Transport in Poland


Transport in Poland involves air, water, road and rail transportation. The country has a large network of municipal public transport, such as buses, trams and the metro. As a country located at the 'cross-roads' of Europe, Poland is a nation with a large and increasingly modern network of transport infrastructure.
The country's most important waterway is the Vistula river. The largest seaports are the Port of Gdańsk, the Port of Gdynia and the Port of Szczecin. Air travel is generally used for international travel, with many flights originating at Warsaw Chopin Airport. Railways connect all of Poland's major cities and the state-owned Polish State Railways corporation, through its subsidiaries, runs a great number of domestic and international services of varying speed and comfort. In addition to this, five out of sixteen Polish voivodeships have their own regional rail service providers.

Rail transport

Poland is served by an extensive network of railways. In most cities the main railway station is located near a city centre and is well connected to the local transportation system. The infrastructure is operated by PKP Group. The rail network is very dense in western and northern Poland, while eastern part of the country is less developed. The capital city, Warsaw, has the country's only rapid transit system: the Warsaw Metro.
The only high-speed rail line in central-eastern Europe is the Central Rail Line (Poland), Centralna Magistrala Kolejowa. It has a length of, and was built in 1971–1977; it links Warsaw with Kraków and Katowice. Most trains on the CMK operate at speeds up to, but since December 2014 new Alstom Pendolino ED250 trains operate on a 90 km section of the CMK at, and improvements under way should raise the authorized speed to on most of the line. In test runs on the CMK in November 2013 a new Pendolino ED250 train set a new Polish speed record of.
Other high-speed lines:
  • The Warsaw-Gdańsk-Gdynia railway route is undergoing a major upgrading costing $3 billion, partly funded by the European Investment Bank, including track replacement, realignment of curves and relocation of sections of track to allow speeds up to, modernization of stations, and installation of the most modern ETCS signalling system, which is to be completed in June 2015. In December 2014 new Alstom Pendolino ED250 high-speed trains were put into service between Gdańsk, Warsaw, Katowice and Kraków reducing the rail travel time from Gdańsk to Warsaw to 2 hours 58 minutes, to be reduced in late 2015 to 2 hours 37 minutes.
  • Warsaw–Kutno–Poznań–
  • Warsaw–Siedlce–Terespol– – being upgraded to 160 km/h
  • Warsaw–Puławy–Lublin
  • Opole–Wrocław and further upgraded via Legnica to Berlin and Hamburg
Projects
The Warsaw–Łódź line is being upgraded to allow speed up to 160 km/h.
Plans were made to construct a new high-speed line from Warsaw to Poznań and Wrocław with forks in Łódź and Kalisz., but the project was cancelled in November 2011 due to its high cost.
The PKP Group is the fourth largest railway throughout Europe. Trains are run by its different subsidiaries.

Passenger transport operators

The following companies operate in Poland:

Narrow-gauge railways

There are hundreds of kilometres of,,, and narrow-gauge lines in Poland.
These railways are mostly in decline, some survive as a museum or tourist railways.

Freight transport market

Broad-gauge railways

Except for Linia Hutnicza Szerokotorowa, and a few very short stretches near border crossings, Poland uses the standard gauge for its railways. Therefore, Linia Hutnicza Szerokotorowa in Sławków is the longest broad-gauge railway line in Poland. The line runs on a single track for almost from the Polish-Ukrainian border, crossing it just east of Hrubieszów. It is the westernmost broad-gauge railway line in Europe that is connected to the broad-gauge rail system of the countries of the former Soviet Union.

Rail system

Total:
  • standard gauge :
  • broad gauge :
  • narrow gauge : various gauges including,,, and
As of December 2002 narrow-gauge railways were no longer owned or operated by PKP. They were transferred to regional authorities or became independent companies.

Rail links with adjacent countries

Road transport

Polish public roads are grouped into categories related to administrative division. Poland has of public roads, of which are unsurfaced :
In recent years, the network has been improving and government spending on road construction recently saw a huge increase, due to rapid development of the country and the inflow of European Union funds for infrastructure projects.

Motorways and expressways

Polish motorways and expressways are part of national roads network. As of December 2021, there are of motorways and of expressways.
Motorways in Poland, :
A1 | A2 | A4 | A6 | A8 | A18
Expressways in Poland, :
S1 | S2 | S3 | S5 |
S6 | S7 | S8 | S10 |
S11 | S12 | S14 | S16 |
S17 | S19 | S22 |
S51 | S52 | S61 | S74 | S79 | S86

Air transport

The most important airport in Poland is Warsaw 'Frederic Chopin' International Airport. Warsaw's airport is the main international hub for LOT Polish Airlines.
In addition to Warsaw Chopin, Wrocław, Gdańsk, Katowice, Kraków and Poznań all have international airports.
In preparation for the Euro 2012 football championships jointly hosted by Poland and Ukraine, a number of airports around the country were renovated and redeveloped. This included the building of new terminals with an increased number of jetways and stands at both Wrocław Airport and Lech Wałęsa Airport in Gdańsk.

Airlines

There are a total of 8 Polish airline companies currently operating, with the most successful airline being LOT Polish Airlines, the flag carrier of Poland. It is also the only regularly scheduled airline in Poland.
6 of the airlines are chartered airlines, including Buzz, Enter Air, LOT Charters, Skytaxi, SprintAir, and Smartwings Poland. SprintAir Cargo is also the main cargo airline in Poland.

Airports

The Polish airline market was until 2004 a closed market, with bilateral agreements between countries served from the national hub – Warsaw. The regional airports were mostly serving as spokes, and were controlled by PPL, the state-owned airport authority. However, in the 1990s it was decided to deregulate the airport market and abolish the dominant position of PPL. Nearly all local airports became separate companies, with local governments involved in their management, which led to the partial decentralisation. Soon after opening of Polish sky for competition, flights "avoiding" the Warsaw hub became more common.
There are twelve passenger airports in operation, and there is also an airport Heringsdorf in German village Garz, 7 kilometers from Polish seaside spa Świnoujście.

International airports

List of airports in Poland
The following are the largest airports in Poland :
Domestic:
Airports with paved runways:
Total: 84
  • over 3,047 m: 4
  • 2,438 to 3,047 m: 29
  • 1,524 to 2,437 m: 41
  • 914 to 1,523 m: 7
  • under 914 m: 3
Airports – with unpaved runways:
Total: 39
  • 2,438 to 3,047 m: 1
  • 1,524 to 2,437 m: 4
  • 914 to 1,523 m: 13
  • under 914 m: 21
Heliports: 2

Water transport

The country's most important waterway is the river Vistula. The largest seaports are the Port of Szczecin and Port of Gdańsk.
Marine transport in Poland has two main sub-groups, riverine and seaborne. On the Baltic Sea coast, a number of large seaports exist to serve the international freight and passenger trade; these are typically deep water ports and are able to serve very large ships, including the ro-ro ferries of Unity Line, Polferries and Stena Line which operate the Poland – Scandinavia passenger lines.
Riverine services operate on almost all major Polish rivers and canals as well as on domestic coastal routes.

Waterways

Poland has of navigable rivers and canals.

Ports and harbors

Merchant marine

Total: 57 ships totaling 1,120,165 GT/
Ships by type:
bulk 50, cargo 2, chemical tanker 2, roll-on/roll-off 1, short-sea passenger 2
  • *

Municipal transport

Bus

Most Polish towns and cities have well-developed municipal bus services. Typically, a city possesses its own local bus service, however, in some cases they have private competitors operating on certain lines upon the agreement with local authorities.
Until the 1990s, interurban connections were operated by a single, state-owned company PKS. Since then, it has been broken into a number of independent national and municipal enterprises. In addition, several private operators emerged. There are two classes of service distinguished by vehicle length:autobus — longer vehicles,bus — shorter vehicles with smaller capacity, very popular on local connections, run by individual persons and smaller companies.
While they often use the same bus stops, they tend to use different stations.

Tram

Bigger cities run dense tram networks, which are the primary mean of public transport. Currently, there are 15 systems serving over 30 cities including Bydgoszcz, Gdańsk, Katowice, Kraków, Łódź, Poznań, Szczecin, Warsaw and Wrocław, with the total track length varying from to less than . A new network has been constructed in Olsztyn in 2015. See the list of town tramway systems in Poland
Since the 1990s, a number of cities attempts to upgrade certain parts of their networks to the light rail standard. The most notable investments are Poznań Fast Tram and Kraków Fast Tram with the underground premetro section.

Trolleybus

Trolleybuses can be found in three cities: Gdynia, Lublin and Tychy.

Rapid transit

The first metro line was opened in Warsaw in 1995. Part of the second line was opened in 2015. This is part of the country's rail transport infrastructure. There is an ongoing debate whether a new metro or premetro should be built in Kraków. The current President of Kraków, Aleksander Miszalski, supports the idea and has declared that first works will commence in 2028.

Commuter trains

In major Polish cities such as Warsaw and the Tricity area, Commuter trains provide efficient connections between the city center and surrounding suburbs or satellite towns. In other cities like Łódź and Kraków, similar commuter rail services operate under different names but follow the same principles and rules.

Pipelines