re factors that might increase the requirement for new construction on rail infrastructure. These include: Conscious government policy to shift transport infrastructure spending and use away from road vehicles toward rail (including high-speed rail): Up to (perhaps) 10% of the road new construction (i.e. USD 20-30 billion/year) could be diverted from road to rail infrastructure, with some attendant (but possible bearable) consequences in terms of deteriorating overall road infrastructure quality (i.e. as experienced during the 1980s-90s) and higher road congestion (especially in urban areas). Up to (perhaps) a further 15% of rail construction (USD 5-10 billion/year) could be added if non-EU countries embraced high-speed rail (e.g. United States, Canada) during this period. Increased safety and security requirements. Additional tunnel, access, security and monitoring systems could add up to 5% of additional rail new construction requirement. Increased costs associated with rail construction in urban and congested- traffic areas. It is believed these are factored into the model. Higher-than-anticipated growth in HSR use and rail freight traffic. One optimistic forecast for passenger modal shift for Western Europe (over 2000-50) predicted a decline in daily travel distance by car (from 35 km to 20 km) and an increase in daily travel distance by air/HSR (from 5 km to 70 km). 28 Benefits of transport infrastructure There are several implicit assumptions related to anticipated benefits that are embedded in the approach and model of transport infrastructure requirements over the period to 203029: 1. The bulk of existing transport infrastructure (in place in 2000) is cost-beneficial to maintain, and to marginally improve in terms of quality (i.e. rising replacement cost per route-km). 2. Most of the transport infrastructure investments over the past 20 years have been cost-beneficial, and it is very that likely some amount of cost-beneficial new construction has been constrained by public finance availability (i.e. trend