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For
American visitors to France:
Unlike in the USA, the railways (railroads) are the main form of
intercity public transport in France and in Europe. French and European
rail networks offer thousands of miles of modern high-speed
tracks, and state-of-the- art trains. France has the best developed and
fastest high-speed rail network in the world. |
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tickets here
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Travelling by rail in France |
High speed
through France: Eurostar and the TGV network
Since the autumn of 2007, the opening of the new London
terminal for Eurostar
at St Pancras has brought the journey time from London to Paris down to
just 2 hours and 15 minutes, city centre to city centre. And for anyone
boarding the Eurostar at Ebbsfleet, the new station in south east
London, the trip is even faster, from just 2 hours and 5 minutes.
In terms of speed and convenience,
Eurostar
has shown that on journeys of 200 miles or so, the train is far more
convenient than the plane.
The opening of a new high-speed rail
line into London was a novelty for Londoners in 2007; but Parisians
were not particularly impressed; after all, France has been steadily
expanding its high-speed rail network for over a quarter of a century!
The first French TGV lines were on the drawing board in the early
1970s, and the first long-distance route, from Paris to Lyons, opened
way back in 1981!
But if a lot of people already know
that the best way to go from London to Paris for a day's shopping or a
weekend break, is to take the Eurostar,
far less people realise that the extent of the French high-speed rail
network means that taking the train is rapid option for
reaching a large number of destinations in provincial France.
Connecting
to provincial cities. It's easier to change at Lille than Paris.
The map opposite shows the extent of France's high-speed rail network
in 2008. At present, the network consists of some 1700 km (over 1000
miles) of dedicated high-speed track, comprising four routes radiating
out from Paris. However, an "interconnection" route round the south and
west of Paris allows high-speed connections between the routes, notably
allowing north-south TGVs to avoid the centre of Paris.
Note that TGV services operate to all the
cities indicated on the map, and to many others too, since these high
speed trains can also run - at reduced speed - on the traditional rail
network.
This makes the TGV station at Lille Europe a very
handy hub for passengers coming by Eurostar
from the UK or Belgium and Holland. There are direct TGV
connections from Lille to a large number of French towns and cities,
including Bordeaux,
Rennes, Nantes,
Dijon,
Strasbourg,
Besançon,
Avignon, Aix en Provence, Marseilles, Montpellier, Perpignan or Nice.
The big advantage of changing at Lille is that travellers do not need
to change stations or cross
Paris; Eurostars and French TGVs actually share the same platforms at
Lille
Europe station.
The alternative to changing at Lille is to take Eurostar to Paris, and
then travel beyond Paris from the appropriate mainline terminus.; but
this will normally involve changing
terminus at Paris: see below.
Airport
connections:
Thanks to intelligent forward thinking, planners of the French TGV
network had the sense to connect it directly, when possible, to major
airports. Thus, there is a major TGV station right underneath Terminal
2 at Paris's Charles de Gaulle airport;
and there is a TGV station in the middle of the Lyon Saint Exupery
airport.
Click
here
to check train timetables and book tickets.
Paris
rail termini:
Like many capital cities, Paris suffers from having no central railway
hub, but a number of mainline termini. Here are the main destinations
served from each of the principal termini: TGV services depart from the
Gare du Nord, Gare de l'Est, gare de Lyon and Gare Montparnasse.
Gare du
Nord: North east France, London (Eurostar), Brussels,
Amsterdam (Thalys) , Lille, Valenciennes, Calais.
Gare de
l'Est: Nancy, Metz, Rheims
(or Reims),
Strasbourg, Mulhouse,
Germany, Luxembourg.
Gare de
Lyon: Lyon, Dijon, Besançon, Geneva, Clermont-Ferrand,
Marseille, Nice, Montpellier, Perpignan; Italy and the east of Spain.
Gare
d'Austerlitz: Non-TGV services to Tours, Poitiers, Limoges, Bordeaux,
Toulouse, Biarritz, western Spain.
Gare
Montparnasse: All western TGVs, Brest, Rennes, Nantes
Gare
St. Lazare Caen,
Cherbourg,
Rouen,
Le Havre
 France's impressive railways
On main routes not served by TGVs, such as Paris-Clermont-Ferrand or
Paris-Limoges-Toulouse, very comfortable express trains run at speeds
that can reach 200 km/hr on some stretches. Such trains, referred to in the
timetables as
"corail" trains - or on the fastest lines, "Corail TEOZ" , run
on all intercity routes.
French railways have a reputation for punctuality, though delays seem
slightly more common these days than in the past. Most trains however
run on time, and delays of over ten minutes are unusual. This is
doubtless one of the reasons why the French are regular rail
travellers. If a mainline train (TGV or Corail) is over 30 minutes late
at arrival, on a journey of over 200 km., demand a late-arrival form
when you reach your destination ; in some stations, staff will hand
them out automatically. Fill this in and send it off with your ticket
in the business-reply envelope provided, and you should receive a
voucher worth 30% of the cost of your ticket. 2007 saw the opening of a
considerable part of the latest dedicated high-speed line, the "TGV de
l'Est" linking Paris to Strasbourg, via Nancy and Metz.
 At peak
periods, thousands of extra trains may be run to cope with very heavy
demand.
It's not just on main lines, however, that rail travel in France can be
a great way to travel. More and more branch lines and feeder services
are now operated with state-of-the art and very comfortable new
railcars that resemble miniature TGV's. With massive picture windows
along the sides, the experience of travelling along some of France's
rural rail routes is rather like that of riding a scenic
railway; and regional councils, that are now in charge of running local
rail services, seem to be competing with each other,
particularly in tourist areas, to boost their image by investing in
these very impressive new railcars.
France also offers plenty of
scope for rail tourism on its various scenic
railways.
There are or course other less comfortable rides to be had on French
railways. Many suburban routes and local services on main lines are
still operated using old and sometimes noisy and uncomfortable stock -
but even on such routes, this is by no means always the case.
The
cost of rail travel in France:
Finally, there's the question of As a
nationalised system, the French railways run a clear and coherent
ticketing system, and generally speaking rail travel is relatively
cheap - about 10p a mile (1 Euro per 10 km) for a standard second class
fare. This is more than the cost of rail travel in Spain or Italy, but
far cheaper than standard rates in the UK. Lots of discounts can be
obtained: two people travelling on a return trip together; over 60's;
under 26's; "escapades", regular travellers.. Discounts generally vary
between 25% and 50%.
ID-TGV - the
low-cost TGV service.
To compete with low-cost airlines,
some TGVs offer major reductions if tickets are purchased
online. ID-TGV services (sometimes complete trains, at other
times a quota of seats in a standard service) now operate from Paris to
about 20 destinations; for example, a first class ticket
from Paris to Lyon can be had for 24 Euros on certain off-peak
trains, compared to 55 €uros or 112 €uros for a normal first class
ticket on the same train . However, don't pay much attention to the
sites that say "Paris-Marseille" or "Paris-Montpellier" for just 19 €:
these very low prices are indeed available, but only on about one train
a month, if that!
Click
here to check ID-TGV prices
and buy
tickets on line at Rail Europe.
Other new ideas include an overnight TGV from Paris to Biarritz, which
comes complete with a clubbing car, for those who can't sleep on a
moving train; other destinations are being added .....
Tickets
online
Other
tickets can also be ordered online - and even printed out on your own
computer like low-cost airline reservation forms; but be warned. If you
print out your own ticket, note that you cannot get it reimbursed if
you have to cancel your journey or even put it off. Like a low-cost
airline ticket, it is non transferable, non refundable and
unchangeable.
Check out
the Rail
Europe site to check offers and book tickets
and further
details.
Pictures:
above left, a TGV at Lyons. Above right, a modern branch line railcar.
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