quote:Deutsche Bahn gets green light for Eurotunnel use: company
Wed, Dec 16, 2009
FRANKFURT — The German railway Deutsche Bahn can run its high-speed trains through the Channel Tunnel, the head of the Eurotunnel group said in a press report on Wednesday, increasing the chances of more competition in European rail service.
"Deutsche Bahn fulfills all the conditions for transporting passengers via the tunnel," Jacques Gounon told the Financial Times Deutschland, adding that the German railway was welcome. It had been blocked by a directive on fire protection that has now been lifted, a Eurotunnel spokeswoman told the German newspaper.
The French national railway SNCF was the only one authorized until now to carry passengers through the 38-kilometer (24-mile) tunnel, the newspaper said.
Eurostar, which currently offers service between Brussels, London and Paris via the tunnel, is operated by SNCF, the Belgian railway SNCB and Eurostar Limited, a subsidiary of London and Continental Railways.
Geoff Mayo Member # 153
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Interesting that the fire directive has been lifted. I wonder what the specific text was?
I suspect the reason SNCF were able to (but never did) run trains through the tunnel is because the Eurostar train is a derivative of the TGV and hence any changes to make TGVs acceptable would have been minimal.
Incidentally, no Eurostar services for 3 days now because of snow getting into places that snow shouldn't get into (electrics). Eurostar are claiming it's the first time: it's not - I was on a similarly-affected train back in 2003. Swirling snow gets into the vents, warm tunnel, snow melts onto electrics.
MetSox Member # 6035
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Interesting idea. This got me thinking about what the service would be like. Using the fastest current travel times and allowing for five minutes dwell time in Brussels and Cologne, I calculated that it would take 3:43 from London to Cologne and 4:50 to Frankfurt. I also noticed that all trains from Brussels to Cologne stop at Liege and Aachen, so if these two stations were bypassed, it would reduce the travel time by at least 10 minutes. They might also skip Brussels, so as not to infringe on Eurostar's territory reducing the trip time even more.
I would also think that they would use ICE3 trainsets, unless a completely new train were designed for this service. The great thing about the ICE3 is that passengers can see out the front and back of the train.
Could there be services to other parts of Germany? Once the extension of the LGV Est to Strasbourg is completed, they could go to Stuttgart via the Paris Interconnexion line. When the high speed line from Stuttgart to Ulm is finished, they could conceivably go as far as Munich.
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