Proposed new Channel Tunnel services discussion

[Trainbike46]

SNCF is simply desperate, and has been for sometimes, likely scared about the EU rules. Which is funny as they are doing what they don't want on their turf.

Both operations (in IT and ES) broke out because SNCF backstabbed their partners. Which arguably has succeded, Ouigo Espana (along with Iryo) is rocking Renfe quite bad, and it took TI 9 years before running a day train to France on their own.

Yes, I understand the breakdown there. It is weird that SNCF is both very protectionist about its own market, and so willing (and arguably quite succesful) at operating on other countries' railways.

SNCF and SBB, apart from the fares which can indeed be ludicrous, I would argue not at all, they have bent backwards to fit as Swiss takt when the French way is the farthest from that

Sorry if I was unclear; what I meant was that Eurostar - NS cooperation seems quite succesful. SBB also appears capable of cooperating well (in TGV Lyria, with OBB, with DB, and with Trenitalia), so a Eurostar-SBB cooperation does not appear impossible, even if the SNCF is not the best partner.

 

[Chester1]

EU rejoin is basically implausible and impossible at this point. The UK joining the EFTA (and then maybe the EEA) is the best thing that can be done.

There are no serious politicians pushing it other than to tease people who are desperate to join. This could change but its clearly got no governmental support within the sort of time frame government's plan on. Today demonstrates the thinking of governments. Its all about partnership and alliance, not membership. The travel specific stuff is all about stretching but not breaking the limits of the UK being a third country e.g. it was confirmed today that British citizens will be able to use E Gates in Germany from the end of August (with a stamp desk until EES launches).

This announcement is just about looking into extending the current setup of channel tunnel services to German cities.

 

[NCT]

London - Brussels - Koln - Frankfurt only would actually be faster than the ICE/Thalys services, no North, Liege or Aachen. Possibly not the FRA airport station too - so it might be popular for those intermediate legs too. Sub 4 hours I would have thought.

Super productive time spent, vs the time waste involved in a short flight. Green. Easy.

German railways are on a takt, however imperfect it may be; Belgian too. Any London - Frankfurt service would necessarily have to take one of the existing Brussels - Aachen - Cologne - Frankfurt standard paths.

If a London - Berlin service is being written into a treaty, I struggle to think how practically it could be delivered. There's no precedent for a singular tendered very long-distance international service using extensive high-speed infrastructure. Even if that precedent were set, the subsidy bill would be enormous and I can't see either the British or the German authorities committing to it over the long term.

Infrastructure between Rhine-Ruhr and Berlin isn't brilliant - I don't see how they would release a path for a service that would be unable to carry intra-Schengen demand. I fear this is just political overpromising that'll end up in abject embarrassment.

Unless there's a sea-change in British attitudes and the UK government will allow on-train passport checks. That would be the next best thing to joining Schengen.

I made my first paragraph of post 972 waiting for this. Anyone who thinks its politically viable for any future British government to allow illegal immigrants to jump on a train in France without passport checks need a wider social circle reflective of British politics. The Dublin protocol had a return rate of asylum seekers of about 1% to the other EU members pre brexit.There was a poll this week that put support for British rejoining of EU at 36% if we weren't given euro and Schengen opts out (that no new member has had since the 90s). There is majority in the UK to rejoin on special terms but a majority against it in EU unless we joined on same terms as everyone else.

What xenophobic claptrap.

 

[Shrop]

I made my first paragraph of post 972 waiting for this. Anyone who thinks its politically viable for any future British government to allow illegal immigrants to jump on a train in France without passport checks need a wider social circle reflective of British politics. The Dublin protocol had a return rate of asylum seekers of about 1% to the other EU members pre brexit.There was a poll this week that put support for British rejoining of EU at 36% if we weren't given euro and Schengen opts out (that no new member has had since the 90s). There is majority in the UK to rejoin on special terms but a majority against it in EU unless we joined on same terms as everyone else.

I don't think anyone would doubt that it would be crazy to provide an almost open border for asylum seekers looking to come to the UK, although with the numbers crossing the channel, the border isn't far off open to those prepared to undertake the boat crossing, given the lack of willingness of the French police to pay any more attention to it than the occasional boat sabotage for media effect. However, although we might despair of lack of French support to stop the boat crossings, they do have a point when they say we ought to be looking a lot more closely to our own country, in terms of the incentives we provide for them to come here.

This said, I don't want to digress too much into boat crossings. Suppose we were to make it considerably less attractive for asylum seekers to come to the UK, and couple this with joining the EU and Schengen, then we could focus on whether or not it would make sense to provide services to more places via the Channel Tunnel as per the OP. If those ifs are too great, then sadly this thread might not be going very much further than a theoretical exercise

 

[vuzzeho]

But are Ashford and Ebbsfleet due to Eurostar, or Government, intransigence?

Eurostar. They don't want to come back, MPs can beg them and their response can be 'mmm nah' and we (basically) just have to take it. I feel like it makes sense to have a British stake in at least ONE international operator.

 

[Chester1]

What xenophobic claptrap.

And that's kinda my point. I voted remain and am lean towards an EFTA style relationship with the EU but wanting physical border checks makes me racist... Joining Schengen = no checks. That means instead of paying smugglers thousands of pounds to take a small boat across the channel anyone could simply take the train to London, the same as traveling between Paris and Caen. I don't know anyone can look at our political discourse and think removing a massive barrier to illegal migration has any chance of happening whatsoever. Its a niche dream by people with a very international world view. Without making London to X city in EU the same as travel between London and Manchester most of the ideas posted here are not viable. What is viable is what the government's have agreed to look into, that's expanding the current channel tunnel service model to German cities.

I don't think anyone would doubt that it would be crazy to provide an almost open border for asylum seekers looking to come to the UK, although with the numbers crossing the channel, the border isn't far off open to those prepared to undertake the boat crossing, given the lack of willingness of the French police to pay any more attention to it than the occasional boat sabotage for media effect. However, although we might despair of lack of French support to stop the boat crossings, they do have a point when they say we ought to be looking a lot more closely to our own country, in terms of the incentives we provide for them to come here.

This said, I don't want to digress too much into boat crossings. Suppose we were to make it considerably less attractive for asylum seekers to come to the UK, and couple this with joining the EU and Schengen, then we could focus on whether or not it would make sense to provide services to more places via the Channel Tunnel as per the OP. If those ifs are too great, then sadly this thread might not be going very much further than a theoretical exercise

Having to pay smugglers thousands of pounds to make a dangerous crossing hugely reduces numbers compared with taking a train. I agree with you about addressing the causes. The French government is very loud about blaming the problem on the scale of illegal work in the UK. Schengen doesn't make practical sense for an island. It works in mainland because border walls are almost useless and the natural travel rate across land borders and therefore the economic benefits are much higher. If I lived in any country in mainland Europe I would support Schengen membership.

 

[Brubulus]

There's an obvious solution. Cede the international section of St Pancras station to France. Have UK juxtaposed controls on French territory in Central London. Means that the trains are just any ordinary intra-schengen train, just that the terminus is an international border. Removing the security checks is a reasonable and pragmatic solution that is neither here nor there regarding illegal immigration.

 

[JamesT]

There's an obvious solution. Cede the international section of St Pancras station to France. Have UK juxtaposed controls on French territory in Central London. Means that the trains are just any ordinary intra-schengen train, just that the terminus is an international border. Removing the security checks is a reasonable and pragmatic solution that is neither here nor there regarding illegal immigration.

How does this solve someone pulling the cord whilst in Kent?

 

[AlastairFraser]

There's an obvious solution. Cede the international section of St Pancras station to France. Have UK juxtaposed controls on French territory in Central London. Means that the trains are just any ordinary intra-schengen train, just that the terminus is an international border. Removing the security checks is a reasonable and pragmatic solution that is neither here nor there regarding illegal immigration.

Removing security checks would make the service a massive target and would never be approved.

 

[popeter45]

Removing security checks would make the service a massive target and would never be approved.

these days most attacks are prevented way before they can even happen, to be stopped at Eurostar security could be a massive failure on MI5/DGIS/BfV's part . main aim of on site checks these days are for Customs and picking up people who somehow think brining back WW1 shells is a good idea

 

[Brubulus]

Removing security checks would make the service a massive target and would never be approved.

Why would it be any more of a target than any other intra-schengen high speed railway? The security measures were put in place in the context of the IRA terror campaign where such an attack was substantially more of a possibility. HS1 domestic can be accessed without security and the measures when driving one's car through the tunnel are relatively lax. There are many other railways which could be used to cause a mass casualty event, why would the Channel Tunnel be special in that regard?

How does this solve someone pulling the cord whilst in Kent?

Treating the trains as having not left France for the purposes of immigration at any point, in UK law and in any agreement with France. Secondly fraudulent passcom activations can generally be detected, for instance by requiring confirmation of passcom alerts from TM and use of CCTV. There is no need to open the doors just because the cord has been pulled, especially on a modern high-speed unit.

 

[AlastairFraser]

these days most attacks are prevented way before they can even happen, to be stopped at Eurostar security could be a massive failure on MI5/DGIS/BfV's part . main aim of on site checks these days are for Customs and picking up people who somehow think brining back WW1 shells is a good idea

Of course it's mostly security theatre, but it is useful to have a last line of defence against attackers who slip through the system.

Why would it be any more of a target than any other intra-schengen high speed railway? The security measures were put in place in the context of the IRA terror campaign where such an attack was substantially more of a possibility. HS1 domestic can be accessed without security and the measures when driving one's car through the tunnel are relatively lax. There are many other railways which could be used to cause a mass casualty event, why would the Channel Tunnel be special in that regard?

It's a high profile target because it links 2 heavily interventionist European powers who have forces deployed all over the world combating jihadists, and it's predominately used by people from the middle and upper classes, who tend to have a lot of influence and power in the economy of most developed European countries.

 

[Chester1]

Of course it's mostly security theatre, but it is useful to have a last line of defence against attackers who slip through the system.

It's a high profile target because it links 2 heavily interventionist European powers who have forces deployed all over the world combating jihadists, and it's predominately used by people from the middle and upper classes, who tend to have a lot of influence and power in the economy of most developed European countries.

Add to the list that there will be at least one American tourist in each coach. The rules for cross channel trains are not going to change. Hopefully one service to Germany can be created with a bit of government support, probably as an extension of a Brussels service and UK building border posts at the German stations.

 

[AlastairFraser]

Add to the list that there will be at least one American tourist in each coach. The rules for cross channel trains are not going to change. Hopefully one service to Germany can be created with a bit of government support, probably as an extension of a Brussels service and UK building border posts at the German stations.

Haha I think Geneva/Zurich is as good as we are going to get. The change is already relatively easy at Brussels, while Switzerland is a more of a ballache with the need to change in Paris for a direct service to CH.

 

[signed]

There's an obvious solution. Cede the international section of St Pancras station to France. Have UK juxtaposed controls on French territory in Central London. Means that the trains are just any ordinary intra-schengen train, just that the terminus is an international border. Removing the security checks is a reasonable and pragmatic solution that is neither here nor there regarding illegal immigration.

This would make the whole advantage of the service (do everything control-related before boarding and get out without queues at the other end) go away.

 

[The exile]

Yep StP to Frankfurt Central in about four and half hours if they find a path

Or even Frankfurt Airport (via Koeln/Bonn airport?) - decent onward connections and the border / immigration staff are already on site.

 

[Shrop]

Very sad that modern society can’t be based on where people want to go, and the transport practicalities of getting them there. We should be looking at how many trains can be pathed along the routes, the costs and benefits of providing through services from London to numerous continental destinations, and heaven forbid, even providing trains from Birmingham/ Manchester/ Leeds etc to at least some of these destinations via what should have been an HS1-HS2 link.

Instead, all of this has been and continues to be dictated by the need to cater for the lawbreakers, with the result that useful transport links are often discounted before they’re even properly considered. I know this is addressing practicalities, but it’s sad that this is what modern society is all about.

 

[NCT]

Of course it's mostly security theatre, but it is useful to have a last line of defence against attackers who slip through the system.

It's a high profile target because it links 2 heavily interventionist European powers who have forces deployed all over the world combating jihadists, and it's predominately used by people from the middle and upper classes, who tend to have a lot of influence and power in the economy of most developed European countries.

We are getting to slightly comical levels of paranoid social profiling.

 

[martin2345uk]

. Secondly fraudulent passcom activations can generally be detected, for instance by requiring confirmation of passcom alerts from TM and use of CCTV. There is no need to open the doors just because the cord has been pulled, especially on a modern high-speed unit.

Eurostar trains don’t even (necessarily) stop if a passcom is pulled at high speed.

 

[Chester1]

Very sad that modern society can’t be based on where people want to go, and the transport practicalities of getting them there. We should be looking at how many trains can be pathed along the routes, the costs and benefits of providing through services from London to numerous continental destinations, and heaven forbid, even providing trains from Birmingham/ Manchester/ Leeds etc to at least some of these destinations via what should have been an HS1-HS2 link.

Instead, all of this has been and continues to be dictated by the need to cater for the lawbreakers, with the result that useful transport links are often discounted before they’re even properly considered. I know this is addressing practicalities, but it’s sad that this is what modern society is all about.

I don't think its modern society that is the problem. The border setup was created in the early 90s. Its only prohibitive for very marginal international services from London. It works well for services from London to Northern France, Belgium and Netherlands. The reason the Netherlands wasn't served for 20 odd years was due to the signalling kit that could and couldn't be squeezed into the cab. If Cologne and Frankfurt were in each other's locations there would be a Eurostar service already. The problem with services from London to Germany is that the cities within 4 hour travel time are to small to support a service and the large cities are too far away to capture the majority of the market from airlines.

There should be a mechanism for the government's to under write or or temporarily subsidise new cross channel services. London - Geneva and London - Frankfurt are probably the most viable options. They are too high risk for private sector and would probably take years to break even.

Its politically messy though. The Tories selling UK stake in Eurostar was sacrilege to those who see the pan European identity as a higher form of civilisation but it was a great financial decision. The UK government sold the shares at close to the top of the market and then saved a fortune on not needing to bail out Eurostar during the pandemic, despite increasingly hysterical statements. The government offered to buy shares or lend money with some of the fleet being used as collateral (as per airline loans) but eventually the governments that own shares paid up rather than accept commercial terms from the UK treasury. Some sort of international franchise might be a better model than a private largely state owned company.

 

[Trainbike46]

There should be a mechanism for the government's to under write or or temporarily subsidise new cross channel services. London - Geneva and London - Frankfurt are probably the most viable options. They are too high risk for private sector and would probably take years to break even.

Getlink offers a commercial subsidy for new services under their ETICA-PAX scheme, which the Amsterdam service made use of at the start. A Geneva or Frankfurt service would likely use this too, regardless of operator.

 

[Sorcerer]

Eurostar trains don’t even (necessarily) stop if a passcom is pulled at high speed.

I believe that in France after the Gare de Lyon rail crash that only drivers would be able to stop trains even if the passcom is pulled, so no doubt the old Eurostar fleet would've certainly been built in this way as well if that rings true.

 

[stuu]

I don't think its modern society that is the problem. The border setup was created in the early 90s. Its only prohibitive for very marginal international services from London. It works well for services from London to Northern France, Belgium and Netherlands. The reason the Netherlands wasn't served for 20 odd years was due to the signalling kit that could and couldn't be squeezed into the cab. If Cologne and Frankfurt were in each other's locations there would be a Eurostar service already. The problem with services from London to Germany is that the cities within 4 hour travel time are to small to support a service and the large cities are too far away to capture the majority of the market from airlines.

Cologne is a much bigger city than Frankfurt, nearly twice the size. And I would assume it has many more leisure visitors, although fewer business visitors.

 

[HSTEd]

I believe Eurostar did have an incident where someone stopped the train on HS1 and ran for it, or am I misremembering that?

 

[NCT]

I don't think its modern society that is the problem. The border setup was created in the early 90s. Its only prohibitive for very marginal international services from London. It works well for services from London to Northern France, Belgium and Netherlands. The reason the Netherlands wasn't served for 20 odd years was due to the signalling kit that could and couldn't be squeezed into the cab. If Cologne and Frankfurt were in each other's locations there would be a Eurostar service already. The problem with services from London to Germany is that the cities within 4 hour travel time are to small to support a service and the large cities are too far away to capture the majority of the market from airlines.

There should be a mechanism for the government's to under write or or temporarily subsidise new cross channel services. London - Geneva and London - Frankfurt are probably the most viable options. They are too high risk for private sector and would probably take years to break even.

Its politically messy though. The Tories selling UK stake in Eurostar was sacrilege to those who see the pan European identity as a higher form of civilisation but it was a great financial decision. The UK government sold the shares at close to the top of the market and then saved a fortune on not needing to bail out Eurostar during the pandemic, despite increasingly hysterical statements. The government offered to buy shares or lend money with some of the fleet being used as collateral (as per airline loans) but eventually the governments that own shares paid up rather than accept commercial terms from the UK treasury. Some sort of international franchise might be a better model than a private largely state owned company.

Fundamentally a railway operating like a railway should not have to rely on trains serving point-to-point flows. The whole point of a train is that even away from the London - Paris markets a train can serve a series of overlapping flows so a train like Prague - Budapest can wash its face. It's purely our xenophobic paranoia that's preventing this from happening.

A London - Frankfurt service would be commercially viable if it could operate unrestricted as a train even if only 20% of the cross-sectional load travels end-to-end.

 

[Chester1]

Fundamentally a railway operating like a railway should not have to rely on trains serving point-to-point flows. The whole point of a train is that even away from the London - Paris markets a train can serve a series of overlapping flows so a train like Prague - Budapest can wash its face. It's purely our xenophobic paranoia that's preventing this from happening.

A London - Frankfurt service would be commercially viable if it could operate unrestricted as a train even if only 20% of the cross-sectional load travels end-to-end.

Can you name a non European island nation that has no border controls? Even the two European island nations in Schengen were pushed into it. Malta had to join Schengen as a condition of EU membership and Iceland had a choice of joining or losing Nordic passport free travel. The economic cost of border controls is absolutely tiny for an air or sea border compared with a land border. The benefit is a reasonable degree of control and monitoring over who enters and leaves the country and that includes British Citizens (e.g. monitoring travel of suspected criminals), its not just about migrants. Its a fundamentally different situation for mainland countries because they would need to build a ring of steel to have half the security benefit of the sea and the economic benefits of open land borders are much greater. Schengen is a no brainer for most of Europe but that doesn't mean we should copy. The lack of some direct train services isn't a big deal and as yesterday's announcement shows government's can (and are) work to reduce the limitations imposed by passport controls.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Jul 2025 ==

Cologne is a much bigger city than Frankfurt, nearly twice the size. And I would assume it has many more leisure visitors, although fewer business visitors.

Isn't that a bit like saying Birmingham is twice the size of Manchester by using local government boundaries? Frankfurt's metropolitan area is significantly bigger than Cologne's.

 

[Krokodil]

Frankfurt's metropolitan area is significantly bigger than Cologne's.

By any measure Cologne's population is significantly bigger than Frankfurt's

 

[stuu]

Isn't that a bit like saying Birmingham is twice the size of Manchester by using local government boundaries? Frankfurt's metropolitan area is significantly bigger than Cologne's.

Definitely not. An area the size of Frankfurt's metropolitan area around Cologne includes most of the Rhein-Ruhr conurbation, which is much, much bigger

 

[NCT]

Can you name a non European island nation that has no border controls? Even the two European island nations in Schengen were pushed into it. Malta had to join Schengen as a condition of EU membership and Iceland had a choice of joining or losing Nordic passport free travel. The economic cost of border controls is absolutely tiny for an air or sea border compared with a land border. The benefit is a reasonable degree of control and monitoring over who enters and leaves the country and that includes British Citizens (e.g. monitoring travel of suspected criminals), its not just about migrants. Its a fundamentally different situation for mainland countries because they would need to build a ring of steel to have half the security benefit of the sea and the economic benefits of open land borders are much greater. Schengen is a no brainer for most of Europe but that doesn't mean we should copy. The lack of some direct train services isn't a big deal and as yesterday's announcement shows government's can (and are) work to reduce the limitations imposed by passport controls.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Jul 2025 ==



Isn't that a bit like saying Birmingham is twice the size of Manchester by using local government boundaries? Frankfurt's metropolitan area is significantly bigger than Cologne's.

Why does Britain *need* to be more isolated than France?

 

[Chester1]

Definitely not. An area the size of Frankfurt's metropolitan area around Cologne includes most of the Rhein-Ruhr conurbation, which is much, much bigger

Having looked at it your right, the metropolitan land area to get Frankfurt to 5.6 million is vast and the comparison would be the whole Rhein Ruhr of 13 million. The later would still struggle to fill 900 seats to London. Frankfurt has always been the floated destination because of its business traffic but its probably too far to be a private sector service. Another issue with Cologne is space to terminate and fit in border controls. The alternative terminus to Frankfurt would probably need to be Dortmund. Paris, Brussels, Rotterdam and Amsterdam are profitable because they have high demand from both tourists and business travel. Its why Geneva is often considered the most likely new service.

Why does Britain *need* to be more isolated than France?

Because nearly all the isolation already exists and always will do because there is a sea between us and Schengen. There is one physical transport link between the UK and Schengen. There are thousands between Schengen countries, ranging from single track roads to motorways. The additional isolation from border controls is very marginal for an island but brings security and policing benefits. Its only a significant limitation to channel tunnel trains and they are a small fraction of UK - Schengen journeys. I would support us being part of Schengen for visitor visas, its data base and EES/ETIAS but only if we retained border controls. That would stream line them while still having a filter of who comes in and out. An associate membership would work well for UK and Ireland, would probably be better for Iceland and Malta than the status quo and allow Cyprus to be closer to Schengen membership despite part of the country being occupied by Turkey.