SNCF would sooner leave passengers stranded than make simple timetable adjustments

In the Newsletter this week
Analysis: SNCF would sooner leave passengers stranded than make simple timetable adjustments
Bullshit Meter: Beograd - Zagreb - Ljubljana trains back and faster by 2029
Good week: New Cottbus - Legnica service from December 2026
Good week, possibly: Renfe to get a new website
Good journalism this week: FT long read about Deutsche Bahn's woes
Bad week: Modane - Oulx, €59 for a 29 minute trip
Very bad week: End of 2031 for Stuttgart's new station?
Elsewhere this week: VCD Magazin
Photo of the week: Tramway to Raeren
Calendar: Lehrte - Berlin line closure starts 5th February 2027

Newsletter 021, Friday 12th June 2026.
Subscriber-only newsletter, sent every Friday at 14:00 CET.

SNCF would sooner leave passengers stranded than make simple timetable adjustments

Yesterday I was in Paris for different meetings and, somewhat to my surprise, my last appointment finished early, meaning I could take a train home an hour earlier.

Or not.

Because this being SNCF, it does not work.

So let's work out what went wrong, and what SNCF should have done instead.

This is the rough schema of the TER (i.e. regional) train routes between Paris Bercy and Dijon and Auxerre:

Each line indicates a running line. Grey boxes are stations where Paris - Dijon or Paris - Auxerre TER trains stop, white boxes are junctions or stations added for illustrative purposes. The station I need to reach - Nuits-sous-Ravières - is on the Dijon branch.

There are 17:29 and 19:27 departures from Paris Bercy to Dijon Ville - and those go direct to Nuits-sous-Ravières. But today, having planned to take the 19:27, I surprisingly was at Bercy by 18:10.

And there is a 18:25 departure from Paris Bercy to Laroche Migennes, arriving there on a normal day at 19:57. And there is a Laroche Migennes - Dijon train that departs at 20:02. So with a quick change it works. 1 change to get home an hour earlier, sure I'll do that.

Except today, and every weekday up until 5th September, it does not work.

Speed restrictions as a result of track works near Sens mean the 18:25 Paris Bercy - Laroche Migennes is scheduled to arrive at 20:04 rather than 19:57, 7 minutes longer than usually.

And that means missing the 20:02 train to Nuits sous Ravières.

Yeah, you understood that right. For three months, trains that are designed to connect, do not connect - because SNCF did not adjust the timetable of the 20:02 to accommodate the 7 minutes later arrival of the train from Paris.

I asked the SNCF employee at Laroche Migennes why the 20:02 train was not re-timetabled. He was friendly, and understood my frustration, and said he and his colleagues had been asking themselves that too.

So rather than just rant, what could SNCF have done to fix this? Here are a few suggestions.

1. Bring forward the departure time of the 18:25 train from Bercy to 18:18 - thereby keeping the 19:57 arrival time in Laroche Migennes. But this solution might be complicated due to slower RER trains using the lines between Paris and Montereau - there might not be a path.
2. Run the 18:25 train via Moret - Veneux-les-Sablons instead of via Champagne sur Seine, as that way is 10 minutes shorter than via Champagne (and I took the 18:25 - it went via Champagne). But this might be complicated as the line via Moret is more congested, due to the trains towards Montargis and Nevers - again there might not be a path.
3. Delay the departure of the 20:02 train in Laroche Migennes by 7 minutes, to 20:09. That means likewise delaying it at every subsequent station by 7 minutes. But given there are no connecting trains at any stop other than Dijon Ville, only there could theoretically be a problem. Arrival in Dijon is scheduled for 21:27, so that would be 21:34. And the next train after 21:27 in Dijon is 22:09 to Besançon, so 7 minutes makes no difference to anyone. There are no TGVs arriving off the high speed line through Montbard at this time either, so that causes no path conflict, and there might be a minor conflict with one or two freight trains that would have had to be likewise re-timetabled a couple of minutes.

As there seems to be no obvious downside to 3., all I can conclude is that SNCF was too lazy to organise the re-timetabling of the 20:02 train to 20:07 for a three month period.

This is not about money.

This is not about infrastructure.

This is not about staffing.

This is about the wrong attitude. A simple, obvious solution, not acted upon.

Bullshit Meter: Beograd - Zagreb - Ljubljana trains back and faster by 2029

Observer of rail in the Balkans Fabian Vendrig sent me this story about plans to have the infrastructure in place by 2029 to be able to run a Beograd - Zagreb - Ljubljana train with a reasonable trip time, pointing to the renovation of the Ruma - Šid section in Serbia as the reason for some optimism. This follows the contract award for the Novska - Dugo Selo renovation (that is currently the worst part of the corridor in Croatia).

Better infrastructure by 2029 to allow the service to happen is possible, but given the unwillingness of Croatian and Serbian railways to collaborate I am sorry but I do not yet fully believe this - although of course it is a good idea!

All previous Bullshit Meter posts can be found here.

Good week: New Cottbus - Legnica service from December 2026

It is possible to take the train from Cottbus, Germany to Legnica, Poland now, but it requires at least one change (in Forst) and the ticketing and timetabling are a mess.

But now change is afoot. From December 2026 there will be 7 direct Cottbus - Legnica trains each day, as reported by Schlesien Heute (there are other sources, but that one is without paywall). With regular trains from Berlin to Cottbus, and from Legnica to Wrocław, the new service offers interesting connections both ends as well.

Ultimately this is exactly how cross border rail at the Germany - Poland border goes, each and every year. The infrastructure might be in a poor state (this is mostly a single track non electrified line!) but there is a real determination to use it as much as possible - and that is a very welcome attitude!

Good week, possibly: Renfe to get a new website

SNCF and Renfe share three things in common: an obsession with high speed trains, a dedication to compulsory reservation, and websites so bad they've becoming running jokes in their respective countries.

But now change is afoot. Maybe.

Renfe has invested €164 million in a new sales platform. Getting it launched has already led to a senior manager for digital and transformation being moved from their post, and according to El Confidencial some people involved in the project say the new system is even worse than the old one.

Maybe they would be bette off not trying, work to get the EU Passenger Package proposals approved, and then we can all use DB Navigator or Trainline to book trains in Spain for the best price instead!

Good journalism this week: FT long read about Deutsche Bahn's woes

How can German trains have become so bad is a recurring question I receive on social media. Simply put I think you can point the finger at Gerhard Schröder, and the late 1990s new public management craze - while the effort to privatise Deutsche Bahn did not happen back then, the effort to do more and more while investing comparatively less in the network has left German rail in its current predicament. While I maintain it's remarkable how much Deutsche Bahn does given all of what has happened, the situation remains grave.

So that is why I am grateful for this long read from the Financial Times - a kind of explainer for those who do not follow this every day as to how things got so bad, and what Germany is doing about it, and whether it will work.

Bad week: Modane - Oulx, €59 for a 29 minute trip

News this week that a trip on the cross border TGV between the final station in France, Modane, and the first stop in Italy, Oulx, will cost €59 for a 29 minute trip. That makes it 8.1 times as costly as the average TGV ticket.

The reason?

No one actually ought to be taking a TGV for that short route, but the problem is that there are no regional trains along the mainline through the alps. All French TERs end in Modane, all Italian Regionale trains end in Bardonecchia. That is why Bardonecchia 🇮🇹 - Modane 🇫🇷 is one of my priority borders in my #CrossBorderRail project - Regionale trains need to urgently be extended from Bardonecchia to France! (technically it is easier to do it this way than to extend French regional trains to Italy)

Very bad week: End of 2031 for Stuttgart's new station?

Initially planned for December this year, FAZ reported this week that the opening of Stuttgart's new main station could be pushed back to 2031. Heise has a bit more information about the many issues in English here. Serious errors have been made with the cabling of the signalling systems, and it is going to take a long time to correct those errors, although whether this is the only reason for the further delay is not clear at the moment.

Anyway, Stuttgart 21 is the project of this century, right? They have 69 more years they can delay it if they need to!

Elsewhere this week: VCD Magazin

A few weeks ago in Maastricht I sat down for a chat with Martin Unfried and the interview with me has now appeared in the VCD Magazin.

Photo of the week: Tramway to Raeren

Until 1918 - when borders between Germany and Belgium were re-drawn - there was a tramway from Aachen to Raeren. This week I went to the spot where the tram used to run - it is hard to imagine a tram used to run here!

This was one of the borders I visited on my last border investigation trip before the summer. Currently the number of border lines, current and former, visited as part of the #CrossBorderRail project stands at 428.

Calendar: Lehrte - Berlin line closure starts 5th February 2027

The next major stage of Germany's Generalsanierung of its railway - the main line from Lehrte (to the east of Hannover) to Berlin will be closed from 5th February until 10th December 2027. More from Bahnblogstelle here.

Photo Rights

VR train in Haparanda by Joel Savilaakso, used with permission.
All other photos by Jon Worth.
Bullshit Meter images always have photo rights listed directly on the image.