main Station in the future. Once this happens, over 350,000 passengers will transfer between different modes of rail transport at this station every day.

Metro D

In recent decades, the metro network has expanded solely by extending the existing three lines further out to the outskirts of Prague. Construction is currently underway on the new Line D, which in its first phase will run from Pankrác through Krč to Nové Dvory and then through Libuš to Písnice. Later, the line will be extended northward from Pankrác to the city center via Náměstí Míru and the Main Station to Náměstí Republiky. New construction is also planned around Metro Line D stations in the southern part of the city. For example, at the Nové Dvory station, the Prague Development Company plans to build a completely new neighborhood with affordable housing for 5,000 people. The Nádraží Krč station will then allow for transfers to trains and, at the same time, access to the proposed “sports oasis of Prague” along the Kunratický potok valley.

New Tram Lines

Prague has one of the most extensive and heavily used tram networks in Europe. It spans a total of 150 kilometers and transports 368 million passengers annually. Because some tram routes were discontinued in the 1970s and 1980s in connection with the construction of the metro, the city center currently lacks capacity and suitable alternatives to the busiest lines. For this reason, for example, tram tracks are already being reinstalled on Wenceslas Square. New neighborhoods in redevelopment areas in the wider city center, such as Bubny-Zátory or the Žižkov Freight Station, will also be connected to the tram network. In addition, further extensions of tram lines toward the city’s outskirts are planned, as well as the development of so-called tangential connections—lines that bypass the city center and link the city’s outskirts with one another. Such connections will include, for example, the new line between Smíchov and Podolí via the Dvorecký Bridge, which is currently under construction, or the planned extension of this line via Budějovická to Michle.

Development and Transformation Areas

Rail transit is a reliable, high-capacity, and sustainable mode of transportation, and in Prague, nearly three-quarters of all public transit passengers use it. Therefore, in urban planning, it is important to ensure that new urban areas have the best possible connections to the existing tram, metro, and rail networks. The reverse is also true—if a new rail line is to pass through the city, it is important to identify the potential this corridor may hold in terms of serving and developing the affected parts of the city. That is why, for example, Prague is promoting the so-called Northern Terminal project on the high-speed rail line to Ústí nad Labem, around which a completely new neighborhood for ten thousand people could be built in the Letňany area. Another planned transportation hub is a key component of Hostivař’s development, and the construction of new urban neighborhoods is also planned around the Metro D stations—Nové Dvory, Libuš, and Písnice.