European Rail Buff News
 

European Rail News... for rail buffs; as reported by special correspondent Hope Bonnhoff:
LGV EST UPDATE
France's newest high-speed rail line, the LGV-Est, under construction between Paris and Germany is due to open in 2007 at 350 km/hr running max. Some recent developments:
...The previous provision agreement between the SNCF, Luxembourg Railways, SBB and DB has fallen apart and now only the French SNCF and German DB will operate the new trains, which were previously branded RHEALYS trains. TGV POS train sets will be used on Paris-Frankfurt runs; ICE 3's on Paris-Stuttgart runs. Both cities will be reached in about 4 hours from Paris, down by two hours over now. (www.rhealys.com)
...the SBB will run the Paris-Basel-Zurich trains over the new line under the LYRIA brand name they currently use on Paris-Lausanne-Brig and Paris-Bern-Zurich and Paris-Geneva trains (with TGV POS train sets)
... Paris-Geneva train times will decrease 20 mins in 2007 after the reopening and electricfication of the La Cluse-Bellegarde line in France.
...the SBB has increased its stake in LYRIA train company to 26% from 11%, with the SNCF holding the balance.
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I always am eager to here new rail news - please feel free to add in anything. Lots of thanks, Hope B.

EUROPE'S 4TH LONGEST RAIL TUNNEL
has just been completed - breakthrough but still a few years from being put in service. It burrows under the Guadarrama mountain range on the new high-speed Madrid-Valladolid rail line under construction. 28,377 meters long the project has been called Spain's single largest civil engineering project ever attempted. Next tunnel attention will turn up the line towards Segovia, where twin tunnels 8.5 km long will be bored leading to a new Segovia station, 4.5 km outside of town. the new line will allow AVE type trains of up to 350 km/hr running.
The pain in Spain no longer will still be on the train!

I tend to greet these news releases with mixed emotions. While it is nice to see the speeds increase and times decrease, I'm starting to miss the old days of arriving by train in the middle of a city. More and more these high speed trains have stations and terminals way outside of town. It's nice to get to Segovia a few minutes (or more) earlier, but then one must somehow get the remaining 4 1/2 kms into the town you wanted to visit in the first place, for example. Arriving in the town was always one of the main advantages of trains over planes.

ditto - i heartily agree. And these high-speed trains all require reservations even if not full - i always go the railpass route and now it's getting to be a hassle to have to reserve all the time, negating one of the benefits - the spontaneous ability to hop any train any time - of a pass. And like Intrepid would lament, the windows don't open and you can't lean out! (Risking you life perhaps but a thrill - getting the smells of the countryside as well.) The new Koln-Frankfurt hi-speed line is lined by windbreaks or in tunnels - you see nothing but it's an hour quicker than the classic line thru the Rhine Gorge. Yes rail travel is losing something whilst gaining speed.

I agree but I will say this, riding from Cologne to the Frankfurt airport last year in only 57 minutes AND watching as we literally whizzed by the traffic on the adjoining highway which was slowed to a creep (and this at 6:30 AM) made not being able to hang out the window a little less disappointing.

Let's see leaning out the window at about 190 mph - makes for a bad hair day i'd think it not a bad head week!

MERANO-MALLES VENOSTA LINE IN DOLOMITES REOPENS AFTER 14 YEARS
The Merano-Malles Venosta rail line, closed in 1991, has reopened to passenger trains on its 60 km stretch. Once meant to link Merano to Landeck, Austria, the line never reached beyond Malles Venosta. But there is talk of builing a new 17 km line from Malles V to Scuol Tarasp in Switzerland to connect with the Swiss rail network. this is more than a pipe dream and is being seriously considered, dependent on EU funding. As for now buses link Malles Venosta to Landeck and Scuol Tarasp and the reopened line plus bus means that Zurich is just six hours from Merano by this route. (www.ferroviavalvenosta.it) The new rail route provides a novel way of going between Italy and Austria and Switzerland.

These new high speed trains don't have private compartments - with a couple of exceptions. There was something mystical about being in a compartment for nine hours, while riding through glorius scenery, head out the window, bottle of wine and salami sandwich in tow. Now you sit two by two, staring straight ahead, watching who comes and goes through the coach door, which in my opinion too closely identifies it to the airplane experience I am studiously trying to avoid.

Germany To End Station Ticket Discounts
As of next Dec 12 (2005) Germany will stop selling 50% off companion tickets at station ticket windows. The policy has been a success, but apparently too much so as the plan lets the first person pay full fare and accompanying passengers 50% off. It seems an Internet service is matching solo travelers to get the discount - anyway Deutsche Bahn will stop the sales at stations but apparently continue them if ordering online.

VIENNA DECIDES ON NEW CENTRAL STATION
Vienna is going ahead with plans to built a central station that will replace both the Sudbahnhof and Ostbahnhof, which will be demolished or incorporated into the new station. Called Wien Europea Mitte, opening is set for 2009 and will eventually accommodate most international trains, such as EC trains from Nurnberg and Budapest, which will no longer serve the Westbahnhof. West station is still have local trains however, such as those to Salzburg and Innsbruck. the new station is being built over vast freight train yards and will future an extensive commercial development. S-Bahn and Metro lines will connect the new station with most areas of Vienna.

FRANCE: FINALLY MUCH NEEDED TIMETABLE CHANGE!
It appears that the SNCF will finally cave in to critics who have long advocated the rail company move to regular timetables throughout its system, not just on a few main TGV and suburban commuter lines radiating out of Paris. Regular interval, like that in UK, Switzerland, Germany and Belgium and Netherlands see at least hourly service on most lines, with the theory that this increases rail patronage. Currently on many lateral lines in France trains run a spotty schedules with often 3-4 hours gaps in service. Now SNCF plans regular intervals for the whole of France sometime in 2008. Regular intervals means passengers really don't need to know exact schedules, because there will be a train within an hour after the show up at the station - mainlines in places like UK, Germany, Swiss, Benelux often run twice hourly or more.

MADRID-LLEIDA HIGH SPEED UPDATE
The much plagued new high-speed Spanish line between Mardird and Lleida, though the track work was finished a few years ago is still plagued by not only unexpected soil erosion but a messed up signalling system - that has never been activated. Now it's decided to revert to the old signalling system used on AVE Madrid-Seville line - postponing 300 km/hr speeds until late 2005 at the earliest.
TORINO-NOVARA HI-SPEED LINE
In conjunction with the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turino, Italy a new high-speed rail line Torino-Novara is slated to open by Feb 2006; the Novara-Milano section will open in 2009.

NEW STATION AT VISP
Due to the construction of the Lotschberg route tunnel from Fruitingen all the way to the Rhone Valley, emerging at Visp, Visp will replace Brig as the major transit station for those going onto Italy and will serve as the intersection of the Rhone Valley line from Montreux, the Lotschberg route from Germany and Bern and the narrow-gauge mountain railway to Zermatt. Thus a major new station will be built here to accommodate the crowds. Brig promises to become a backwater.

CAEN-TOURS TRAINS THREATENED
The SNCF would like to axe direct trains between Tours and Caen, though some limited service may remain on the line but without thru trains. I took this train last year and, quite unlike the TGVs i savored the small regional farming towns it stopped at - and i could lean out the windows! so far Tours-Caen service has been retained for at least the near future.

RHATISCHE BAHN UNESCO WORLD HERITAGE SITE?
Cantonal officials from the region two sections of Switzerland's Rhatische Bahn runs thru have applied to UNESCO to make the two lines a World Heritage Site. The sections are Thusis-St Moritz ("Albula Line") and St. Moritz-Campocolgna (Bernina Line), on the Italian border. (Personally the Bernina Pass line is Europe's most scenic line -awesomely scenic!) Only two rail lines currently have been annointed by UNESCO as Heritage Sites: Austria's Semmering line and India's quaint Darjeeling line.

I won't be sorry to see the Sudbahnhof go...it is kind of dumpy. I do like some of the spots around the Westbahnhof, esp. the West End Cafe. I assume the new station will also handle the ICE trains that come in from Germany as well as the regular EC trains.

More updates- The highspeed upgrade on the Berlin to Hamburg line opened recently. Travel time has been reduced by 30 minutes and is now just 90 minutes. Along with higher speeds is higher prices. The high speed upgrade between Berlin and Leipzig is expected to be completed by the World Cup in 2006. Also DB announced that the new main station in Berlin will be opened in May and that international trains will no longer stop at the Zoo Station.

When Visp becomes the "new Brig" does this also mean we no longer get to descend along those wonderful palisades of the Rhone with the fabulous views?

If so, too, too sad.

Yes and if Swiss plans for their Alps Transit 2000 or whatever monniker they put on are realized travelers from Germany to Italy will see mainly tunnels, really mainly in tunnels even in flatter areas. Partly aimed at taking lorries off the roads. You will emerge briefly at Visp and back in tunnel to Italy! But the classic lines no doubt will still be there so we can experience what i also consider one of Europe's most thrilling mainline rides, the descent along a ledge to Brig hundreds of feet over the Rhone Valley below. so i guess it will be our choice to go for speed or scenes.

thanks Charlie B - didn't have that info on Hamburg-Berlin. I visited the new Berlin main station being built north of the Reichstag on the site of the old Lehter Bahnhof last September - S-Bahn trains are actually using it now and it seemed nearly ready for long-distance trains. a fine fine station architecturally, nearly all glass. Kitty-corner from it is Berlin's oldest train station, the Hamburger Bahnhof, no longer used but to a rail buff interesting to look at this old train shed.

Actually, this gives me an excuse (as if I really needed one) to go back to Switzerland soon for another train fix before these new improvements become reality!

EVEN FOR ITALY A LONG TIME
In what is probably a Guinness World Record, the new station at Portici on the Napoli-Torre Circumvesuviana rail line has opened after 22 years of construction! Beaucratic infighting and incompetence led to many delays. the old station becomes the town library.

The Brussels-Amsterdam high-speed rail line is due to open in 2007. currently Thalys high-speed trains only run at top speed until near Brussels then poke along thru Antwerp and Holland to Amsterdam. the new line features a new stop at Antwerp Centrale station, currently bypassed by Thalys trains which only halt at Antwerpen-Berchem, in the suburbs as Antwerpen-Centrale is currently a dead-end spur line off the mainline. the new line burrows under Antwerpen Centrale with a stop there and then continue on thru the port area to Roosendaal. Paris-amsterdam soon in under 4 hours!

TGV DUPLEX TRAINS
The success of the Paris-Lyon/Avignon TGV line is such that many trains are at capacity so SNCF in recent years has launched TGV Duplex, or doubledecker TGVs on the route rather than launching more trains, which may not be possible due to necessary spacing. To me this is great, you get better views from being up top!

TER Trains have also been introduced in recent years on regional routes - these move at a much higher speed than the older regional trains, approaching high-speed times. (Train Express Regional) These along with regular interval timetables hopefully will boost feeder trains to TGV lines and increase use of regional trains. A long day from the old <Michelines>, as the French once called locals because originally the Michelin company developed trains with rubber wheels for local services but these flopped but the word Micheline stuck.

NETHERLANDS RAILWAYS & SMART CARDS
NS Reizigers, the Dutch Railways, says it will by 2007 at least begin sale of tickets by a Chip Card (smart card) that will give 50% off off-peak rail fares.
DB SUPERMARKET PUTSCH
The German Railways recently put tickets on sale thru the Lidl supermarket chain for a flat 49.90 euros for any destination in Germany - though there were thousands of tickets reserved for the scheme, they sold out in one hour. No word on if it will be repeated but DB hopes to start providing such novel outlets for its tickets, especially promotional fares.
DB SERVICE STORES
DB, seeking to be more client oriented, has also opened 800 DB Service Stores in stations, mainly smaller stations where the store serves as ticket seller, newsstand, bakery and food shop - On Sundays DB stations and airports are often the only places, besides petrol stations, selling any groceries and they can be mobbed with locals. In Berlin recently at the tiny Zoo food store it was a real mob scene on a Sunday night.

NORWAY NIGHT TRAIN ROBBERY
One thinks of Norway as the safest country on Earth so it is surprising that in May the Trondheim-Oslo overnight train was victimized by a gang that used duplicate key cards to gain entry to 30 cabins whilst passengers were sleeping and stole many handbags, purses, etc. Passengers didn't realize they had been robbed until waking up in the morning, leading some to believe they had been gassed as well. 2 years ago the Stavenger-Oslo night train was similarly robbed and after that attack Norwegian Railways changed locks to the need key cards like in many hotels these days but somehow the banditos got copies of the cards.
INLANDSBANAN DOWN TO 1 TRAIN A DAY
Sweden's Inlandbanan railway running thru the heart of Reindeer and Lapp country running between Gallivare and Ostersund is now strictly a tourist service and is down to one trip a day only in summer (thru Sep 11, 2005).
NORWAY TRAINS & RESERVATIONS
Norway has dropped previous mandatory reservation requirements on many of its trains, such as the Bergen line.

NETHERLANDS TRAINS TO REINTRODUCE CATERING?
The once ubiquitous coffee wagons were recently eliminted from most Dutch trains because it was thought that competition from a growing number of station kiosks was making them unprofitable. But it seems NS officials are having second thoughts and may reintroduce some snack carts on some trains as a test. Personally, though the carts can be a bother, i like the opportunity to nab a cup of strong Dutch koffee on the train - though i too usually bring my own aboard from station kiosks as they tend to be cheaper.

TOLEDO AVE SPUR DELAYED
the 7km spur line off the Madrid-Seville AVE hi-speed rail line's opening has been delayed until 'sometime before the end of 2005'. Does anyone know if to go from Toledo to say Seville you would have to backtrack to Madrid on this new link or would there be a new station you could transfer to before Madrid, currently i believe there is no AVE stop between Madrid and Seville save Cordoba? Or possible there may be Toledo-Seville trains though i doubt there would be enough demand for that.

ROME-NAPLES HIGH-SPEED LINE TO OPEN
The new Rome-Naples high-speed rail line is due to open on Dec 15, 2005. Trains will hit 300 km/hr, making this Italy's fastest line. the line will use a unique higher voltage than any other line in Italy, thus the higher speeds.

BRIANCON-ALPS TUNNEL?
To alleviate the heavily used freight and passenger route on the Modane route, the French and Italian railways are seriously considering blasting a new tunnel thru the Alps between Briancon, currently a rail deadend, and Italy, rejoining the Modan-Turino line there.
THALYS QUITS ZAVENTEM
The one daily Thalys train to go from Paris directly to Brussels' Zaventem Airport has ceased serving the airort, now terminating at Brussels-Midi, from where suttles go to the airport.

BARCELONA-FIGUERES AVE UPDATE
Spanish authorities have decided to fund preparations for a 14.4 km section of the future Barcelona-Figueres high-speed line, part of the eventual high-speed line to France. This segment will feature four tunnels and is expected to open in 2009.
NEW BUDAPEST-VENICE-ZAGREB TRAIN
A new EC train (52/53 called the Goldoni has been launched Budapest-Zagreb via Venice.

UK'S GNER TO START ITALIAN SERVICE?
Uk train operator GNER, operator of many trains over the successful east coast mainline to Scotland has obtained a license to offer long-distance passenger service in Italy! Caio!

UK: VIRGIN WEST COAST WAY UP
Passenger traffic on Virgin's West Coast line is up 43% since the introduction of fast Pendolino trains last fall - speeding up travel times. In Dec 2005 when some track improvements are finalized (or actually signiling) times will be speeded up another 15-20 minutes.

NEW CZECH SPEED RECORD
The Czech Railways new prototype Pendolino train set a national speed record in Nov 05 - hitting 237 km/hr near Breclav - smashing the previous record of 219 km/hr in 1972, on a railway test circuit. With a max in service speed of 160km/hr the Breclav-Brno line is the fastest part of the Czech Railways lines. (160 km/hr would be slow by French standards!)