Today the European Commission released its “plan to accelerate high-speed rail across Europe” (press release here). Only it’s not a plan. And Community of European Railways (CER), the state owned railways’ trade body, stated this will “revolutionise the way travel distances are perceived in Europe” (press release here). Only this […]
As the discussion about future rivals to Eurostar has heated up, so more and more of the focus has been on access to the Temple Mills depot in East London. The Office of Rail and Road (ORR) last week decided that yes, there was capacity for a company other than […]
On 12th July I was at Nagykereki on the Hungarian great plain, trying to find remnants of the former cross border railway line to Episcopia Bihor in Romania. You can see where the line used to run on OpenRailwayMap here, and on my borders map here. In terms of international […]
The UK’s Office of Rail and Road has today decided that Virgin Trains should have access to the Temple Mills depot in east London to maintain its future Channel Tunnel fleet, and has rejected applications from Trenitalia, Gemini and Evolyn to use the facility. It has also, importantly, rejected Eurostar’s […]
Put all the rhetoric to one side. In announcing today they are ordering 30 Alstom Avelia Horizon (TGV-M) double decker trains (see the FT here), with only options for 20 more, Eurostar is being less ambitious than has been rumoured for more than a year, where the talk was of […]
Back in June I wondered why – despite it being heavily rumoured for more than a year – Eurostar still had not signed a deal with Alstom for the purchase of 50 Avelia Horizon double deck high speed trains. These trains are to be called TGV-M in France, while Avelia […]