52.2km as the crow flies. 67.3km train route kilometres.
Those are the distances between Wissembourg (Bas-Rhin, Alsace, France) and Strasbourg (Bas-Rhin, Alsace, France).
And I want to travel between the two by train after dinner on Saturday 21st October. Fair enough, surely? France the country of good food and wine and all that.
No, it doesn’t work.
Here are the evening train times on that Saturday:
The last train, French side, goes at 19:42. And that’s not just the last train to Strasbourg, it is the last train into France that evening, full stop.
Oddly there is a later train – at 21:03 to Germany, towards Landau(Pfalz). Taking that one, and changing in Winden(Pfalz), Karlsruhe Hbf and Appenweier gets you to Strasbourg at 23:58. Total route-kilometres – 129.
But ah you may say, no one wants to go out to dinner in Wissembourg, but they might in Strasbourg. But the timetable there is little better – the last Strasbourg-Wissembourg train departs at 20:05, arriving 21:01.
Want a night out on a Saturday in Alsace?
Buy a car.
Oh but don’t drink and drive of course…
Unnecessary clickbaiting and cherry picking from a well known francophobe.
While it is fair enough to say that parts of the TER network are underserved and deserve more attention, anyone can cherry pick two locations in any part of Europe and claim that people want to go for dinner from A to B and bemoan the poor train service.
Thanks for the kind comment. This well known francophobe who speaks French and spends more than three months each year in France. Hate it I do, hate it.
Here’s the deal “Toulousain” – the reason I want public transport to work better in France is because I want more people to be able to visit France, go out to dinner in France etc., and NOT NEED A CAR TO DO SO. That is it.
And that is fair enough. What is not fair is the pick of a random town of 7600 habitants and writing a snarky article about its bad connections – there are tons of towns of 8000 habitants in Europe that do not have ultra frequent connections or late connections. This is not merely a French issue as you make it out to be.
The problem is *much more severe in France* than it is in most of the rest of Europe. Spain, I grant you, is probably even worse than France though.
It looks like you can cut 30 minutes off by using the flixbus from Karlsruhe direct to Strasbourg, but that comes with risks of an unprotected connection and bus delays. No later departure, either.
It seems odd that there is no direct train or bus. Surely everyone who loves France should hate how SNCF and interurban buses are being dismantled?