Channel Tunnel: More trains planned from the mainland to London
Published: Saturday, Jan 13th 2024, 06:50
Volver a Live Feed
The Channel Tunnel between Great Britain and France, which was opened 30 years ago, will soon allow more trains to travel to new destinations on the European mainland.
Tunnel operator Getlink wants to create the technical conditions for competing rail companies to be able to travel to new destinations from London, the company announced in Paris.
This includes Deutsche Bahn, which is still aiming to run its ICE trains directly to London, something it has wanted to do for many years. Up to now, only high-speed passenger trains operated by the Franco-British company Eurostar have traveled through the tunnel.
DB: High growth rate in long-distance traffic
"Traffic between London and the mainland through the Eurotunnel continues to be of fundamental interest to Deutsche Bahn," a DB spokesperson told Deutsche Presse-Agentur. DB's international long-distance traffic is showing high growth rates and the trend in traffic to the UK is also clearly towards environmentally friendly rail.
At present, however, neither the routes nor the trains are equipped with an end-to-end European Train Control System (ETCS), according to the DB spokesperson. "The approval of our ICE trains for Belgium, northern France and England depends on this equipment." Further details on the timetable could only be provided once the schedule and the technical requirements for the track upgrades were transparent.
New connections within 5 years
As early as 2013, DB had originally planned to run its ICE trains from Frankfurt via Cologne, Brussels and Lille to London and back three times a day. Years of disputes over safety requirements ultimately prevented this. The Spanish state-owned rail company Renfe was also repeatedly mentioned as another interested party in starting train connections through the Channel Tunnel.
A few weeks ago, the tunnel operator Getlink announced accelerated efforts together with regulatory authorities and infrastructure managers to enable rail companies to launch new connections from London to the mainland within five years. Connections from London to Cologne and Frankfurt, Geneva and Zurich were mentioned. Specifically, this involves the standardization of norms for the tunnel and the trains as well as the preparation of new connections with the network operators and affected stations.
©Keystone/SDA
Spanish 
English 
German 
French 
Arabic