Proposed new competitor for Eurostar

[Ron Ron Ron]

A tiny bit more information on the story....

 

12  Avelia HS trains being ordered from Alstom.

 

 

https://evolyn.com/evolyn/f/evolyn-acquire-12-high-speed-trains-from-alstom-to-link-uk-and-ue

 

https://www.railwaygazette.com/high-speed/evolyn-to-launch-paris-london-trains-in-competition-with-eurostar/65100.article

 

https://news.sky.com/story/cross-channel-rail-competitor-evolyn-buys-12-trains-ahead-of-2025-launch-12982441

 

https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/planned-eurostar-competitor-evolyn-buy-12-trains-frances-alstom-2023-10-11/

 

 

 

Some examples of the Alstom Avelia range....

 

https://www.alstom.com/solutions/rolling-stock/avelia-high-speed-trains-best-way-travel-fast

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[Jeremy Cumberland]

Nothing that I can see to say which cities/stations the trains will run between. Also, Alstom's statement about "being in discussions" does not appear to match Evolyn's "reached an agreement to acquire", even allowing for non-dislosure agreements, and Evolyn's own headline of "Evolyn acquire" is misleading.

[Nick C]

1 hour ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

Nothing that I can see to say which cities/stations the trains will run between. Also, Alstom's statement about "being in discussions" does not appear to match Evolyn's "reached an agreement to acquire", even allowing for non-dislosure agreements, and Evolyn's own headline of "Evolyn acquire" is misleading.

second link in Ron's post:

 

Quote

Evolyn told Railway Gazette International that services would run non-stop between Paris Nord and London St Pancras International. 

 

Which is silly IMHO - Eurostar already offer a pretty good service between those two. What's actually needed is better connections to places other than Paris (I doubt we'll ever get better connections this side to places other than London...)

[lmsforever]

Another service provider will be good for the incumbent and for passengers if the new operator provides new destinations as well that can only be good for passengers, this is an interesting project. 

[nightstar.train]

42 minutes ago, Nick C said:

I doubt we'll ever get better connections this side to places other than London...

You'd need trains that fit our loading gauge. Unless you can procure some original Eurostars (probably impossible) they’d need to be specially designed and built. The costs for a run of just 12-16 trains would be enormous, far far more than just buying an off the shelf design from Alstom (with added Chunnel bits). So unfortunately I think the chances of beyond London international services are nil. The only other options are places on HS1, so Ebbsfleet, Stratford and Ashford. 

[AMJ]

Why run NOL as Eurostar planned when we have very good services from Kings Cross and Euston, which are a short walk from St P.  Better to buy London CIV ticket.

 

They would be better linking to other places south of the tunnel.  Paris is good however the majority of times that I have used the tunnel I'm heading through to Brussels.

[hayfield]

4 hours ago, AMJ said:

Why run NOL as Eurostar planned when we have very good services from Kings Cross and Euston, which are a short walk from St P.  

 

 

Not a short walk for 2 elderly travellers with large suite cases !!

[GoingUnderground]

Competition could be good in terms of ticket prices. But, judging by the last time that I used Eurostar in October 2019, I'd be concerned about the ability and capacity of STP to handle any more passengers. Getting through security and passport control was already slow, and space in the departure lounge was at a premium if there were departures within hslf sn hour of eachother as was sometimes the case with the Paris and Disneyland services. 

 

Or would Eurostar have to give up some paths to the newcomer? That would seem to be counterproductive and could increase ticket prices if the total number of trains and thus passengers remained unchanged as there'd be two lots of admin/head office costs to cover from the same customer base - economists & accountants call it "economies of scale" or in this case "diseconomies".

[Siberian Snooper]

When I went to Switzerland last year, I managed to amble from Marylebone to Stp with my case and Im in my late 60's and it was a very warm morning.

 

 

[Ron Ron Ron]

4 hours ago, GoingUnderground said:

......Or would Eurostar have to give up some paths to the newcomer? .....

 

I thought they already have, by cancelling and ceasing to serve some of their routes, such as Disneyland and some of the alpine and southern French services?

 

 

 

.

[phil-b259]

1 minute ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

 

I thought they already have, by cancelling and ceasing to serve some of their routes, such as Disneyland and some of the alpine and southern French services?

 

 

 

.

You need to remember that these have not been cancelled due to a lack of train paths - they have been cancelled due to the inability to process people quickly enough at St Pancras!

 

In that situation the management of Eurostar have gone back to basics and focused their energies on the main ‘3 Capials’ services which are far more important to Eurostars finances and long term survival.

 

Consequently I simply do not see how there is any realistic possibility of anyone else being able to provide any extra services out from St Pancras regardless of what might be printed in the media.

 

The only opportunities I can see is if the new rival terminated at Stratford or Ebslfeet - but  in both cases the sheer number of people who would need to be processed by U.K. border forces would mean a massive expansion of said security facilities - plus of course persuading HM Government to actually agree to employ the extra border force personnel needed.

[phil-b259]

12 hours ago, lmsforever said:

Another service provider will be good for the incumbent and for passengers if the new operator provides new destinations as well that can only be good for passengers, this is an interesting project. 

A new operator can only exist if there is enough spare capacity to process all the new passengers these trains generate through U.K. border force / UK customs facilities at St Pancras’s.

 

We already know that the facilities at St Pancras are cramped, the passenger waiting areas get horribly overcrowded and the time taken to turn round trains is significantly grater than used to be achieved at Waterloo even though that only had 5 platforms compared to the 6 at St Pancras.

[Ron Ron Ron]

Well you never know ?

The arrival of a new operator, may spark a redevelopment of the St. Pancras International, internal layout ?

I imagine Eurostar might have been pressing for this already, in light of the issues and problems arising of late.

I can't imagine they've been totally accepting of the situation and not making any sort of complaint?

 

 

.

[GoingUnderground]

1 hour ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

Well you never know ?

The arrival of a new operator, may spark a redevelopment of the St. Pancras International, internal layout ?

I imagine Eurostar might have been pressing for this already, in light of the issues and problems arising of late.

I can't imagine they've been totally accepting of the situation and not making any sort of complaint?.

 No, I don't suppose they have been terribly happy. But the problems are not of their making and I don't think can be readily solved because the departure lounge was designed decades before the complexities introduced by Brexit came into being. It might be possible to smooth out some of the lumps and bumps on incoming services by putting passport control onboard as has been done in the past, but that costs, and I cannot see HMG putting their hands in their pocket to fund that at present.

 

I read that Eurostar have been letting trains go without all the booked passengers simply because it has not been possible to get them through the departure process quickly enough for them to make their trains and delaying the departures so that everyone was on board wasn't a solution. In some ways I'm a bit surprised that they haven't said "B****r it, I'm off. Go find some other mug to run the HS1 services."

 

With an additional operator, the space available at STP for the departure lounge and arrivals would have to be radically expanded by taking out many, if not all of the undercroft shops. Short of evicting the Javelin services, the opportunities for additional platforms seem to be nil unless the Midland Mainline services have their platforms moved even further away from Euston Road to make space for approaches to additional platforms constructed above the undercroft next to the existing ones, with new enlarged departure and arrivals facilities below them in the same fashion as the existing facilities. As a user of the Midland Mainline services from time to time I wouldn't be terribly happy about that, it already feels like you're walking back to the East Mids as it is. But the disruption involved in any sort of redevelopment looks to be horrendous, not to mention the cost, and again I cannot see HMG stumping up the readies as judging by their recent actions the current lot don't apparently believe in public transport by rail.

 

There's also the question of capacity at Paris Gare du Nord for another train company which I read is their stated French terminus as again, as I recall, that used to struggle at times to get folks through passport control and also with available seating in the departure lounge. And I don't think there is spare platform capacity there either nor space to expand short of evicting local services to free up additional platforms. But, as I said, it is now some years since I last passed through Gare du Nord.

 

What would make sense, as others have said, would be for new destinations to be added served by the new operator or by Eurostar from London to free up paths into Gare du Nord..

 

And finally, are there sufficient free pathways through the Channel Tunnel for the new services? No one has mentioned that potential bottleneck yet, and I can't recall seeing any info about current utilisation levels. I believe that Eurostar already flight some of their services, hence the congestion at times in the departure lounge at STP. One remedy might be to slow down the speeds in the Tunnel to reduce headway and increase capacity but at the expense of longer transit times, if I understand the process correctly. But please correct me if I've got it all wrong..

 

These must have been issues looked at by DB when they were thinking of opening up direct services from STP to Germany.

[hayfield]

10 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

You need to remember that these have not been cancelled due to a lack of train paths - they have been cancelled due to the inability to process people quickly enough at St Pancras!

 

In that situation the management of Eurostar have gone back to basics and focused their energies on the main ‘3 Capials’ services which are far more important to Eurostars finances and long term survival.

 

Consequently I simply do not see how there is any realistic possibility of anyone else being able to provide any extra services out from St Pancras regardless of what might be printed in the media.

 

The only opportunities I can see is if the new rival terminated at Stratford or Ebslfeet - but  in both cases the sheer number of people who would need to be processed by U.K. border forces would mean a massive expansion of said security facilities - plus of course persuading HM Government to actually agree to employ the extra border force personnel needed.

 

Phil

 

I dont doubt the reason you stated is correct in as much as Eurostar communications. But I have been to Italy and back in the late summer. At St Pancras the only queues I met at 7am was one person in front of me at the security scanner and one person (my wife) in front of me at passport control.

 

Garde du Nord was busier a bit, but it took less than 15 mins to check in, go through 2 sets of passport control and then tunnel security. I have heard moves are afoot to speed up the UK check in further, but at St Pancras I waited longer in M&S than Eurostar.

 

Eurostar are not using their full allocation of travel slots, so there are train spaces available. And the odd extra train will not need "massive" expansion. Two scanners in use now are/were designed for a larger number of trains, and 1 extra scanner will give an extra 50% increase of flow for a few extra square yards of space, from memory plenty of additional check in machines were not being used and not all passport booths manned. I think at most less than an extra train an hour could be accommodated through the tunnel after reading on this thread what those in the know have said

 

As for additional pickup stations on both sides, certainly in France it would work better for onward TGV travel, as for Ebbsfleet and Ashford they are both limited to what services they connect with. Stratford may be better in that it connects with the Elisabeth line

[phil-b259]

53 minutes ago, hayfield said:

 

Phil

 

I dont doubt the reason you stated is correct in as much as Eurostar communications. But I have been to Italy and back in the late summer. At St Pancras the only queues I met at 7am was one person in front of me at the security scanner and one person (my wife) in front of me at passport control.

 

Garde du Nord was busier a bit, but it took less than 15 mins to check in, go through 2 sets of passport control and then tunnel security. I have heard moves are afoot to speed up the UK check in further, but at St Pancras I waited longer in M&S than Eurostar.

 

Eurostar are not using their full allocation of travel slots, so there are train spaces available. And the odd extra train will not need "massive" expansion. Two scanners in use now are/were designed for a larger number of trains, and 1 extra scanner will give an extra 50% increase of flow for a few extra square yards of space, from memory plenty of additional check in machines were not being used and not all passport booths manned. I think at most less than an extra train an hour could be accommodated through the tunnel after reading on this thread what those in the know have said

 

As for additional pickup stations on both sides, certainly in France it would work better for onward TGV travel, as for Ebbsfleet and Ashford they are both limited to what services they connect with. Stratford may be better in that it connects with the Elisabeth line

 

However for this new entrant to make enough money to survive in the long term they are going to need more than a couple of trains running at awkward times during the day. Thats why competition for slots at airports is most intense at certain times of the day or London termini may have zero extra space to accommodate specials during peak hours but will be able to facilitate them during the middle of the day or weekends when less services are run.

 

From what I recall the main constraints affecting International train services are, from biggest to smallest...

 

(1)  Capacity to process passengers at St Pancras, particularly at times of peak demand and provide somewhere for them to wait till the train is ready without it becoming dangerously overcrowded. (Even if you personally don't think its bad my experience of Eurostar is very different and there is plenty of anecdotal evidence out there that plenty of other folk think it sucks --particularly when disruption occurs as there is no slack in the system).

 

(2) The amount of time it takes to  empty, clean / service the trains then board the next lot of passengers (which is significantly slower that the old Waterloo terminal*) due to the location of entrances to / exits from the platforms and the location of the stores / servicing areas.

 

(3) The availability of paths on the LGV Nord between Paris Lille which running at maximum capacity

 

(4) The ability of Gare Du Nord to handle extra passengers - although its not in as bad a positron as St Pancras (largely because folk simply walk off the platform ends straight onto the concourse thus avoiding the bottlenecks seen at St Pancras while people queue to exit the platform via travalator) the departures areas still have issues in coping with passengers at periods of peak demand.

 

(5) Finding paths through the channel tunnel which do not adversely impact Eurotunnels shuttle services.

 

 

* The old Waterloo terminal was laid out in a much better fashion - because it had enough space for two levels of facilities below the platforms it was possible to double deck things (each area being signifficantly larger as a result) , plus as a result it could have platform exits into arrivals hall in the middle of the platforms thus clearing incoming passengers far more quickly than St Pancras can.

 

Edited October 13, 2023 by phil-b259

[hayfield]

8 hours ago, GoingUnderground said:

 No, I don't suppose they have been terribly happy. But the problems are not of their making and I don't think can be readily solved because the departure lounge was designed decades before the complexities introduced by Brexit came into being. It might be possible to smooth out some of the lumps and bumps on incoming services by putting passport control onboard as has been done in the past, but that costs, and I cannot see HMG putting their hands in their pocket to fund that at present.

 

I read that Eurostar have been letting trains go without all the booked passengers simply because it has not been possible to get them through the departure process quickly enough for them to make their trains and delaying the departures so that everyone was on board wasn't a solution. In some ways I'm a bit surprised that they haven't said "B****r it, I'm off. Go find some other mug to run the HS1 services."

 

With an additional operator, the space available at STP for the departure lounge and arrivals would have to be radically expanded by taking out many, if not all of the undercroft shops. Short of evicting the Javelin services, the opportunities for additional platforms seem to be nil unless the Midland Mainline services have their platforms moved even further away from Euston Road to make space for approaches to additional platforms constructed above the undercroft next to the existing ones, with new enlarged departure and arrivals facilities below them in the same fashion as the existing facilities. As a user of the Midland Mainline services from time to time I wouldn't be terribly happy about that, it already feels like you're walking back to the East Mids as it is. But the disruption involved in any sort of redevelopment looks to be horrendous, not to mention the cost, and again I cannot see HMG stumping up the readies as judging by their recent actions the current lot don't apparently believe in public transport by rail.

 

There's also the question of capacity at Paris Gare du Nord for another train company which I read is their stated French terminus as again, as I recall, that used to struggle at times to get folks through passport control and also with available seating in the departure lounge. And I don't think there is spare platform capacity there either nor space to expand short of evicting local services to free up additional platforms. But, as I said, it is now some years since I last passed through Gare du Nord.

 

What would make sense, as others have said, would be for new destinations to be added served by the new operator or by Eurostar from London to free up paths into Gare du Nord..

 

And finally, are there sufficient free pathways through the Channel Tunnel for the new services? No one has mentioned that potential bottleneck yet, and I can't recall seeing any info about current utilisation levels. I believe that Eurostar already flight some of their services, hence the congestion at times in the departure lounge at STP. One remedy might be to slow down the speeds in the Tunnel to reduce headway and increase capacity but at the expense of longer transit times, if I understand the process correctly. But please correct me if I've got it all wrong..

 

These must have been issues looked at by DB when they were thinking of opening up direct services from STP to Germany.

 

 

Firstly the UK government should pay nothing towards increasing anything at St Pancras just as they pay nothing to increase any major airport, plus there is no UK passport control at St Pancras.

 

To date there has been no need to increase services at St Pancras as the amount of services has reduced, half the time there is only 1 train per hour, the other half 2 trains

The only queues I encountered this year were at the catering establishments

 

One year there was overcrowding, this was caused by train departure delays following a train breakdown overnight

 

If the departure lounge gets overcrowded, simply too many customers are being let in too early.  There is a simple solution restrict how early passengers can enter the departure lounge 

 

As for missing a train unless there is a technical fault, like all international departures (air, boat, train) the standard advice is to arrive in plenty of time. After all of the scare stories on this thread I was amazed at how easy, quick and trouble free it was !!! 

 

There are 26 departures in 17 hours is a maximum of 2 trains departing per hour according to the timetable, hardly a lot !!! ( these numbers have increased since August, as the 1st service then was 8 am)

There are 6 platforms available enough for 4 services 2-3 hours worth !! If greater services are needed staff numbers will increase  to turn round trains quicker

 

As for Garde du Nord the additional services will not go there

 

The busier the terminal gets the revenue and passengers will increase, so there will be far more to spend on facilities (a bigger lounge) and staff. Given the decline in retail and office space I guess there are areas which the terminal can expand into. No need to increase border force checks as they are done in France !!!

 

Any decent business looks for growth, if London to Paris is saturated, then open up different routes

[hayfield]

3 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

 

However for this new entrant to make enough money to survive in the long term they are going to need more than a couple of trains running at awkward times during the day. Thats why competition for slots at airports is most intense at certain times of the day or London termini may have zero extra space to accommodate specials during peak hours but will be able to facilitate them during the middle of the day or weekends when less services are run.

 

From what I recall the main constraints affecting International train services are, from biggest to smallest...

 

(1)  Capacity to process passengers at St Pancras, particularly at times of peak demand and provide somewhere for them to wait till the train is ready without it becoming dangerously overcrowded. (Even if you personally don't think its bad my experience of Eurostar is very different and there is plenty of anecdotal evidence out there that plenty of other folk think it sucks --particularly when disruption occurs as there is no slack in the system).

 

(2) The amount of time it takes to  empty, clean / service the trains then board the next lot of passengers (which is significantly slower that the old Waterloo terminal*) due to the location of entrances to / exits from the platforms and the location of the stores / servicing areas.

 

(3) The availability of paths on the LGV Nord between Paris Lille which running at maximum capacity

 

(4) The ability of Gare Du Nord to handle extra passengers - although its not in as bad a positron as St Pancras (largely because folk simply walk off the platform ends straight onto the concourse thus avoiding the bottlenecks seen at St Pancras while people queue to exit the platform via travalator) the departures areas still have issues in coping with passengers at periods of peak demand.

 

(5) Finding paths through the channel tunnel which do not adversely impact Eurotunnels shuttle services.

 

 

* The old Waterloo terminal was laid out in a much better fashion - because it had enough space for two levels of facilities below the platforms it was possible to double deck things (each area being signifficantly larger as a result) , plus as a result it could have platform exits into arrivals hall in the middle of the platforms thus clearing incoming passengers far more quickly than St Pancras can.

 

 

Phil

 

Firstly I doubt if the extra trains are going to Paris

 

Several replies here state there are more pathways for Eurostar than being used

 

Passenger control at busy times could easily be avoided by better passenger flow

 

As for cleaning more people would get the train cleaned quicker, I guess the problem has been down to lower passenger numbers recently

 

If the overcrowding persists people will stop using the service, so I assume managers will be working on putting this right

 

We had a problem with the travellator on the return journey as it was not working and a passenger was unsuccessfully trying to take a trolley down it with the wheels gripping the floor. The issue was inattentive station staff not doing their jobs in both not helping and not turning the travellator back on. But in the end a very minor inconvenience, which was easily dealt with

 

Eurostar services need people with both vision and the will to improve things, its a great asset to our country and one which could be used better

[phil-b259]

27 minutes ago, hayfield said:

 

 

Firstly the UK government should pay nothing towards increasing anything at St Pancras just as they pay nothing to increase any major airport, plus there is no UK passport control at St Pancras.

 

 

 

 

There IS Passport Control at St Pancras!

 

Both UK and French border staff will carry out passport checks on departing travellers there (this is part of the reason that in Paris you can simply walk straight off the platform and onto the concourse without any checks taking place - because they have already been carried out at St Pancras.

 

Granted incoming trains do not feature such checks at St Pancras - but unlike the |French, the British still believe in the need for a customs hall through which arrivals need to march when exiting the international platforms*

 

As for Government 'paying' for facilities at airports (and suchlike) - while its true that HM Government do not actually pay for more infrastructure (i.e. more passport booths, more e-gates, etc) the STAFF who work said infrastructure are directly employed by The UK Government (The UK Border Force being a division of the Home Office). The same is true of customs officers - they might well work in infrastructure financed by the operators but they themselves will be employed by the Uk Government.

 

I recall reading that a year or two Heathrow had increased the number of passport gates at the airport but due to UK Border Force not employing enough people those gates could not be used.

 

The same is also true of course for the facilities used by French border forces at St Pancas - Eurostar can provide as many gates / booths as it likes but its up to the French Government to actually staff them...

 

 

* If we didn't do that you could have exits directly from the platforms to the upper concourse and also a secondary one directly to the lower concourse near the Thameslink platforms which would greatly speed up turnaround times

Edited October 13, 2023 by phil-b259

[Nick C]

24 minutes ago, hayfield said:

If the departure lounge gets overcrowded, simply too many customers are being let in too early. 

....

the standard advice is to arrive in plenty of time.

You can't have it both ways! "get here early, but we won't let you in" doesn't tend to go down well with passengers! Also, a full Eurostar can take nearly 900 passengers, and they've just lifted the cap they had applied to cope with the lack of border staff - so that's 1800 passengers per hour with 'just two trains' - all of whom need to be processed through security and passport control.

[phil-b259]

3 hours ago, hayfield said:

 

Several replies here state there are more pathways for Eurostar than being used

 

 

Agreed - but those pathways are not being used primarily because of passenger handling issues / turnaround times at St Pancras.

 

Sorting out St Pancras so it can process more people is the critical factor here - whether that be for Eurostar or for another competing operator. 

 

That will cost money - and mostly likely require the removal of some retail units so more space (which wouldn't go down well with the owners of St pancras station BTW) can be provided in the departure area plus the recruitment of more security vetted staff (thus pushing up costs for Eurostar)

 

3 hours ago, hayfield said:

 

 

If the overcrowding persists people will stop using the service, so I assume managers will be working on putting this right

 

 

 

Which is precicley why Eurostar has been axing services to regional destinations and is concentrating on its core product.

 

Yes it has generated spare pathways - but people need to remember why Eurostar gave up on them in the first place!

 

3 hours ago, hayfield said:

 

 

Eurostar services need people with both vision and the will to improve things, its a great asset to our country and one which could be used better

 

Agreed - but the world has changed significantly since Eurostar started!

 

Back in 1994 it was assumed that grater integration between the Uk and Europe was a given, so many aspects of Eurostar were designed around 'minimal checks' and a desire for it to simply operates as just another InterCity rail service.

 

We now live in a hugely changed world - a combination of events like the 9/11 attacks and the UKs departure from the EU (a thing that simply wasn't ever considered a possibility when planning the infrastructure for Eurostar) has changed the environment within which Eurostar operates.

 

As such its clear that if Eurostar is to achieve its potential significant extra infrastructure is required at St Pancras station so as to speed up passenger processing / throughput because the current operating constraints is the real issue here - not a lack of ambition by Eurostar themselves....

 

 

Edited October 13, 2023 by phil-b259

[Michael Hodgson]

13 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

 

The only opportunities I can see is if the new rival terminated at Stratford or Ebslfeet - but  in both cases the sheer number of people who would need to be processed by U.K. border forces would mean a massive expansion of said security facilities - plus of course persuading HM Government to actually agree to employ the extra border force personnel needed.

Our passports "requests and requires" them to allow me to pass "without let or hindrance".

HMG seem to be the biggest let or hindrance around.  Perhaps we should write to the King and tell him?

[The Stationmaster]

19 hours ago, GoingUnderground said:

Competition could be good in terms of ticket prices. But, judging by the last time that I used Eurostar in October 2019, I'd be concerned about the ability and capacity of STP to handle any more passengers. Getting through security and passport control was already slow, and space in the departure lounge was at a premium if there were departures within hslf sn hour of eachother as was sometimes the case with the Paris and Disneyland services. 

 

Or would Eurostar have to give up some paths to the newcomer? That would seem to be counterproductive and could increase ticket prices if the total number of trains and thus passengers remained unchanged as there'd be two lots of admin/head office costs to cover from the same customer base - economists & accountants call it "economies of scale" or in this case "diseconomies".

I do wonder if this bunch quite understand what they are taking on?  Before they start buying or leasing trains they need to make sure that they have got the necessary track access over the three administrations involved plus, obviously, platforming slots and terminal arrangements at the two termini.  Unless they have contracted, or at the very least reached clearly agreed understandings about  that lot before spending money on trains they do seem to be shooting in the dark.  And of course the trains need to be Tunnel compliant so that limits their choice about what they can buy/lease.

 

And those of course are the easy bits.  they need multi-lingual traincrew trained in CTRL/ET/SNCF LGV rules and procedures - supported of course by their Safety Case etc and whatever is needed to. comply with ROGS in Britain plus anything required in France (ROGS basically mirrors the EU equivalent).

 

As far as paths are concerned there are probably two things - 1. paths already contracted to Eurostar but not is used, and 2. Theoretical paths which fit the overall pattern but have not been created or contracted. But that doesn't really matter because whatever ever they'll stiil be bound either by flighting or 'domestication (of speed/running time) through the Tunnel and that has to match not only available paths over LGV Nord/CTRL/HS1 but also the optimum times to achieve profitable load factors.

 

If it comes to it Open Access rules might get them paths on LGV Nord and HS1 but thaat won't get them Tunnel paths and it definitely won't necessarily get them platform access at the two termini.  However perhaps unbeknown to us they have already made all these arrangements and are keeping it under their hats?

 

Personally I think 'beyond London' is a dead duck - the market doesn't really exist in any sort of viable form unless things have changed drastically in the past 25 years.

[GoingUnderground]

13 hours ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

 

14 hours ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

 

Please ignore the bixes, I was going to quote Ron but changed my mind and can't delete the damned quote boxes, and I'm not specifically responding to his comments, so apologies to Ron and for any confusion. 

 

I have certainly been through passport control at STP inbound from France. I think it was on ski trains from Bourg St Maurice and Moutiers. There were the baggage checks at Bourg & Moutiers but no UK passport control there and no onboard passport checks.

 

Chucking UK bound folks out at Lille for UK passport control was the solution, but that is very passenger unfriendly as it adds an hour to the journey time. It also begs the question whether Lille could cope with more passport checks and trains emptying out. 

 

Comments such as "turn up earlier" are just facile. Early arrivers simply get in the way of those turning up in time and take up space in the departure lounge. It used to be that all passengers could use all gates, excluding Business, but train specific queues seemed to be the norm back in 2019 presumably to stop early arrivers getting in the way of others arriving on time.

 

I'm not surprised that there were no queues at 7am because you'd be in the first departures of the day so there were no early arrivers to get in the way. Incidentally, the fastest trip that I ever had through STP was at 7am a week after the 1st Chunnel fire. Eurostar told folks to turn up as early as they could. We were booked on a mid-morning train but turned up just before 7 as we were catching an afternoon train from Gare du Lyon which we didn't want to miss. Eurostar instantly rebooked us on the 1st Paris- bound train. We went through security etc very rapidly and went straight up on to the platform and onto the train, eaving STP at about 7:15 IIRC. We ended up spending 2 hours in the sunshine with a bevvy or two at aa pavement cafe near the Gare du Lyon

 

The whole layout of the departure and arrivals areas at STP are clearly designed for rapid just in time flowthrough for the Class 373 with a maximum capacity of 750, later 758. Much of any design slack will have been taken up with the introduction of the Class 374/e320 sets seating 902, a 20% increase over the 373.

 

Also I take great exception to the idea that HMG shouldn't fund changes at STP, and smacks of an "I'm all right Jack" mindset. HMG funds almost every road in the UK, footpaths etc through taxation both national and local, not to mention police, prisons, NHS, defence, unemployment and disablement benefits etc. And if money spent at STP eases the pressure at ports and airports then that is IMHO, a capital investment for the future and money well spent for the benefit of us all in one way or another. 

 

Rant over. You can all come out now. 

 

 

[hayfield]

2 hours ago, Nick C said:

You can't have it both ways! "get here early, but we won't let you in" doesn't tend to go down well with passengers! Also, a full Eurostar can take nearly 900 passengers, and they've just lifted the cap they had applied to cope with the lack of border staff - so that's 1800 passengers per hour with 'just two trains' - all of whom need to be processed through security and passport control.

 

Its exactly the same as all the airports I have used and its not having it both ways

 

My own example was on our trip to Italy using Rail Discoveries

 

Both Eurostar and Rail Discoveries recommend arriving at the station up to 2 hours before departure. Our departure was 8 am, we checked in at the Rail Discoveries some time after 6, once we had a quick chat with the rep we went off for coffee and sat down knowing we had arrived at the station on time

 

Eurostar stated the gates opened at 7am and were to close 30 mins before departure, we noticed that M&S were allowing customers in early, so we brought some nibbles, walked up to Eurostar gates at 7am, there were no queues and we went straight in and were in the departure lounge fully checked within a few mins. Plenty of space to sit and wait, though a lot of queuing for refreshments at the concessions.

 

Boarding was well ordered and were seated long before the departure time

 

I had no expectations of being let in the departure lounge early, but had planned to have a coffee and bun for breakfast at one of the many cafe's. I would have done the same at an airport which is to comply with the system as it seems most of the other passengers did. Ample seating in the station prior to entering the Eurostar lounge and again once we were let in

 

As I said the biggest issue on our last journey was the rolling road not working, which in itself was not an issue, but one passenger not overloaded the baggage trolley, but the trolley was doing its job in gripping the walkway. A few of us helped out by grabbing an extra bag and carrying them to the bottom. as I said no issue at all once sense and being helpful prevailed 

 

The border staff is nothing to do with St Pancras of UK Border Force, its the French that is the issue, sadly all the goodwill of St Pancras and Eurostar staff will not alter a thing if the French border staff will not play ball. Which is surprising as Eurostar is a French owned company !!!  In the end their wages are paid by the passengers using the service