Discussion
Great isn't it?
Was travelling between Paris and Le Mans and was amazed by how quiet, comfortable, fast and cheap these were. We had assigned seats, we were able to prebook seats around a table and a return was £47 each.
How can the French get this so right compared to the nightmare the UK has to put up with?
Was travelling between Paris and Le Mans and was amazed by how quiet, comfortable, fast and cheap these were. We had assigned seats, we were able to prebook seats around a table and a return was £47 each.
How can the French get this so right compared to the nightmare the UK has to put up with?
theboss said:
So basically you're saying:steve-5snwi said:
I'm guessing its because they invest in their railways.
France has 29,901 KM of railway compared to the UK's 16,209 KM for comparison.99dndd said:
Great isn't it?
Was travelling between Paris and Le Mans and was amazed by how quiet, comfortable, fast and cheap these were. We had assigned seats, we were able to prebook seats around a table and a return was £47 each.
How can the French get this so right compared to the nightmare the UK has to put up with?
We travelled by TGV from Gare Montparnasse in Paris to Le Mans a few years ago, for my cousin’s daughter’s wedding in Daumeray, Maine-et-Loire.Was travelling between Paris and Le Mans and was amazed by how quiet, comfortable, fast and cheap these were. We had assigned seats, we were able to prebook seats around a table and a return was £47 each.
How can the French get this so right compared to the nightmare the UK has to put up with?
We had a bottle of wine at the table, and a couple of salads, I couldn’t go mad, I was picking up a rental car at Le Mans, to do the last 70 kms to Daumeray.
My wife said to the dining attendant, “You could eat from the floor on here, on English trains, it looks like everyone has been eating on the floor.”
He couldn’t make that out, my wife’s Peckham accent isn’t impenetrable, but her French consists of “une verre plus s’il vous plaît”, so I told him in French, “She said the salad was excellent.”
I’d wanted to fly into Nantes, and drive from there, but she said, “Can’t we go on Eurostar, all that security agg at airports is a drag”, so it was Waterloo, (pre St. Pancras), to Gare du Nord, then taxi to Gare Montparnasse, then TGV to Le Mans, I was glad that she suggested it, j’aime bien La France, et j’aime bien SNCF.
99dndd said:
Great isn't it?
How can the French get this so right compared to the nightmare the UK has to put up with?
In no particular order- How can the French get this so right compared to the nightmare the UK has to put up with?
1) They spend much more on their railways then we do, and consistently.
2) It's country with around the same population as the UK but with twice the space.
3) A civic and political tradition of 'sacrifice for the greater good' rather than individual property rights. If SNCF want to build a TGV line through your garden, they're going to do it. Significantly cuts down on the legal costs and time of building new infrastructure.
4) SNCF has enjoyed 50+ years of consistent political support. For decades its remit has been to provide a good service to the French nation (as defined by central government), allowing it to fund, invest and organise large-scale projects in the long term. By contrast British Railways swapped from 'public service regardless of cost' to 'pruning down to a sustainable core' to 'managed decline' to 'investment in productive bits and drawing-down of non-productive bits' to 'massive investment in an unholy mish-mash of public and private money and ownership.' As a nation we have never been able to decide exactly what our railways are for (the same goes for most of our public services) and so their fundamental mission statement has changed every five years or so. You can't get a system as good as France's that way.
5) Until fairly recently much of the rest of the SNCF network was pretty dire, because the consensus was that the TGV network was significantly more efficient in terms of the social and economic benefit of every franc put in than the other services (which was undoubtedly true). Getting a TGV from Paris to Bourdeaux is lovely - try and get a train from Bordeaux to Aiguillon and you'll find that the service only runs twice a day on an ancient railcar that travels at abour 30mph and was last refurbished during the d'Estaing presidency. That has changed in recent years as the TGV network has matured and the political priorities have shifted but the quality of the service on SNCF remains much, much more variable than in the UK. The French equivalent of the Beeching Axe was also much more brutal than the UK's, leaving large swathes of rural France with no passenger rail service - partly because the purpose of SNCF was redrawn to cover long-distance intercity passenger travel with the TGV. The ability to get from place to place in the UK by rail is much better.
2xChevrons said:
In no particular order-
1) They spend much more on their railways then we do, and consistently.
2) It's country with around the same population as the UK but with twice the space.
3) A civic and political tradition of 'sacrifice for the greater good' rather than individual property rights. If SNCF want to build a TGV line through your garden, they're going to do it. Significantly cuts down on the legal costs and time of building new infrastructure.
4) SNCF has enjoyed 50+ years of consistent political support. For decades its remit has been to provide a good service to the French nation (as defined by central government), allowing it to fund, invest and organise large-scale projects in the long term. By contrast British Railways swapped from 'public service regardless of cost' to 'pruning down to a sustainable core' to 'managed decline' to 'investment in productive bits and drawing-down of non-productive bits' to 'massive investment in an unholy mish-mash of public and private money and ownership.' As a nation we have never been able to decide exactly what our railways are for (the same goes for most of our public services) and so their fundamental mission statement has changed every five years or so. You can't get a system as good as France's that way.
5) Until fairly recently much of the rest of the SNCF network was pretty dire, because the consensus was that the TGV network was significantly more efficient in terms of the social and economic benefit of every franc put in than the other services (which was undoubtedly true). Getting a TGV from Paris to Bourdeaux is lovely - try and get a train from Bordeaux to Aiguillon and you'll find that the service only runs twice a day on an ancient railcar that travels at abour 30mph and was last refurbished during the d'Estaing presidency. That has changed in recent years as the TGV network has matured and the political priorities have shifted but the quality of the service on SNCF remains much, much more variable than in the UK. The French equivalent of the Beeching Axe was also much more brutal than the UK's, leaving large swathes of rural France with no passenger rail service - partly because the purpose of SNCF was redrawn to cover long-distance intercity passenger travel with the TGV. The ability to get from place to place in the UK by rail is much better.
That just about covers it - good post 1) They spend much more on their railways then we do, and consistently.
2) It's country with around the same population as the UK but with twice the space.
3) A civic and political tradition of 'sacrifice for the greater good' rather than individual property rights. If SNCF want to build a TGV line through your garden, they're going to do it. Significantly cuts down on the legal costs and time of building new infrastructure.
4) SNCF has enjoyed 50+ years of consistent political support. For decades its remit has been to provide a good service to the French nation (as defined by central government), allowing it to fund, invest and organise large-scale projects in the long term. By contrast British Railways swapped from 'public service regardless of cost' to 'pruning down to a sustainable core' to 'managed decline' to 'investment in productive bits and drawing-down of non-productive bits' to 'massive investment in an unholy mish-mash of public and private money and ownership.' As a nation we have never been able to decide exactly what our railways are for (the same goes for most of our public services) and so their fundamental mission statement has changed every five years or so. You can't get a system as good as France's that way.
5) Until fairly recently much of the rest of the SNCF network was pretty dire, because the consensus was that the TGV network was significantly more efficient in terms of the social and economic benefit of every franc put in than the other services (which was undoubtedly true). Getting a TGV from Paris to Bourdeaux is lovely - try and get a train from Bordeaux to Aiguillon and you'll find that the service only runs twice a day on an ancient railcar that travels at abour 30mph and was last refurbished during the d'Estaing presidency. That has changed in recent years as the TGV network has matured and the political priorities have shifted but the quality of the service on SNCF remains much, much more variable than in the UK. The French equivalent of the Beeching Axe was also much more brutal than the UK's, leaving large swathes of rural France with no passenger rail service - partly because the purpose of SNCF was redrawn to cover long-distance intercity passenger travel with the TGV. The ability to get from place to place in the UK by rail is much better.
2xChevrons said:
3) A civic and political tradition of 'sacrifice for the greater good' rather than individual property rights. If SNCF want to build a TGV line through your garden, they're going to do it. Significantly cuts down on the legal costs and time of building new infrastructure.
This is something that doesn't really dawn on you unless you spend a lot of time in France. There's an incredible overbearingness in government and public services that Brits absolutely would not swallow that seems to go largely unquestioned in France. bloomen said:
2xChevrons said:
3) A civic and political tradition of 'sacrifice for the greater good' rather than individual property rights. If SNCF want to build a TGV line through your garden, they're going to do it. Significantly cuts down on the legal costs and time of building new infrastructure.
This is something that doesn't really dawn on you unless you spend a lot of time in France. There's an incredible overbearingness in government and public services that Brits absolutely would not swallow that seems to go largely unquestioned in France. "If you want to drain a pond, you don't ask the frogs..."
bloomen said:
This is something that doesn't really dawn on you unless you spend a lot of time in France. There's an incredible overbearingness in government and public services that Brits absolutely would not swallow that seems to go largely unquestioned in France.
Not only unquestioned but often actively embraced. The idea of the individual being prodded and managed for collective good goes back centuries in France - at least to the Revolution if not further as a carry-over of the old Ancien Regime. It's just how things have always worked there. They find our petty self-importance and intransigence, and how national projects that stand to benefit hundreds of thousands collectively can be stalled by a handful of NIMBYs, just as simultaneously amusing and pitiful. It also begs drawing into looking at the UK v. EU and how national political cultures fundamentally differ on each side of the Channel but this isn't the place. It's not as if French 'citoyens' are being bulldozed out of their homes as the track-laying equipment waits at their door. A government official turns up, offers them the going rate for their property and, on a scale that is unthinkable to an Anglo-Saxon, they take the cheque and leave. Often they'll do so very happily because they can move into another house nearby (an option not usually available in the UK with its horrendous housing shortage and badly unbalanced national economy) and the value of their new property will soar once there's a TGV station in the district. You get cities, cantons and even individual communes, actively lobbying for the TGV lines to be built through them, which you would never see in the UK.
Times changed a few years back , NIMBY's arrived a few years back, and are alive and active in Charentes/Dordognes.
https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2016/03/fra...
https://www.sudouest.fr/2017/03/24/l-espoir-des-op...
In the last one, of the 338 against, 338 were ex-pats of various nations.
https://www.citylab.com/transportation/2016/03/fra...
https://www.sudouest.fr/2017/03/24/l-espoir-des-op...
In the last one, of the 338 against, 338 were ex-pats of various nations.
captain_cynic said:
France has 29,901 KM of railway compared to the UK's 16,209 KM for comparison.
Yet the UK’s 50% sized network carried roughly 150% of the individual passengers 80% of the passenger-km, whilst costing the government nominally about 30% of the subsidy from a near identical sized population and economy. That’s why it’s relatively poor in comparison because it’s geared up to provide a more intensive shorter distance service to more people at a fraction of the public cost.FWIW I’m a big advocate of rail, but look at our public appetite for HS2. The French have been doing projects like that for the last 40 years and the people are generally proud of it. I’m spending my weeknights in rural Bucks 3 miles away from the HS2 alignment and you can’t get away from the subject in the local pubs - they are all rabid about the effect on house prices etc. It’s pathetic, yet don’t complain about the ecological impact of the M40 which has conveniently taken all the long distance traffic away from their precious little villages and that was built barely 30 years ago.
Edited by theboss on Wednesday 27th June 22:44
Just my tuppence worth having lived and worked in the south of France for over 13 years now.
I would add to the comments on the local train networks, outside the TGV which to be fair to the TGV, are about the only things running when everything else is on strike.
I used to live a train ride away from my office (about 10km away) (cycling is not an option unless you do alpine stages daily and have a death wish) but after two years of late, cancelled and strike cancelled trains, I chose instead to move house closer to my office where I can walk to work or take the local bus easily. I then get to great my colleagues still using the trains, as they try and fight their way to work in the mornings and back home in the evenings as they contend with daily delays, cancellations or strikes.
Unfortunately for people using the local buses regularly and otherwise driving is not an option due to the heavy traffic which only gets worse during the touristic periods of the year and would increase their already long commute. Added to all this is parking if you do drive as spaces are still very scarse.
its been a while since i rode the rails in the U.K and whilst the price still sticks in my mind as being expensive, i think its often a case of the grass is greener!
I would add to the comments on the local train networks, outside the TGV which to be fair to the TGV, are about the only things running when everything else is on strike.
I used to live a train ride away from my office (about 10km away) (cycling is not an option unless you do alpine stages daily and have a death wish) but after two years of late, cancelled and strike cancelled trains, I chose instead to move house closer to my office where I can walk to work or take the local bus easily. I then get to great my colleagues still using the trains, as they try and fight their way to work in the mornings and back home in the evenings as they contend with daily delays, cancellations or strikes.
Unfortunately for people using the local buses regularly and otherwise driving is not an option due to the heavy traffic which only gets worse during the touristic periods of the year and would increase their already long commute. Added to all this is parking if you do drive as spaces are still very scarse.
its been a while since i rode the rails in the U.K and whilst the price still sticks in my mind as being expensive, i think its often a case of the grass is greener!
Several years ago, I read a report in one of our broadsheet newspapers (so presumably well-researched) which analysed the economics of the TGV.
They came to the conclusion that, given the massive state subsidy it receives, it would actually make more economic sense to scrap it and give every household a brand-new base-spec Clio or C1 every five years (IIRC...) for transport instead. Less overall cost, support for the car industry and wider engineering etc., etc.
On a user level, Mrs Rooster took me to Avignon via Eurostar/TGV a couple of years back. It was fantastic - left the UK Midlands after brekkie, had lunch in Paris and dinner in Avignon after watching the French countryside glide past at over 200mph. I'm led to believe it wasn't overly expensive, either.
They came to the conclusion that, given the massive state subsidy it receives, it would actually make more economic sense to scrap it and give every household a brand-new base-spec Clio or C1 every five years (IIRC...) for transport instead. Less overall cost, support for the car industry and wider engineering etc., etc.
On a user level, Mrs Rooster took me to Avignon via Eurostar/TGV a couple of years back. It was fantastic - left the UK Midlands after brekkie, had lunch in Paris and dinner in Avignon after watching the French countryside glide past at over 200mph. I'm led to believe it wasn't overly expensive, either.
theboss said:
captain_cynic said:
France has 29,901 KM of railway compared to the UK's 16,209 KM for comparison.
Yet the UK’s 50% sized network carried roughly 150% of the individual passengers 80% of the passenger-km, whilst costing the government nominally about 30% of the subsidy from a near identical sized population and economy. That’s why it’s relatively poor in comparison because it’s geared up to provide a more intensive shorter distance service to more people at a fraction of the public cost.FWIW I’m a big advocate of rail, but look at our public appetite for HS2. The French have been doing projects like that for the last 40 years and the people are generally proud of it. I’m spending my weeknights in rural Bucks 3 miles away from the HS2 alignment and you can’t get away from the subject in the local pubs - they are all rabid about the effect on house prices etc. It’s pathetic, yet don’t complain about the ecological impact of the M40 which has conveniently taken all the long distance traffic away from their precious little villages and that was built barely 30 years ago.
It was forced through as a "doable" project rather than an integrated high speed rail plan. The train service where I live will get worse should the thing be built.
(It won't get fully built see electric flying for why not)
Look at the demand for HS3 though
captain_cynic said:
theboss said:
So basically you're saying:steve-5snwi said:
I'm guessing its because they invest in their railways.
France has 29,901 KM of railway compared to the UK's 16,209 KM for comparison.Took the Railjet from Salzberg to Villach last year , about a 2 hr trip , about £40 each way in business class, lovely very smooth train ..had the whole carriage to ourselves on the way back !! subsidize'd by the government i believe .
Spur of the moment trip from Villach to Venice on the over night train starting somewhere in Germany leaving about 5am , 200yds walk from the Hotel and as you know to the water front in Venice !! .. Easy peasy ! , Border from Austria to Italy was interesting as the Train stopped and the Armed Police got on checking for migrants waking everybody up down in the sleeping carriage's .. They just walked past me and my mate as we looked like anaemic Brits
IMG_20170609_122042255 by Jon Webster, on Flickr
IMG_20170616_140639482 by Jon Webster, on Flickr
IMG_20170616_140710617 by Jon Webster, on Flickr
What a view from the Train
IMG_20170616_142253802 by Jon Webster, on Flickr
Spur of the moment trip from Villach to Venice on the over night train starting somewhere in Germany leaving about 5am , 200yds walk from the Hotel and as you know to the water front in Venice !! .. Easy peasy ! , Border from Austria to Italy was interesting as the Train stopped and the Armed Police got on checking for migrants waking everybody up down in the sleeping carriage's .. They just walked past me and my mate as we looked like anaemic Brits
IMG_20170609_122042255 by Jon Webster, on FlickrIMG_20170616_140639482 by Jon Webster, on FlickrIMG_20170616_140710617 by Jon Webster, on FlickrWhat a view from the Train
IMG_20170616_142253802 by Jon Webster, on FlickrGassing Station | Boats, Planes & Trains | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff