Abstract New transport infrastructure alters the spatial distribution of accessibility, which can influence a region’s development potential. The implementation of High-Speed Rail (HSR) during the last decades has often considerably improved rail accessibility of connected regions, but is also often found to increase relative discrepancies between regions. We analyse the effects of currently planned rail projects on regional accessibility in Germany, with a spatial and network structure differing from other countries, for the year 2030. We use a population potential and a degree centrality measure and find slight tendency towards greater balancing of accessibility across regions and greater poly-centralisation within the rail network, showing the importance of network integration and improvements beyond the HSR network. Two macro-regions of Germany profit most from the planned rail lines: the economically dynamic South and the catching-up East. We interpret this as the outcome of two simultaneous planning goals which include removing “bottlenecks” and supporting weaker regions. We propose that the official regional planning assessment currently used in the planning process of national rail infrastructure could be improved by applying a potential accessibility measure.

中文翻译：

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哪些地区受益于新的铁路无障碍设施？2030年的德国

摘要 新的交通基础设施改变了可达性的空间分布，进而影响一个地区的发展潜力。过去几十年中高速铁路 (HSR) 的实施通常显着改善了连接地区的铁路可达性，但也经常被发现增加了地区之间的相对差异。我们分析了当前规划的铁路项目对 2030 年德国区域可达性的影响，其空间和网络结构与其他国家不同。我们使用人口潜力和度数中心度量，并发现在可达性更好平衡方面的轻微趋势跨区域和铁路网络内更大程度的集中化，显示出高铁网络以外的网络整合和改进的重要性。德国的两个宏观区域从计划中的铁路线中获益最多：经济活跃的南部和赶超的东部。我们将此解释为两个同时规划目标的结果，其中包括消除“瓶颈”和支持较弱的地区。我们建议可以通过应用潜在的可达性措施来改进目前在国家铁路基础设施规划过程中使用的官方区域规划评估。