| Where low-cost airlines pioneered, motorways and rail networks have followed – and the increasing mobility between European cities created new property hotspots. Mark Faithfull reports  As French Transport Minister Dominique Perben sped Strasbourg-bound this April at 320km/h on the inaugural rail journey from Paris on the new TGV-Est, some 3,000 torches lit the way. But the torches could just as easily have been aflame for a new generation of European rail travel, with several countries developing and opening faster networks designed to compete with the ubiquitous no-frills airlines. Their expansion will almost certainly change the property map across important stretches of Europe.
The new TGV (Train à Grande Vitesse) is already one of the world’s speediest rail vehicles. German railways operator Deutsche Bahn, NS Hispeed of the Netherlands, OBB in Austria, SBB in Switzerland, Belgium’s SNCB, SNCF in France and Eurostar have also formed an airline-style alliance called Railteam, with the aim of improving connections, making cross-border timetables and information clearer and enabling through-ticketing. Deutsche Bahn is promoting its striking new Hauptbahnhof station in Berlin as a European hub, while in Brussels modernisation of the Midi station as an international hub serving the Eurostar, TGV, Thalys and ICE services is designed to have the same effect on the EU capital. The Paris-Strasbourg TGV line opened to the public in August and has cut the trip to two hours and 20 minutes from the previous four hours. It has also slashed travel time eastwards, connecting Paris and Luxembourg in about two hours, Frankfurt in less than four and Munich in six hours 15 minutes. The second phase of construction, which will bring the journey time from Paris to Strasbourg down to one hour 50 minutes, is being brought forward from 2010 to 2008. “Some 37 million Europeans can be reached,” says TGV-Est director Alain Le Guellec. “A network of high-speed links with the rest of Europe is being put into place.” Germany’s Deutsche Bahn has sped up many journeys on its own network since the turn of the year and in Spain too journey times are bring slashed by Alta Velocidad Española (AVE), with the high-speed line connecting Madrid and Barcelona in its final stage of construction. AVE will connect with the TGV in 2009 with the opening of the Perpignan-Figueres route, allowing services to go to French destinations such as Marseille and Avignon. Another connection to the TGV is planned at either La Jonquera in Catalonia or Irun in the Basque Country. The AVE Madrid-Lisbon line is currently being constructed and will include an international station on the border near Badajoz. Eurostar moves its London terminus from Waterloo to St Pancras in November, reducing London to Paris journey times from two hours 35 minutes to two hours 15 minutes and London to Brussels times to one hour 51 minutes. |