This paper is about the methodology of defining projects for the National Railway Development Concept, which is an essential part of the Hungarian National Transport Strategy referring to the time perspective of EU White Book planning for medium (2020), long (2030) and strategic framework term (2050). The concept and the methodology are based on service concepts and integrated periodic timetables. The goal of the strategy is to improve performances of the transport network, to achieve a higher modal split ratio for public transport, by increasing the competitiveness of railways and of the entire public transport system. The first part of the paper is about the passenger demands. It analyses competitiveness of the current railway network, and it points out the bottlenecks of the network – where the capacity is not enough, and the parts, where the competitiveness is poor. It defines two kinds of necessary interventions: increasing competitiveness and eliminating bottlenecks. The second part is about the current integrated periodic timetable and its development concepts which are able to increase the competitiveness in short, medium and long term. The timetable development concepts can show, where and what the real bottlenecks of the network are. By these concepts we can define the exact infrastructure development projects which are necessary to achieve the main goal of our strategy. European and Hungarian taxpayers could also benefit from using this methodology, by making it possible to avoid inefficient investments. The last part of the paper gives a detailed overview of the proposed projects embedded in the strategic aims. The proposals could ensure an efficient use of the EU sources in the budget period 2014–2020, by increasing the competitiveness of railways.

ntegrated periodic timetables, transport strategy, public transport system