ABSTRACT
The transport system of the Czech Republic inherited an infrastructure which is oriented rather in favour of railways, especially heavy goods trains, with an ability to cater for bulky products and, in where problems arise, with remarkable preference for quantity to quality (heavy trains, low speed, the quality of track adjusted to accommodate lower velocities, naturally within the UIC (International Union of Railways) scale). The infrastructure in all modes of transport has been poorly maintained. The lack of money for constructing motorways, for example, more quickly was to some degree compensated by many constraints on the development of all types of road transport. After the 'Velvet Revolution' these constraints have broken down; the gap between the capacity of and demand for infrastructure has opened up at exactly the same time that many more actual problems connected with the transformation from central command to the free market economy have occurred. It is now necessary to find money for maintenance, improvement and new construction of main railway lines with a higher quality of services offered both in passenger and in goods traffic and roads and motorways - all in an environment with many more constraints than at any other time.
